Human Resource practitioners can influence change in future: Pillai
The human resource practitioners have an opportunity to influence change in the Technological advancement era. These were the words of encouragement from national manager Professional Development Australian Human Resources Institute Angelina Pillai yesteday. She was speaking at the BSP Fiji Human Resources Institute National Convention at the Warwick Fiji. She said although the future is uncertain with things like technology, digitalisation and automation impacting the way the workforce is being managed the message is clear. “Human Resource Managers or Human Resource Practitioners have an opportunity to be able to influence that change,” she said.
“Human Resource needs to take the necessary steps to engage the people employed in the business with owning its mission and making a meaningful contribution to the competitiveness of the enterprise.” Ms Pillai said the task for HR today and in the future is to operate as a business partner to work that out and to contribute towards making it happen. Speaking on the theme: “Future of Work and the Human Capital”, she said this is not an easy task in a business environment that is increasingly global and litigious.
“This poses challenges for workforce designers, for talent strategists, for culture and change leaders, for risk minimisers and for remuneration planners.”
At the end of the day, Ms Pillai said regardless of how much technology takes over, it is the human element that is the important thing in the business.
“There is always a person behind the mechanism, algorithms of the machines,”she added
Challenges for HR
She said some challenges facedby HR include, firstly, where will demand for re-training, re-skilling and up-skilling come from. “And secondly, what are the likely timing structural changes, moving from invention to embedding.
“While these are big challenges, these are things that skilled HR practitioners should be able to do well, and will be of great value to their organisations if they do, “she said.
It need not be scary in technology era
According to Ms Pillai, human resource needs to contribute to workplace cultures that anticipate an unpredictable future “In terms of the future of work, if we as human beings are capable of learning, we may see a workforce in which ethical practice is not something that comes from a compulsion to be simply compliant within the law. “Also Governments and companies will see it in their interests to do things that are right because they are right.”