My friend, Steve Boese, has a healthy (I think) fascination with robots. Steve’s prolific writing on the topic has two of his posts showing up on page one of Google search results for robot. He is clearly the FOT robot expert, but I am going to try out the topic today.
I always assumed I was safe from being replaced by technology. I work in a high touch, highly personal job. Human interaction is at the core of what I do. I always pictured the guy in the auto plant pulling a lever getting replaced by a robot pulling a lever. Not an HR guy.
That was a narrow and micro level look. At the macro level, BusinessWeek recently looked at technology’s impact on high touch jobs. Check the whole article, but here’s a taste:
The U.S. produces almost one-quarter more goods and services today than it did in 1999, while using almost precisely the same number of workers. It’s as if $2.5 trillion worth of stuff—the equivalent of the entire U.S. economy circa 1958—materialized out of thin air.
So are robots getting all the good jobs? …technology inevitably destroys some jobs even as it ultimately creates new ones….(and) technology is not just revolutionizing the assembly line. Paralegals can’t match software in accurately searching thousands of documents for specific words or patterns. New software apps easily best journeyman sportswriters at penning routine game wrap-ups. “The era we’re in is one in which the scope of tasks that can be automated is increasing rapidly, and in areas where we used to think those were our best skills, things that require thinking,” says David Autor, a labor economist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
I am not a predictions guy, and I do not claim to be a prognosticator, but it’s easy to see the bottom line is that most occupations today, even HR, will need fewer people in the future. So what HR jobs are potentially so enhanced by technology that some of them will go on the chopping block? Here’s a starter list:
- Talent acquisition—as now, “looking for people” will be automated more and valued less. Goodbye people who source and screen, and stick around, people who can be relationship managers.
- Benefits—meaningful self-service for companies of all sizes is coming. Goodbye first level transaction processors, admins and coders. More safe will be folks who effectively manage and resolve negotiations and conflicts.
- Compensation—technology will make comp data easier to get, review, protect and share. Goodbye techs, formula fanatics and process purveyors. The most valuable people will solve talent acquisition and retention issues with creative compensation solutions.
As Steve wrote in one of his robot posts, it’s all about invention:
Specialization, even high-touch, highly complex, valuable specialization that requires spending years training, developing, and perfecting, still is no guarantee or security against a robot that can do it better, cheaper, and faster. Even if those skills are ones that society needs and highly values, that’s no protection in the long term.
The message? Invent something new, stay one step ahead of the robot masters. You’d better be prepared to keep inventing.
My man Steve knows his robots for a reason. In an automotive plant, doctor’s office, or the HR world, you better know how to invent solutions. Process specialization is not your friend.
I predict a strong market for robot-repair techs…
Great article! We HR folks need to spend more time thinking about this for our own careers’ sake. We RIF and Outsource and Restructure all day and then put our heads in the sand about it ever happening to us. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
First off, thanks R.J. for the shout-out. I think one area that any professional folks can try to stay ahead of our future robot masters is in staying ahead, i.e., making predictions and determining strategies going forward based on past data and current trends. Making meaning out of information, that is relevant to your firm’s specific competitive context, is (for now), something the robots have not mastered yet, Love the piece!
People have been routinely automated out of jobs since the first ‘saboteurs’ threw their wooden shoes (sabots) into weaving machines in Europe in the 17th century… But, strangely, there are more people employed making more stuff than ever before. The point is that if a person can do it, it will eventually be automated to make it cheaper and faster. That’s why we enjoy a better standard of living than those weavers. So the thing to ask is – what can I do that a machine can’t (today).
Machines are very weak at creativity (in the sense of new stuff from nothing, rather than repeating old creativity ideas.) So we need to be creative in adding human value to what we need to do. I have a feeling that this goes in waves. In the 80s and early 90s there was a tremendous sense of creativity as we bulit Internet v1.0. Then it got a bit dull. Now we’ve just finished building v2.0 and the last few years have been exciting. Maybe there’ll be a bit of a lull..?
Stimulating post. Thanks.
I suggest however the robots are getting more credit than is warranted by the article in BusinessWeek and a significant portion of the productivity increase since 1999 is due in part to lousy accounting and a slow recovery. The noses one might count in the contingent labor sector, for one thing, is missing from the calculation. for another, the recession has also caused lots of HR folks to look aside while exempt labor (that hasn’t been laid off) has been loaded with work beyond even what F.W. Taylor calculated was possible in his Scientific Management tome written in 1911. Maybe the jobs won’t disappear as much as simply burnout.
Still, the point that HR roles won’t look anything like they do now in the next 10 years is a given. Employment branding and sourcing roles were almost never mentioned in 1999. A Talent community discussion would have been about entertainment not pipelining.
it would be interesting to imagine the intended or unintended consequences that current and emerging technology might cause to change HR functions.
Traditionally, HR ratios per employee have come in around 1 HR professional for every 100 employees. What would 1/1000 or 1/10,000 mean for how the HR function would be staffed in a 100,000 k firm…or, what would you have to have in resources and technology to be the sole HR professional for a 1k-2k employee firm?
If your business had cyclical needs for staffing, or any other HR function would your use of contingent HR labor represent 10%, 50% or 90% of your ‘staff’?
Assuming you could teach someone the HR content on an as needed basis, what other skill set might you consider to get temporary support for workforce analysis; privacy and risk management; recruiting, development and succession? How many of the obstacles to outsourcing HR functions today will disappear with technology advances in communication? What if all performance were public? What if every managers’s skills and record of managing others was transparent to their employees AND the candidates considering working for them…what would you call the job that has to handle the unintended consequences of full transparency?
Could be an interesting discussion for one of the HR un-conferences.
How in the hell does Steve Boese get first page google results on Robots? Amazing.
Maybe Steve is the guy that brings Robots on the world in the way that eventually leads us into the Terminator trilogy for real. It would be cool to know him if that happened, but the downside of that scenario seems expansive.
KD