There is a lot of nervousness about what AI will mean for HR, and it is not difficult to see why. Many activities that have traditionally occupied our time such as producing policies, answering routine questions, creating job descriptions, preparing reports and managing processes, can already be completed faster by AI.
But I don’t think this makes HR less relevant. I think it gives us the opportunity to become much more relevant.
For years, HR professionals have complained that they spend too much time on administration, transactions and firefighting, and not enough time doing strategic, interesting and valuable work. Well, here is our chance.
The future HR professional will be valued for their ability to understand context, exercise judgement, challenge assumptions, design around real human needs and help people make change happen. So, how do we prepare for this future?
First, we will need to build our consultancy skills.
Currently, and too often, HR is presented with a solution and we immediately start delivering it. A leader says, “We need a restructure,” so we start moving boxes. They ask for a leadership programme, so we find a supplier. They say there is a performance problem, so we redesign performance management.
The future HR professional will resist the urge to leap into action. They will ask leaders questions to ascertain the underlying issue and the right diagnosis; “What are you seeing? Why is this a problem now? What might be causing it? What have you already tried? What would be different if we solved it?”
Great consulting requires commercial understanding; knowing how the organisation creates value, what matters to its customers, where it is trying to grow and how people contribute to the outcomes it needs.
Instead of saying, “We need a new talent programme,” we might explain that growth is being restricted because the organisation lacks particular capabilities. Instead of reporting that engagement has fallen by four points, we need to explain where it has fallen, why it matters and what it could mean for customer experience, productivity or retention.
AI will help us analyse more information, much faster, but data alone does not create influence. Our value will come from turning data into insight. Making it intelligible, relevant and action-inducing for leaders.
Judgement will be particularly valuable. AI can identify patterns, but people decisions rarely involve perfect information or one correct answer. Our role will be to combine data, business context and our understanding of human behaviour, and then make a thoughtful judgement about what to do.
The second core skill of the future HR professional will be design.
The future HR professional will use human-centred design to understand what different people genuinely need. We will create employee personas, explore the moments that matter, involve users early and test ideas before launching them across the organisation.
We will think about HR products rather than simply HR processes. Does this solve a real problem? Is it easy to use? Does it fit into the flow of somebody’s work? Would anyone choose to use it if they were not forced to?
We will also need to contribute more to work and organisation design. AI will change roles, redistribute work and alter the balance between what people do and what technology does. HR should help decide how work is redesigned, rather than simply dealing with the people consequences afterwards.
Where can AI remove repetitive work? Which activities still require human connection, creativity or judgement? What new capabilities will people need? How should roles, teams and decisions change?
AI will enable greater customisation too. Instead of giving every employee the same onboarding, learning or career support, we can provide help that reflects their role, experience and ambitions. But AI cannot decide what a good human experience should feel like. That remains our responsibility.
Finally, we will need to become much better at making change happen. A good idea is not enough. A beautifully designed HR product that nobody understands, trusts or uses has no value.
We need to understand the leaders we are trying to influence. What matters to them? What evidence will they find persuasive? Who do they listen to? What might make the change feel safer or easier to try?
AI can help us develop arguments, anticipate objections and tailor communications. But it cannot build a relationship with a sceptical leader, fully read the room, sense what has not been said or know when to push and when to pause.
But perhaps the most important change will be how we think about HR itself.
We need to stop seeing our value as owning policies, controlling processes or stepping in whenever managers struggle. Our relevance will increasingly come from the quality of our thinking: our curiosity, our willingness to challenge conventional wisdom and our ability to help the organisation respond thoughtfully to change.
We need to move from a Parent-Child relationship with leaders and employees, to one that is Adult-to-Adult. We can provide expertise, challenge and support, but managers must remain responsible for managing their people. Our job is to build their confidence, capability and judgement, not take over whenever things become difficult.
This is why I feel optimistic about the future of HR.
Yes, AI will take away some of our traditional work, but much of it is the work we have been trying to escape for years. This gives us the opportunity to move from processing to consulting, from data to insight, from compliance to judgement, from standardised processes to human-centred products, and from rescuing managers to building their capability.
The future HR professional will use AI confidently and combine it with deeply human skills: curiosity, commercial understanding, empathy, courage, creativity, influence and judgement. They will not need to be the person with all the answers. They will be the person who helps the organisation ask better questions, make better choices and create the conditions in which people can do their best work.
That is not a diminished role for HR. It is a much more exciting and valuable one.
We help HR teams build the confidence and skills to work differently in an AI-enabled world, whether that means developing their consulting skills, designing more human-centred solutions or becoming better at influencing change.
Take a look at how we can help your team through in-house workshops, programmes and the Disruptive HR Club.
The third book in Lucy Adams’ series for forward-thinking HR professionals explores why HR struggles to influence leaders — and how to build the confidence, credibility and authority to create real change.
