Human Resources and Digital Transformation: What Are the Challenges?

Currently, supporting the digital transformation of organizations by the human resources (HR) function is problematic. The latter indeed responds to the discourse on the current digital "revolution" without questioning itself deeply on the very object of this revolution, nor on the historical process which led to its emergence. For the HR function to be able to play an effective role in a world of work colonized by digital technology, it must face three challenges: strengthening its fundamentals, acquiring digital skills, and, as a corollary, training.

Strengthen HR Fundamentals

A large number of organizations are mobilizing their human resources department (HRD) to propose a support strategy for the transformation generated by digital technology. But its role does not end there: the HRD is also involved in issues of anticipation and prospective, associated both with emerging professions ( psydesigner , user interface designer, ethicist ), with new professions already in place ( digital assistant, chatbot UX designer), and to the professions of tomorrow with still unknown contours. These changes, which do not only concern designers associated with digital technology, have an impact on the ways of working and the operating rules of the collective. Faced with a situation where the work tends to be carried out differently, the HRD must ensure its fundamentals.

Brush the contours of a profession, build a flexible and scalable skills framework, produce bridges, career paths, implement training, create evaluation processes ... The human resources manager (HRM) must fully master all these fundamentals because traditional practices falter under the effect of digital transformation. As with any change process, it places people outside their comfort zone or their daily tolerance for flexibility. Under these conditions, HRM must be present alongside employees, anticipate problems, support management, and cooperate with employee representative bodies (IRP) to conduct the necessary negotiations.

These missions have long been carried out by the HRD, which also manages organizational changes resulting from external contingencies. The digital factor is part of the continuity of the technological factor, but nevertheless has a new complexity: it tends to become globalizing. It is now the prism through which organizations will operate in the future. This situation, therefore, makes competence the primary stake for HRD.

Facing new expectations on skills

Responding to the digital question presupposes, for individuals and managers, the development of new skills in order to adapt to expectations and achieve their individual and collective objectives. The acquisition of competence (which results from the association of knowledge: interpersonal skills, know-how, and making known) supposes contextualized action. It is individual or collective, and can be, or even must be, cumulative. The role of the HRD is to analyze, imagine and define the needs that emerge under the influence of digital technology. It is a question of forecasting them not only in the context of existing professions but also of anticipating those which will appear at the same time as the professions of tomorrow.

If the evolving professions require marginal adaptations on technical aspects, the transforming professions, or even disappearing, involve a deep work of analysis and choice for the HRD. The disappearance of a profession or the replacement of a way of doing things by technology (for example, remote management of services) requires working on workforce management, respecting the choice of individuals and the requirements of organizations. In the situation where the profession does not yet exist or remains in the conceptualization phase, the HRD must define it. It must determine the bundle of associated skills and fair remuneration. Lastly, and above all, it must find human resources with these skills.

Implement other training practices

Reflecting on training practices requires that HRD be trained in new HRM uses: e-recruitment, network HRM, HR information systems, dematerialized performance evaluation, mobile and remote training ... All these missions give pride of place robots, artificial intelligence, and big data analysis. It is essential that HR actors understand and master them. Indeed, chatbots, bots in general, candidate experience, social networks constitute exponential expanding galaxies, essential to use for HRD. It must be trained in their understanding, their technicality, their tricks, in order to attract the skills expected by the organization, via increasingly digital channels.

Be careful, however: it is not just for the HRD to train its teams in digital technologies. It must also prepare them for their consequences, for their influence on the behavior of employees and managers. It is important that the latter be supported and accompanied in their handling of digital technology. Using a new technology remains easy, but understanding its impact on people, behavior, and work is not easy. Analysis, observation, taking a step back, and supporting the teams will be the keywords to achieve this. The processing of big data is fundamental here for the HRD, which must become an expert in their processing. They will be used to analyze changes in the relationship to the work of individuals, to produce hypotheses,

Finally, these issues require a different approach to training, by reinterpreting secular methods. New technologies offer every day more possibilities to access raw knowledge (digital books, databases) or problematized (distance courses, MOOC). To take advantage of this, it is now up to training institutions to build their programs around mixed pedagogies.

Meetings with teachers and experts would then be so many opportunities to test, discuss, make mistakes, innovate, alone or with others, on the basis of knowledge already acquired personally, but guided. In partnership with training institutions, the HR function holds an ambitious responsibility: guaranteeing the performance of organizations, the fruit of the work of people helped by machines.

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