Report suggests greater use of AI could help ease burden
It seems like something that could be said every year: HR has a lot on its plate.
Before the pandemic, during the pandemic, and now after — both old and new challenges continue to crop up, burdening HR.
That’s evident in a new report from Sage which finds:
- 95% of HR leaders have taken on more responsibilities in their role in the last year
- 91% of workloads and working hours have increased in HR teams over the last year
- 96% of HR leaders said they don’t see changes in HR slowing down any time soon.
“In HR, we found the last year overall more challenging than even the previous year. And, of course, as a result, everyone's feeling slightly more stressed and burnt out,” says Amy Cosgrove, VP of people, North America and product, at Sage.
“Obviously, [with] the workforce changes brought on by the pandemic, and changes that are expected over the next five years, HR is having to manage responsibilities related to hybrid workforces, workforce planning in times of uncertainty and maintaining the ever-changing workforce needs that are traditionally managed by HR.”
Overall, 77% of HR leaders wish they had more support and resources to excel in their role, while 66% said people aren’t clear about the value HR brings to the organization and 59% say the value of HR work is not well-recognized by leadership.
A further 61% say they are understaffed, finds the report, based on a survey of over 1,000 HR leaders in Canada, the U.S., U.K., Germany, South Africa, Spain and France.
“They're definitely overwhelmed by the ways of working, and I would say that's really, fundamentally changed over the past three years,” says Daniela Keon, partner, talent transformation leader, at IBM Canada.
Workload, ‘perceived value’ among top 5 challenges for HR
As for the top five challenges for HR, these are:
- amount of work (80%)
- low morale and burnout of employees (79%)
- limited budget (79%)
- perceived value of HR’s worth (78%)
- pressure to grow as a business (78%)
A big part of the problem could be HR’s continuing focus on processes and paperwork – instead of people strategies, finds Sage. More than three-quarters (78%) of HR leaders say they wish their work was less focused on administration and process, and more on strategy and people-centric activities.
The average time HR leaders spend each week on this type of work adds up to 19 hours, finds the survey.
As a result, HR professionals are feeling burnt out, with 87% saying they’re stressed about their HR responsibilities.
Spending an extra two days a month on processes and paperwork — compared to before the pandemic — is making people feel overwhelmed, says Cosgrove.
“It is definitely a strain throughout the field,” she says. “HR teams are still very reluctantly prioritizing those processes and paperwork over the strategic people priorities, and that translates beyond HR’s morale and feeling of burnout — it translates into a sentiment from the organization that HR’s value is based on its ability to complete these administrative tasks rather than enhancing the overall organizational strategy and designing more people-centric initiatives.”
Automation, AI can ‘empower’ HR
But recent advancements in both automation and AI can help rebalance this, says Cosgrove, citing the survey’s finding that 79% of the respondents felt more HR processes in their organizations could be automated to improve these efficiencies.
“It's time to change this narrative to help us deliver the real value of our profession and feel more empowered as HR leaders to guide the business forward,” she says. “We have lots of opportunity to effect change in that morale, burnout, if we keep working and driving toward those automations and pivoting the work to be more strategic and engaging.”
There needs to be almost a “rebranding” of HR, says Keon.
“It's not your personnel department anymore, right? It's accountable for developing a culture of driving enhanced, transformational value and minimizing costs, increasing engagement. And with those hard facts, you can see the value that HR is contributing to the business and see with AI, by bringing in the right talent at the right time, by developing the employees, giving them the right learning experiences — you need to directly link that to the business imperative, when you see that it's actually having an impact on the business results. The value of HR [is then] automatic.”
HR priorities include employee performance
So, according to the Sage report, what are the top five areas where HR is spending significantly more time?
- attracting talent (58%)
- managing employee performance (57%)
- retaining talent (57%)
- strategic planning (57%)
- internal communications (56%)
Most companies, irrespective of their size, are trying to do more with less, says Cosgrove.
“Making sure that companies are driving high performance is directly going to impact the company's overall success, from a performance perspective and, frankly, the bottom line. But, in addition, a high-performance organization does help build stronger employee engagement, strengthens talent development, and it improves overall organizational effectiveness.”
Source: Sage
When it comes to employee expectations, things have evolved, says Keon.
“They're really expecting a different type of experience from their employer, which lies on the shoulders of HR. And there are labour shortages, the talent market dynamic is evolving, and that's resulting in a widening skills gap. So if we put all of those together, that's a huge driver for HR, for the work that they need to do.”
Employees want a consumer-grade experience, she says, and that means developing different types of culture in an organization — with HR as custodian.
“People are feeling burned out with trying to develop the new skills, develop those new behaviours, work with AI, bring out that partnership between AI and humans, and people are wondering, ‘Can I do this?’ So it's really important to develop that culture, build that trust, have organizational change management.”
Using AI to boost recruitment, talent development
This is where generative AI can really help in time-consuming areas such as recruitment, says Keon. That can mean using an algorithm to identify potential candidates based on their skills and matching them to positions, along with providing recommendations and predicting an applicant's future performance.
And career coaching can be embedded into that.
“It's that whole experience, leveraging AI, which simplifies the amount of work, the repetitive, manual labour that recruitment has to do. And they can focus on more of that value work,” she says.
The tech is also valuable when it comes to learning and talent development, allowing managers to see what their employees are learning, to look at career paths for their employees, and monitor the types of trainings that they are doing, such as digital badging, says Keon.
“It enables me to see where people are needing some extra support, to see where people have been successful, and to be able to recommend training, as well, for employees.”
Generative AI has captured the world's imagination, she says.
“And as companies seek ways to drive better results with this powerful technology, we have to prepare the workforce, so that means different ways of different skills, different behaviours,” says Keon, citing a 2023 finding by IBM that Canadian executives estimate 42% of the workforce will need to reskill as a result of implementing AI and automation over the next three years.
“So that puts a lot of pressure on HR.”
‘Role of HR will change considerably due to AI’
The move towards greater use of AI in human resources is evident in the Sage survey results:
- 80% say the role of HR will change considerably due to AI
- 79% expect organizational changes in response to AI adoption in HR tasks over the next five years
- 78% say that implementing AI in HR tasks will save them a considerable amount of time in their role.
Respondents also listed the top five areas where they would like to see save time on: data processing (39%); digital transformation (32%); attracting talent (31%); using data to drive decision-making (31%); and managing employee benefits and pay (29%).
Many HR leaders are already familiar with AI in broad terms, but they don't necessarily know what specific tools and functionalities are going to look like in practice, says Cosgrove.
“A lot of HR departments have just shied away from large-scale automation. And we really do have to embrace generative AI and look at other ways of automation to help make sure that HR professionals are doing work that automation can't or that AI can't. I think that's still not happening at the degree where we can really start to see the impact.”
Source: Sage
Employers will have to recognize that investing in this technology and automation will reduce that administrative burden and free up the capacity to deliver more productive work, she says.
“HR leaders expect to be doing more strategic planning and using data to drive more strategic decision-making. And that's what our C-suites are expecting from us, a different profile of HR leaders that are more business savvy, more rooted in data and [able] to deliver those data-based decisions and recommendations overall.”
And while many people are probably comfortable with automating processes, it’s with AI that we can attach exponential value, says Cosgrove.
“We talk about making an actual difference in people's lives beyond those everyday tasks — AI can provide us with the time to focus on really delivering employee experiences that drives attraction and retention and engagement.”
