*Generative AI: An exciting opportunity for HR*
By Josh Bersin, CEO and Global Industry Analyst, and Kathi Enderes, SVP and Global Industry Analyst, The Josh Bersin Company
Is generative AI something for HR leaders to worry about? Global Industry Analysts Josh Bersin and Kathi Enderes argue why this powerful technology is actually an opportunity CHROs should grab with both hands.
ChatGPT, which was introduced to the public in late 2022, has over 100 million users and is the fastest-growing consumer application in history. Businesses across all industries are now leveraging this technology in their operations and every vendor is rethinking their offering around it.
As a CHRO or HR leader, you may be feeling a mix of confusion, worry and excitement about generative AI. What is it all about? How can you use it for your business? How will it impact HR processes, talent decisions and learning content? And what should you do about the latest legislation around ethical AI?
What is generative AI?
In short, generative AI is a type of AI that can create new content, such as text, images and code. It does this by learning from a large dataset of existing content. For example, a generative AI model that has been trained on a dataset of resumes could be used to generate new resumes that are tailored to specific job openings. We explain more in our new whitepaper ‘Understanding AI in HR’.
AI in HR: Five big topics
We've been studying this topic for many months, talking with dozens of HR tech companies and HR executives. Now we're running a five-week sprint of ‘Big Reset’ discussions with over 300 organisations to explore AI in detail. We have identified five big strategic areas for HR leaders to consider for the use of generative AI in HR:
Conversational HR technology user experience: How does generative AI change the user experience of HR technology? How does this impact technology decisions and support systems? For example, employees can ask questions about their pay, benefits, performance or any other questions in natural language and get the right answers quickly and easily – reducing the need for elaborate websites, intranets or extensive call centres, resulting in cost reductions and efficiencies.
Augmented HR and management activities: How can generative AI support our managers and HR professionals for better, faster and cheaper work activities? For example, generative AI can write job descriptions, create learning content, support performance feedback, identify bias in pay decisions, enhance leadership development and provide personalised onboarding experiences, resulting in effectiveness and time savings.
Improved talent outcomes: How can we leverage generative AI to solve talent problems through skills and talent intelligence? For example, generative AI can identify needed skills for candidates, determine adjacent skills, match candidates with jobs, projects or learning opportunities based on skills and uncover hidden talent. This can improve the employee experience and create more diverse and inclusive cultures while also solving talent problems in a tight labour market.
Enterprise AI governance: How should we govern employee use of generative AI for their work? Concerns about data privacy and ethics loom large, with publicly available large language models seen as not particularly trustworthy. For example, companies can restrict the use of these technologies altogether, provide a private version, establish scenarios and use cases around the use of public and private versions, or leave the call about usage to each employee’s discretion. This governance framework is critical for compliance, legal protection – and to create trust.
Organisational transformation: How can we create a business strategy, operating model, job and work designs and business processes that leverage AI for business success, while also being more inclusive and systemic? For example, customer service reps can incorporate generative AI into their workflows, automatically proposing mitigation solutions for customer issues, identifying knowledge base topics, reviewing previous issues and empowering mitigation actions for service challenges – thereby creating a much better customer experience. However, while the technology exists, it can’t be leveraged to its fullest potential if business models, skills and work processes remain the same.
The new strategic HR leader is data-savvy, technology-oriented, collaborative, sets a vision and has a laser focus on the business strategy – while also creating irresistible employee experiences.
The need for systemic HR
None of these topics can be addressed in a silo. The entire C-suite has a role to play in setting the company up for future success. To capture this massive opportunity to lead (not just support) these broad strategic topics, HR needs to step up their skills and capabilities. The new strategic HR leader is data-savvy, technology-oriented, collaborative, sets a vision and has a laser focus on the business strategy – while also creating irresistible employee experiences.
This new breed of HR leader is a full stack HR professional with broad and deep skills and experiences, often having rotated in and out of HR, to foster the kind of business and people acumen required in this new world. And no functional HR domain can solve these problems alone, it requires collaboration between all areas.
Falling in love with the problem, agile iteration
Above all, success with AI is dependent on understanding what problem you are trying to solve. Are you trying to improve the employee experience? Provide people with better career paths? Shorten time to hire? Increase the quality of your learning programmes? Fill an urgent talent gap? Once you are clear on the problem, these new AI-based technologies can’t be implemented like an ERP system. Because they are so new, they need SWAT teams who pilot solutions, measure success, improve, iterate and continuously revise.
Generative AI is a powerful new technology that has the potential to revolutionise HR. Over the next months, AI will likely be used in a wide range of HR applications, from chatbots to learning and talent management. HR leaders who want to stay ahead of the curve will need to start planning for how they can use this technology to improve their HR operations, create a better employee experience, increase diversity – and support the transformation of their business.
Employees can ask questions about their pay, benefits, performance or any other questions in natural language and get the right answers quickly and easily, reducing the need for elaborate websites, intranets or extensive call centres.
