How AI is Repositioning HR as a Key Organizational Strategist

Businessolver is a Business Reporter client.

HR is arguably one of the most data-centric divisions in any organisation, yet HR professionals are often without the necessary technology to be efficient and effective in their complex roles. According to recent reports, over 30 per cent of HR teams are without some kind of benefits technology, meaning they are operating without the modern tools to help them identify gaps, measure change, gather feedback and produce meaningful results for their organizations.

AI is shifting the game, however, and will increasingly put HR teams in the driver’s seat during a time when an organization’s success and financial performance is dependent on agility, insights, efficiency and, perhaps most critically, empathy. 

Empathy, while recognized as essential to company culture and trust, is a lesser-known element of AI. But for HR teams, we’re not only seeing efficiencies and pulling forward deep insights, we’re also witnessing AI-scale empathy. For instance, at Businessolver, our data shows that when personalized, empathetic AI is in play, employees are 19 per cent more likely to engage with the right-fit benefits – those best suited to their health and wealth circumstances.

Today, however, many HR teams are working without the right technology and resources in place. It’s resulting in an empathy crisis as they struggle to reconcile conflicting priorities between employees and the C-suite, pull insights from disparate data streams, and manage the business through what continues to be a challenging economic and talent landscape.

Businessolver’s own 2023 State of Workplace Empathy report showed that this lack of technology and C-suite mistrust is taking a steep toll on HR: Only 68 per cent of HR teams feel their organization is empathetic, down 23 points from 2022.

What we’re experiencing is nothing short of a workplace revolution: shifting generations, evolving employee benefits expectations and a renewed focus on burnout and mental health are all top of mind and top of headlines. Many organizations will need to rethink how they do business and reshape their priorities to balance both the employee experience and business results.  

HR sits squarely in the middle of all this, and HR teams are expected to produce effective and scalable change for their organizations. As AI continues to make its mark in business management, we’ll see HR evolve from “administrative executor” to “strategic partner”, most notably by helping to:

• Leverage people analytics to identify risks, opportunities, and forecasted organizational needs
• Drive efficiencies with data-driven decision-making for better business performance
• Demonstrate ROI across core employee experience aspects, including benefits and wellbeing
• Infuse empathy throughout the organization for improved employee engagement, customer relations and company culture

AI is increasingly emerging as a critical co-pilot to HR teams. And those teams who do not scale AI will rapidly be left behind. In fact, 76 per cent of HR leaders agree that not adopting AI solutions such as generative AI in the next 12 to 24 months will leave them at a competitive disadvantage.

However, HR is a valuable and critical part of the business regardless of whether AI is in play. But when HR teams have the right technology, tools and data available and easily accessible, their roles are supercharged with added efficiencies and insights – helping them not only demonstrate ROI across the organization for greater influence at the proverbial table, but scale empathy in ways we’ve yet to fathom.

It’s time for organizations to think bigger and think beyond AI’s efficiency and cost management use-cases. The true potential of AI in HR lies in its ability to positively impact employee wellness and organizational culture. And as HR adopts AI – including personalized, empathetic AI services – the profession will gain greater strategic influence within the C-suite.

Learn more about how empathetic AI and technology are shaping the future of HR in Businessolver’s annual State of Workplace Empathy report.

 Jon Shanahan, President and CEO at Businessolver

This article originally appeared in Business Reporter.

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