Gretchen Alarcon is the Group Vice President for Human Capital Management strategy at Oracle. At Oracle OpenWorld, Oracle published a study looking at the impact of five emerging technologies on Supply chain and Finance. Enterprise Times discussed whether the five would also have an impact on HR in the future. The five technologies were: AI, IoT, Blockchain, A/R & V/R and digital assistants.
First up was AI, Alarcon shared that Oracle did another study in the autumn that found roughly 50% of employees said that they were already using some form of AI at work. Alarcon noted that: “64% said that they would trust a robot more than their manager, which has some interesting implications for an HR standpoint!” AI can do a much better job on some things, although there is still a role for managers on such things as coaching, Alarcon concluded. She explains how AI will augment various areas of AI, notably recruitment, learning management and skills.
Alarcon also believes that AI is positive for the workforce, not as some media portray having a fear factor. Importantly, AI will not take over the decision making from humans.
We discussed blockchain and its use in HR. Alarcon is seeing use of blockchain in credential and benefits and PII. This is an emerging use case though and Alarcon is unsure whether it will reach main stream usage.
She discussed the use of digital assistants. How they are helping HR teams deal with many of the simple enquiries they are asked. She explains how the hand off is important. She also talks about the importance of its naming. Organisations need to think very careful about what they name their digital assistants. She notes: “It’s an opportunity not just to talk about ease of use but also to talk about what values and what culture they are trying to set up as well.”
To hear what else Alarcon has to say, listen to the podcast.
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