Confidence in the HR function could crumble if HR leaders cannot move beyond task-level AI implementation, according to July 22 survey results.
HR professionals said they’re using AI for content creation (86%) brainstorming (83%) and information synthesis (81%). But they need to be moving toward agentic workflows to retain organizational trust, according to Culture Amp, which conducted the survey.
Yet as HR claims more ownership of AI strategy, belief that the technology can “significantly improve how work gets done” has decreased, according to the 264 HR professionals surveyed across various continents. Fewer than 4 in 10 HR operations have moved into any sort of AI automation, and only 34% said they are using agentic workflows, meaning most organizations are using AI “as a smart assistant rather than as an autonomous agent operating within bounded authority,” Culture Amp said.
“With headlines about AI-related layoffs creating organizational anxiety, practitioners are hesitant to truly experiment with autonomous AI systems,” the company said in a press release. “However, the data shows clearly that those who have pushed past that fear are seeing transformation at rates two to three times higher than their peers.”
Notably, 54% of C-suite leaders are already using AI as an agent, compared to 37% of C-suite HR leaders and 16% of individual contributors, according to the survey results, which may indicate enthusiasm among HR leaders but a reluctance to enforce such use across the function.
Other studies have shown that when workers use AI as an agent to be directed and refined, performance tends to increase. The most successful users of AI, per a study from KPMG and the University of Texas at Austin, treated AI as a collaborator that needed oversight, rather than as a tool to which tasks could be delegated.
But in the AI age, HR leaders also have an obligation to focus on human authenticity, experts said during SHRM’s annual conference in June. Doing so may also mean that HR needs to double down on explaining the ROI of people over certain uses of AI technology, SHRM President and CEO Johnny Taylor said during his keynote address. Otherwise, HR is at risk of “extinction,” he said.