The role of HR has gone through a sea of change over the years from being a personnel management system that was more administrative in its nature to a human resource management where employees are seen as resources or critical assets in an organization. The role of technology has also steadily increased with the course of time. More and more HR professionals are resorting to technology to manage their workforce providing more accessibility, time and resources to streamline HR activities with organization goals.
The most efficient and progressive HR organizations today are learning how to use employee data to offer better performance and career management and help individual lines of business meet specific goals and objectives. HR intelligence allows HR organizations to understand not only how to run their business operations effectively and efficiently, but how to apply the information across the entire corporation to reduce costs and increase ROI.
SAAS becomes popular and more widely used: Software-as-a-service is becoming widely accepted for human resources and is expected to outpace purchases of on-premise HR software within several years. Analysts cite faster innovations and updates, and relief from onsite management and maintenance, as the primary drivers.
Cloud-based and mobile apps gain ground: Cloud-based software and mobile apps are starting to be available for almost every aspect of HR, including finding job candidates, keeping tabs on field-service crews, running payroll and managing the entire department.
Influence of social media increases: From sourcing an employee to conducting background checks and getting in touch with the employees, social media is here to stay. As more and more companies are delving into social networking sites, creation of a solid social media policy is fast becoming a norm for a company.
HR analytics have become a mainstay: As we enter a new economic reality and, in turn, a new reality in the labor market, the ways in which people-related data are utilized will be critical to mitigating risk, creating business capability and driving outcomes such as customer satisfaction and sales. Today’s HR analytics tools not only enable managers to gain insights on current workforce performance, costs and services, but to also model “what if” scenarios to anticipate changes in business.
2011 was the year employees and human resources departments went mobile, recruiters embraced social networks, managers coped with increasingly virtual workforces and a hot market for HR tech mergers and acquisitions. In the New Year, HR executives will continue grappling with the technological demands of a multigenerational workforce, more of whom work outside the confines of the typical corporate office. The pace of change is only expected to accelerate in the coming years and may see fresh spending in HR technology as organizations evaluate existing technology and application with what is being offered in the market now.
