In this episode of Career Compass, co-hosts Kevin Abbed and Aly Sharp speak with William Spencer III about the future of AI in the workplace and the ways that HR professionals can utilize AI to boost productivity in their work.
In this episode of Career Compass, co-hosts Kevin Abbed and Aly Sharp speak with William Spencer III about the future of AI in the workplace and the ways that HR professionals can utilize AI to boost productivity in their work.
Earn 0.5 PDC for listening to this episode; details provided during the show.
Follow/subscribe to Career Compass wherever you listen to podcasts; rate and review on Apple Podcasts. Hear more podcasts from SHRM.
SHRM23 is happening 6/11-6/14 in Las Vegas. Learn about the curated student experience.
shrm.org | Facebook | LinkedIn | Twitter | Instagram
Kevin Abbed: Welcome back to season six of Career Compass, a podcast from SHRM and the SHRM Foundation. Career Compass prepares the future leaders today for better workplaces tomorrow.
Aly Sharp: As the voice of all things work, SHRM supports students in emerging professionals with advice, information, and resources. For every step of your career.
Kevin Abbed: Designed for the student or emerging professional Career Compass delivers timely, relevant, and critical conversations about work to help you succeed in your career journey. Thank you for joining us for this episode. My name is Kevin Abbed, and I'll be your co-host.
Aly Sharp: And my name is Aly Sharp and I will also be your co-host. During this episode, we will be joined by HR business partner and emerging professional advisory council member William Spencer III, who will have a conversation about the positives and negatives of AI in the workplace. Also, just so you know, this episode is valid for professional development credit or PDCs for the SHRM-CP or SHRM-SCP, and we'll provide the code later in the episode. With that, let's get started.
Kevin Abbed: Aly, of all the episodes we did this season, this one was one of the topics that I've personally been super excited about. With the fast increase of all kinds of AI in all types of industry, it was truly only a matter of time before we started seeing it have an effect in the workplace. What are you most interested in learning about as it relates to AI and HR or the workplace in general?
Aly Sharp: Yeah, so as most of our listeners probably know, I'm actually in marketing, so AI and ChatGPT and all that has had a huge impact on marketing. A lot of people are using it now just in their copywriting, which I haven't even tried because AI kind of freaks me out, I'm not going to lie. And I think that it's going to have a really big impact in HR. Even just today, not that we're recording, SHRM sent out a notice about the EEOC passing legislation on AI in HR and those kind of practices. So, it's going to be really interesting to see. It's nice to know that the government's kind of trying to put those boundaries on just how far we can take it. But it'll be interesting to see as technology advances, it's just kind of like it's got to be in every aspect of our lives.
Kevin Abbed: Yeah, exactly. And I don't really see where the stop is because it just feels like it's so new and especially this new type of AI with, you see ChatGPT and you see people being able to create songs that sound like famous musicians and they dub over videos of ex-presidents and current presidents having conversations that have never happened. It's all very interesting and I'm excited, but a little nervous to see where it's going to go, especially as it pertains to the workplace.
So, want to jump right into the interview with today's guest. William Spencer III is a SHRM EPAC member, an HR business partner at Innovative Defense Technologies in Arlington, Virginia. As a HR business partner, he leads projects in multiple HR functionalities to help foster the growth of their employees and organization as a whole. William has a master's degree in management and human resources from the University of Tennessee, and it is my pleasure to welcome William to Career Compass.
William Spencer...: Thank you, Kevin. Happy to be here.
Kevin Abbed: Great. We'll just jump right into the first question. AI might be the fastest growing topic of discussion in recent memory, at least for me, that's affecting most people's work and especially their personal life. Have you been able to utilize AI in your role in HR or even in your personal life?
William Spencer...: It's an interesting question, Kevin. I would say that I haven't necessarily used AI specifically, but there are certain aspects of my role in the talent development realm that are automated now that we have a new talent development system. And that I can say has certainly been a blessing.
Kevin Abbed: Yeah, definitely. And I know one thing that people have definitely spoken up about as of late is how it's going to affect the world of recruiting and how utilizing AI to sift through hundreds if not thousands of résumés and cover letters. Do you think that's also going to have a big impact moving forward?
William Spencer...: Absolutely. Speaking from experience, I started out in my career in the talent acquisition realm and just thinking back of how many candidates we had flow through the applicant pipeline, and I mean, we're a small- to medium-sized tech company, and at the time, the support staff that was focused on talent acquisition was small to medium size. So, it was pretty hand in hand with our organization size and the amount of candidates that we received that applied for our various roles, it would take us years to get through the amount of candidate pool there.
