AI: the HR revolution
| Pages | 52-55 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/SHR-12-2018-0104 |
| Date | 08 April 2019 |
| Published date | 08 April 2019 |
| Author | Fred Gulliford,Amy Parker Dixon |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Employee behaviour |
AI: the HR revolution
Fred Gulliford and Amy Parker Dixon
Abstract
Purpose –Artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics are already here, influencing almost every single
industry in one way or another. Organisational scientists at Qlearsite use AI and machine learning to
unleash the businesspotential languishing in workforce data –somethingpreviously unusable because
of its format. This paper aims to track the initial implementation of AI up to present day, based on
Qlearsite’scorporate experience.
Design/methodology/approach –Using actual experiences,Qlearsite were tasked with demonstrating
how businesses can better understand their workforce, identify performance hurdles and develop
strategiesto clear them, ultimately improving productivity.
Findings –While initial implementation strategies may have faced challenges by senior human
resources (HR) members across industries, the multiple benefits are evident and measurable against
corporatesuccess and productivity levelstoday.
Originality/value –Where HR leaders and senior decision-makers struggle to solve ongoing issues,
such as absenteeism,an acute problem for the financial services industry. This paperdemonstrates the
true value of AI, with complexissues solved by data analysis –a monumental and expensivetask for any
employeeto carry out.
Keywords Analytics, Productivity, Human capital
Paper type Viewpoint
Since the twentieth century, the development of automation, manufacturing
technology and digital communications has initiated a sustained period of rapid
socio-economic transformation. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are
now a fixture of our online interactions, our communications and our working lives. The
human resources (HR) sector is experiencingparallel shifts towards complete digitalisation,
with advancements in AI enhancingpeople analytics and improving methods of responding
to the complexities of recruiting and managing the modern workforce. It is time HR had a
serious look at these developments.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is, on the face of it, an intimidating and perplexing idea. We can
accept that a robot can have remarkable physical power (far beyond that of a human), but
can robots also have meaningful accessto the symbolic realms of human activity? Can they
work with language and interact with a knowledge-base in ways that emulate and even
extend human cognitive capabilities? This form of the question captivated AlanTuring in the
1950s and prompted the so-called “Turing Test”: could a machine converse with you in
such a way as to fool you into thinkingit was a human?
These philosophical preoccupations have perhaps coloured the popular understanding of
AI more than the reality. Progress in AI is not solely preoccupied with developing “computer
consciousness”. Instead, it is more commonly being developed as a sophisticated form of
design and engineering with tangible and functionally specific goals. Machine learning,
once a sub-domain of AI and now a field in its own right, proposes that computers can be
deployed in problem-solving contexts by making informed, general inferences from given
data sets. If this is integrated intoa feedback system, then strong, plausible inferences and
correlations can be measured againstperformance.
Fred Gulliford is Marketing
Manager at Qlearsite,
London, UK.
Amy Parker Dixon is
Content Writer at Qlearsite,
London, UK.
PAGE 52 jSTRATEGIC HR REVIEW jVOL. 18 NO. 2 2019, pp. 52-55, ©Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 1475-4398 DOI 10.1108/SHR-12-2018-0104
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