Somewhere between the innocent-yet-challenging pong game and the terminators that will rise up against us one day sits the useful and practical applications of AI, short for “Artificial Intelligence.” This technology has its place in the business world—especially in Human Resources.

What Do We Mean by AI?

Artificial Intelligence is a branch of science and technology that looks to create machines intelligent enough to perform tasks usually requiring a human’s capability and understanding. AI can stimulate creativity, increase problem-solving capabilities, alter our perceptions, and help us grasp complex data.

Although the idea of AI has fascinated and inspired science fiction writers for 150 years or more, the first practical application of AI was not realized until the 1950s when Alan Touring wrote his paper “Computing Machinery and Intelligence.” Today, AI can assist in medical diagnoses, drive automobiles, write essays, and it can help your HR team to flourish.

What are the Benefits of Using AI in HR?

The benefits of using AI are many. SHRM found that just 16 percent of employers with fewer than 100 workers use automation or AI compared to 42 percent of employers with 5,000 or more workers. Both these percentages should be much higher considering that with AI, you can:

• Save Time and Money (e.g., AI makes work go faster and revenue gaps are closed)
• Enhance Efficiency (e.g., productivity raises when mundane tasks are handed to AI)
• Enhance Accuracy (e.g., mistakes are minimized when AI oversees data or operations)
• Make Data-Driven Decisions (e.g., AI produces less bias in hiring and training practices)
• Use Predictive Analysis (e.g., AI finds trends in employee attrition and turnover)
• And more!

 

How Can AI Help in HR?

Clearly, AI is beneficial to those who harness its capabilities. By applying AI to a variety of tasks and scenarios for your business’s needs, your HR team can get out ahead. AI for HR examples include the following:

Recruitment/Talent Acquisition

The hiring process can be streamlined by using AI to screen candidates, parse resumes, and conduct initial assessments. For recruitment, AI programs can match candidate profiles to your available job descriptions, cutting down on searching time. Even chatbots are now advanced enough to automatically answer candidate questions and schedule interviews.

Onboarding

Onboarding processes can be complicated and chaotic. But AI can help simplify each step. Virtual programs help answer questions or provide relevant information when HR personnel are not available. Many AI training programs are also smart enough to adapt to different worker needs and learning styles when getting across pertinent information.

Engagement/Satisfaction

To make decisions on how to engage employees and keep them satisfied, HR workers need actionable data. This data can come from AI. Virtual tools gather and analyze employee feedback through surveys or other means. This information then helps HR departments realize where things need to change to keep employees engaged and happy.

Performance Management

We all want our employees to perform at their best, and HR can help this happen when they use AI programs. AI tools can analyze employee performance metrics, identify patterns, and provide objective feedback and insights. HR professionals will more easily spot top and bottom performers so they can motivate and help each person as they need.

Training

AI systems of all kinds can help in employee learning and development (L&D). Programs can be customized to adapt to a worker’s current knowledge and skill levels and provide only the most relevant information to their specific work. Tracking progress and providing feedback are also possible with AI for L&D.

Employee Assistance

Chatbots, virtual assistants, and other smart programs can provide in-the-moment support when an HR team member is not immediately available to answer questions. Even when the team is in the office, many basic queries and tasks such as providing policy information or enrolling in benefits can be done virtually through AI programs.

Compliance/Risk

From a simple program that flags out-of-date contracts to a complex mathematical model designed to identify the biggest potential safety hazards to your workers, using AI to mitigate risk and manage compliance is critical. Supplementing HR’s duties here can mean minimizing mistakes.

Where Is AI for HR Going Next?

Using AI for HR solutions is a smart move that companies will want to jump on top of. But don’t send out severance notices to your HR department quite yet. HR will ALWAYS need a human component. It’s literally in the name—human resources.

AI can make HR jobs quicker and more efficient, it can give insights and show a bigger picture a worker would have otherwise not seen, and it can respond when someone isn’t there in person to help. But AI is a tool, not an employee. It frees HR workers to use their imaginations and take their productivity to the next level.

We will always need HR professionals to intelligently interpret the data AI systems collect, to make judgment calls, and to truly care for workers (which, ultimately, a machine can’t do). There is a place for AI in HR—as an enhancement, not a replacement.

How Can I Start Incorporating AI into My HR Team?

Mark Marone writes, “Companies that have been successful in adopting AI in various areas of their organizations recognize that they have to prepare their people for it. Otherwise, the impact on corporate culture and employee engagement could counteract all the benefits AI promises to deliver.”

Dale Carnegie survey results back this up, showing that “employees are open to learning how to create these types of strong partnerships with AI, with 68% saying additional training would be important to avoid losing their job to AI.”

HR personnel need to understand topics such as how to implement AI into change management decisions or how AI will affect the future of employee engagement. A 2019 Dale Carnegie survey of 3500 workers showed that “employees are more than three times more likely to be extremely positive about AI when they trust their leaders, understand how AI works, and have received soft skills training in the past three years to help them feel relevant in their roles.”

There are many benefits of artificial intelligence in human resources—if you know how to harness them. Combine your HR team and AI today with courses from Dale Carnegie.

Read more in depth research in our latest White Paper:

Preparing People for Success with Generative AI

 

Sign up for our Webinar on Aug 8th:

Leading Change: AI and the Future of Organizational Culture: A Dale Carnegie Panel Talk