The future of work in the fourth industrial revolution: Sapience 2017
Great Lakes Institute of Management, Gurgaon recently hosted Sapience 2017 that witnessed HR leaders sharing insights on HR transformation when the business is observing the high level of disruption and uncertainty. The theme of the HR Conclave was “The future of work in the fourth industrial revolution.”
Poornima Gupta, Associate Professor in the field of Organizational Behavior and HRM shares, “Sapience was conceptualized in the year 2013, and this is the first time we are hosting HR Conclave as a separate event altogether. Sharing her thoughts on the theme, “Future of work-The 4th Industrial Revolution,” she said, “We are at the onset of the technological revolution which includes a fusion of technologies that are blurring the lines between the physical, digital and biological spheres. The unprecedented growth of technology with the arrival of automation, AI, etc. is already making news for impacting the ways of working and managing talent.” She also believes that however, the businesses today are driven by technology and automation may replace human in performing transactional work. However, the human touch is bound to stay.”
Himadri Das, Director at Great Lakes Institute of Management, Gurgaon, shared, " Given the ongoing disruption in a business environment, the role of HR is becoming more critical and challenging today than it ever was. " On the theme of the HR Conclave, he shared "The growth of services is witnessing a shift from blue collar to white collar. And in a lot of ways, it is far more challenging to maximize the productivity of high caliber intellectual white collar workforce across all the sectors and all geographies of the world. Thus, the theme of Sapience 2017 HR Conclave is very relevant in the current industry scenario.
Pramod Sadarjoshi, Senior Director – HCM & Transformation at Oracle was the keynote speaker at the event. While addressing the students, he shared “We are living in a world of web where the real challenge for us is to manage our time, priorities and devise mechanisms to balance multiple things. The leaders today have to be tech-savvy. For instance, the need of the hour is to be able to use Data analytics for predicting the future trends and thereby acting accordingly to retain and gain customers.”
The HR conclave discussed two very relevant topics as the businesses step into the fourth industrial revolution. Here are the key insights from the event:
HR Challenges in 24/7 Work Environment:
The discussion revolved around the challenges that HR managers face with the requirement for 24*7 working environment with the added premise of different time zones, geographies, and varied cultures. These challenges are - growing attrition rates, shifting time roster differences for employees (with a highlight on female-friendly work environments) along with importance given to the safety and security concerns.
Leveraging HR Analytics for Optimizing Organizational Performance:
Today vast amounts of data are available on various social media platforms, and with the advancement, in technologies, we can extract any given information about anyone. The HR professionals today can gain information about talent by leveraging analytics from analytics and create strategies to optimize organizational performance, recruitment and attrition, talent engagement and employment, learning and development.
The three key takeaways from the conclave were:
- The future leaders should be tech-savvy and nimble enough to take advantage of all of the latest technologies.
- Effective Communication and Employee Engagement play a key role in dealing with the challenges of 24*7 work environment.
- HR analytics crucial for having a customized workforce for the organizations.