A profound shift is currently underway in the HR technology marketplace, as organisations increasingly shift from tools that automate traditional HR practices to technologies that reinvent how people work, according to Bersin by Deloitte.
Software that measures what motivates employees, provides insight into what learning is useful to a specific role, and helps workers monitor their wellness are just a few examples of recent innovations in HR software.
Other broader changes include a shift from cloud-based applications to mobile applications, an explosion in analytics and artificial intelligence, and the emergence of video, social systems, behavioural economics and wearable computing.
Such changes go hand-in-hand with a shift in business focus, according to Josh Bersin, principal of Bersin by Deloitte.
“Today, companies are less focused on automating and integrating their talent practices,” he said.
“They are more worried about employee engagement, teamwork, innovation and collaboration.
“They want HR technology solutions that are engaging, useful and productivity-oriented.
“Integrated talent management is still important, but the real focus is on reinventing how people work – on creating team-based tools for goal alignment and coaching; on putting in place systems to provide feedback and measure engagement; and on rethinking the way we measure performance, manage careers and enable individual learning.”
Bersin said organisations should stay aware of transformational changes that will shape the year ahead to help guide their investment decisions.
“Companies are less focused on automating and integrating their talent practices”
Bersin’s recent report, HR Technology Disruptions for 2017: Nine Trends Reinventing the HR Software Market, outlined nine of the most influential disruptive trends for HR.
1. Accelerating revolution of performance management
Leading organisations are changing the way they manage and measure performance with periodic check-ins; shared goals that are transparent to the entire team; and feedback from employee peers, managers, direct reports and even customers.
This demand is spurring the growth of vendors with systems to manage and automate this process.
2. Convergence of engagement evaluation with feedback and performance
Most performance management systems are now built around regular team quarterly, monthly or event weekly surveys and assessments to monitor engagement.
Events such as hackathons and product innovation sessions also are built around always-on feedback.
3. Explosion of growth in people analytics
The future of analytics will likely involve correlating data with sales, operations and financial data, so organisations should look for vendors who have experience in these areas.
They should also watch closely vendors focused on building artificial intelligence and process automation tools to make analytics easier.
4. Innovation in the learning market
Driven by the tremendous demand for skills building, corporate learning continues to evolve.
Disruptive trends within this area include the growth of intelligent learning systems that can recommend and push learning at the right time, and systems that embed learning content into business processes.
5. New landscape for talent acquisition
Several disruptive changes are driving innovation in this massive market.
These include new systems designed to handle everything from sourcing to candidate onboarding; systems that score job applicants based on social interactions on various professional websites; and application of artificial intelligence to the candidate management process.
6. Growth in contingent workforce management, gig work and part-time work markets
Contingent workforce management systems can include software for vendor management, and time tracking and scheduling systems.
Gig work networks that match workers to projects are morphing into recruiting and skills management sites. Companies that serve contractors looking for work are also growing.
7. Evolution of team management tools and their merger with HR tools
Tools to help people collaborate, set and share goals, and work together as teams are starting to support integrations and partnerships that embed these functions into tools employees already use to get things done.
8. Explosion of wellness and fitness apps – and their potential merger with employee engagement
Expect to see the accelerated growth of tools, systems and platform features to manage wellness, work-life balance, employee activity, and ultimately personal performance.
9. Development of digital HR, including self-service, artificial intelligence and robotic process automation
The tools of AI, robotic process automation and self-service transaction integration can enable a comprehensive redesign of the employee experience to dramatically reduce costs and improve the value of HR itself.
“With the industry poised at a shift in management philosophies and technologies, there is a great deal of opportunity for disruption”
“It goes without saying that no organisation of any size can operate without some type of HR function (whether it is called “people operations,” “people and culture,” or any other catchy name),” said Bersin.
“Organisations have to source, hire, onboard, pay, train, manage, reward, and lead people every day. Decisions about how to best implement these people-related processes are complex, uncertain, and never perfect.”
It follows that tools that can make these decisions easier, more data-driven, and more measurable are indispensable, according to Bersin, who said it was important to remember also that managing people effectively takes a tremendous amount of administration.
Staffing, payroll, training, benefits administration, retirement programs, time-tracking, and programs such as employee relocation and expense management are enormously important – and bureaucratic, Bersin noted.
“Tools that do these things well can pay for themselves many times over. All of these factors contribute to the huge market for HR technology, which impacts the lives of countless working people around the world,” he said.
“All of these factors contribute to the huge market for HR technology, which impacts the lives of countless working people around the world,” he said.
“Right now, with the industry poised at a shift in management philosophies and technologies, there is a great deal of opportunity for disruption.”
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