So, I think in those terms, having some sort of computer program, whether it be AI or something else, would absolutely benefit us as an organization as we're not able to sift through all of those résumés and all of those applications. So, in that regard, it would certainly be a positive, but I think with the caveat that a potential negative impact that AI could have. We know it is a computer program. It's not a human being, so it has the potential to make mistakes, so it could adversely impact candidates in the recruiting process. So, that's something to be wary of.
Aly Sharp: Yeah. That kind of ties into all the worries about AI discrimination, which truthfully, that's a bit over my pay grade and over my head as far as trying to figure out how it would cause discrimination. But I know that's a big point in all the legislation is so that it doesn't discriminate against candidates who are definitely qualified for the job.
William Spencer...: It's essentially a computer program and being human, we make mistakes as well. It's just human nature. So, the individual programming that program is embedding their human nature, their personality, their being into that code, and the program is running off of that code. So, it very well could make a mistake based on those factors.
Aly Sharp: Yeah, definitely. SHRM research has showed that over one third of US workers believe their job will become more reliant on workplace automation in the next few years. Do you see this as a possibility in your industry?
William Spencer...: I absolutely see that being the case, especially because, as Kevin pointed out, we've seen just in the past few months, the advancements that have been made by these AI companies are quite significant. So, I believe AI could certainly be used as a tool to complete some of those more mundane tasks and save time regardless of the industry a professional operates in. And I think that, although we as HR practitioners work in the people industry, there's something to be said about enabling us to have more bandwidth to focus on, whether it be strategies or operations as opposed to those more administrative duties.
Aly Sharp: I totally get that. So, from at least that little snippet of your answer, it would seem that this would have a more positive effect on organizations and employees. I mean, there is always a downside, but do you think that overall it's going to be positive unless something catastrophic happens?
William Spencer...: Well, I don't know the name of the individual, but he's someone that is well respected within the AI community and he recently was appeared out in public or on the news, what have you. I just heard this down the grapevine, but one of these notable individuals that is regarded as an AI expert has recently warned people about the potential negatives that can be dire with respect to AI.
So, I think, with that being said, that it will be a net positive just based on the information we have now in terms of what the capability of AI and what we've seen it do in the past. But I do think it is important to be cognizant of the way that it could, for example, adversely impact a candidate with respect to discrimination. But all in all, from my perspective, it could save us time, it could alleviate some of those bottlenecks that we experience as professionals. It could take away some of those duties that we perform from an administrative perspective to allow us to focus on more strategic operations.
Kevin Abbed: Absolutely. And one area I think that I could see AI having increasing value is in onboarding and training and development. Do you think AI will be able to help drill down into the individual onboarding process, whether that is acknowledging strengths and weaknesses of employees and figuring out what we need to focus on? Because some people might be super good at managing schedules and other people might be better at developing content and figuring out based on whatever parameters you provide, how to onboard people based on strengths and weaknesses.
William Spencer...: Hmm. I think there's a lot to unpack there, so I'll take it piece by piece, but if there is an area that automation could save professionals a good amount of time, it would be within onboarding. That's one of my main focuses as an HR business partner at my employer. And just thinking about my experience there, there's a lot of moving parts when it comes to bringing a group of new hires into an organization. There's that initial coordination process which tackles getting employees their equipment, getting their office set up, collecting their paperwork, ensuring that they have all the resources that they need in order to work efficiently and effectively from the get-go. And if we're able to automate some of that process, we would be able to focus, again, more on the individuals themselves, understanding who they are as a person, what their needs are from an HR and well-being perspective, and focusing on building that rapport and the connection with the new hire as opposed to those admin tasks.
But I think, too, separately AI, I think it has the potential to take into account specific tasks that an employee does on the job as well as any courses or trainings or certifications that they've completed or that they're interested in. And then comparing that data to those obtained skills to the areas of improvement that are noted, whether it be when they're brought on board, whether it be during the screening process or whether it be during a performance coaching cycle. So, I think it would absolutely help us identify those areas that we could administer training to employees in a more effective manner.
Kevin Abbed: And do you think this will help lead to overall better employee retention?
William Spencer...: I mean, as we know, there's a lot of different elements involved as to why employees stay or leave an organization. With that being said, I believe that AI has the potential to assist in an overall better retention rate because, as we've discussed, enabling HR professionals to focus more on those strategic functions and freeing up some bandwidth will allow for more time to be spent on ensuring our employees are happy, ensuring that they're engaged and productive. And those are just a few of the primary elements that are factored into an employee's rationale when they're making the decision to stay or enter the job market.
