The future of HR is dynamic and has evolved over the years from Personnel to HRM to Strategic HR. We try to predict the future of HR, anticipate radical changes with the help of data. In the current scenario, companies are using data to identify, differentiate and innovate for a constant change in the HR world.
The era of big data has already started and is growing exponentially based on variety, volume, veracity and velocity. So the future of HR will revolve around two aspects a) Analytics and b) Outsourcing.
HR Analytics: Present and future of HR is to embrace data by using Descriptive (What has happened i.e insight into the past data), Predictive (What could happen i.e understanding the future) and Prescriptive approach (What should we do? i.e advise on possible outcomes). The Complexity of Analysis is based on data and HR function maturity. The advantage of big data is that, it has a variety of information and the challenge is how effectively to use it. If we use basic analytics with Data and HR functions on X-axis and Complexity on Y-axis; the data usage starts with Anecdotes, Dashboards, Benchmarking, Correlation, presently prediction and going towards optimisation and Prescription.
The analytics are descriptive analytics, being the foundation for predictive analytics, and predictive analytics being the foundation for prescriptive analytics. HR has the foundational capability in descriptive analytics, but present capabilities needs to be focused on predictive analytics and HR professionals should develop or enhance their abilities in prescriptive analytics.
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Companies have already initiated their pace of advanced analytics at business space and now HR function is required to assess capabilities in each area, by identifying and filling the gaps for future resource management using data. HR is required think critical and analyse data using PRISM Philosophy. Prism as an acronym focuses on Prepare, Respect, Implement, Share and Maintain :
PRISM Philosophy helps in building a solid foundation and robust advanced analytics capability that can be leveraged across the HR function. Hence HR professionals should be able to grasp analytics for growth.
Outsourcing: From analytics viewpoint, the outsourcing prediction may seem somewhat, well, predictable. We foresee employees will soon input their own data into the system i.e working hours, engaged activity, output, achievements etc. Hence the focus is on technology and smaller HR departments.
Future HR jobs would be outsourced to specialists or CoE than transactional task. Teamability® team said “Entry-level HR jobs that currently exist, will disappear as the transactional tasks will be outsourced.” Also, one of the most important prescriptive analysis is HR professionals will don hats of a business professional, who would not only focus on HR implication but also business objectives and strategies.
The challenge for HR is to educate themselves in analytics or become master in one HR function to take advantage. Many organisations have already started using HR analytics for workforce planning, using its capabilities in gender, other diversity metrics, and recruitment, by providing matching incentives.
Future of HR lies in analytics and outsourcing. Therefore, HR professionals should deep dive into the HR speciality by preparing self on data analysis and respect business strategy components, while implementing capability enhancement.
Author credit: Anubha Maurya, founder of Prism Trainings and Consultancy is a human process interventionist. She is training, facilitating and consulting local and multi-national companies across sectors on various aspects of people strategy and quality implementation.
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