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In 2019, we saw a shift of focus in workforce management. Human resources technology took control of providing solutions to address last year’s issues of equality, diversity, security, and compliance in the workforce. Thanks to these innovations, processes in onboarding, document management, time tracking, and payroll have successfully adjusted to the demands of a new workforce breed. These advancements have allowed businesses to make informed decisions, eliminate time consuming processes, and improve their bottom line.

Augmented Analytics

Analytics can be trick, especially for small to medium sized businesses who aren’t equipped with a data science team. Thankfully, augmented analytics come in the absence of data science skills. What is augmented analytics? It’s an integral part of data science which automates the insight generation process. As we all know, automation and human resources is always a fun equation.

Not everyone has the time to read the numbers and interpret them so this is where augmented analytics comes in. It automatically pulls insight from the data and allows businesses to look at it in a user-friendly format. Software tools using augmented analytics can follow an employee’s complete life cycle from hiring to exiting. Having these people analytics will help agencies paint a bigger and better picture of employee management. It gives them an unbiased insight to make decisions with hiring, engagement, upskilling, and even retention.

Mobile Platforms

There’s a new generation of employees entering the workforce and they love, live, and breathe mobile apps. Generation Z is the future of the workforce and they might be the key to solving the current employment gap in the industrial workforce. The baby boomers are exiting towards retirement and the digital natives are poised to lead the workforce into the digital transformation. However, this new generation have completely different expectations with their workforce experience. For businesses to attract and retain Gen Z employees, they must center their experience where they spend time in the most – their mobile phones.

Staffing agencies have started using mobile-centric platforms with their workforce management system such as having a mobile application process, video interviewing, and project management apps. Not limited to these, mobile platforms also help with monitoring employee movement, document management, and employee engagement.

Blockchain

While blockchain is mostly associated with cryptocurrency and ICOs (initial coin offering). However in the recent years, many industries including human resources are seeing the benefits that come with this technology. To put it simply, the benefit of the blockchain is to allow participants of a network to exchange information with trust in a usually untrusted environment without the need for central authority.

There are many aspects of blockchain that staffing agencies can take advantage of such as keeping employment history, certifications, and violations that employees cannot fabricate. Best of all, the blockchain helps ensure staffing agencies store trustworthy timekeeping data and employment authorization documents.

Virtual Reality Training

Virtual reality has been around for decades. However, it is only now that innovations using this technology are being utilized specifically for workforce management. Corporate giants Walmart and Fedex are pioneers in using virtual reality for workforce trainings. VR allows companies to use immersive training in situations that are hard to replicate due to costs and safety.

Virtual reality can be used by agencies to place potential candidates in a real-life scenarios using a VR headset. This way, their reactions to certain situations are more realistic and can produce honest data. The use of virtual reality is also beneficial for new hire orientation, sexual harassment training, and hands-on training.

What to expect in 2020?

In recent years, businesses have begun to get to know the more diverse workforce. It started with getting insights on who they are and what they want. After that came the new innovations that solved these needs. As the generation of workers continue to change, so will their demands for new technology. HR technology innovations will continue to emerge and existing technologies will evolve. No matter how unfamiliar they may get, it’s always important to remember that technologies are created to be beneficial for businesses and employees.