Aly Sharp: So, I kind of have a little bit of a follow-up on that because one of my fears with AI in onboarding and those kinds of things with especially regards to remote positions is how do you make sure that people don't feel disconnected if most of their initial interaction with a company is going to be virtual?
William Spencer...: That's a really good point. I mean, we're seeing it now with the absence of AI. We're seeing employees being brought on board virtually. We're seeing them participate in that onboarding process, which is, from my perspective, three to six months following their initial orientation. And some employees are remote for that entire period. So, there is a bit of disconnectedness in those instances, in those circumstances. So, we're dealing with it now, I think from just an industry perspective, but it's definitely something that could be exacerbated with the application of AI. I think we've kind of said this throughout the conversation, but being cognizant of the potential negative impacts and making a preparation plan to alleviate some of those potential negative impacts before they even occur would be wise.
So, in that specific example, maybe it's implementing some social events for those new hires that have been brought on board through that AI program and that have been virtual since they've been brought on board. That's just one example. There's a lot of different ways you could take it, but that's a potential solution there.
Aly Sharp: Yeah, definitely.
Kevin Abbed: I want to pause just for a second to take care of a couple of housekeeping items. First, those of you listening to this podcast who are seeking professional development credit, this program is valid for .5 PDCs for the SHRM-CP or SHRM-SCP. The code to redeem your PDCs is 23-D7KAV. Please note that this code will expire May 24th, 2024. Again, that code is the number two, the number three, dash, the letter D as in delta, K as in kilo, the letter A as in alpha, and the letter V as in victor.
Aly Sharp: And speaking of PDCs, one place to earn 28 PDCs while networking with your peers, connecting with mentors, and expanding your HR knowledge is at SHRM23, taking place June 11th through 14th in beautiful Las Vegas. And we are here to tell you that in-person passes are selling out so quickly, we're actually about to be at max capacity. So, if you plan on going, you may only get a virtual pass, but that's okay. Totally worth it. You get the same amount of content as people on site. And we are even going to have mock interviews for the virtual attendees as well. Just might not be on site, obviously.
So, you can register now to take part in a curated student experience featuring career-focused programming and discounted member pricing at just $425 for the remaining in-person registration or $275 for those virtual passes. For more information, visit shrm.co/SHRM23student.
Kevin Abbed: Thanks for the plug, Aly. Jumping back into the podcast, where do you see the biggest opportunity for success using AI in your daily work and in the whole HR world in general?
William Spencer...: Yeah, good question, Kev. I think we've touched on this throughout the conversation, but the automation of administrative tasks, having a computer complete those as opposed to it being more intuitive and it being done by a human being. But I think drafting job descriptions is one area that we could see AI save us a bunch of time sending blanket notification emails. I touched on our new talent development system, and that is one of the capabilities that we have at our disposal now that we didn't have prior to adopting that system. And it sends reminder emails when your performance coaching cycle is due, upcoming due emails. It's just been really nice to not have to hunt down, so to speak, those individual employees and remind them to complete certain tasks. So, in that regard, I could see AI and automation really being a benefit to HR professionals.
Kevin Abbed: Absolutely.
Aly Sharp: So, that actually just kind of clicked a question in my head is with the blanket emails or those widespread emails. As it pertains to talent acquisition, especially in the world of remote work and virtual interviews, things like that, candidates can sometimes feel ghosted by companies. Do you think that, with AI or just automation in general, when a seat gets filled, it can send out a blast to all the people who applied to say, "Thank you so much for applying. This position's been filled." Instead of being like, "Oh, I applied to this job three months ago and they never even said anything to me."
William Spencer...: Yeah, I think a lot of systems have that capability now, and candidates are certainly appreciating it because, to your point, prior to some of those automated tools, like the notification email, going back to the earlier conversation we had from the get-go, we received just even as a small- to medium-sized business, thousands of applicants for all of our positions. I mean, for example, our intern position alone consistently receives over 1,200, 1,500 applicants each year.
Aly Sharp: Geez!
William Spencer...: So, that's a lot just for an intern requisition to sift through. And I think, again, that courtesy email letting candidates know that they weren't selected so they can pivot and continue their job search or their internship searches, that's a courtesy.
Aly Sharp: We are going to get you out of here after this question. As you may know, SHRM is celebrating its 75th anniversary and our theme is driving historic change in the world of work. We want to know what is something you have done in your career that has driven change in your workplace or your school, what have you?
William Spencer...: Great question. I think the effort that I'm involved with now, and I've spoke a lot about this talent development system that we've recently adopted, but there's a lot of different, as you said, bells and whistles associated with this talent development system. The first element was the performance management system function of the talent development system, which I was involved in configuring and implementing. And then the second piece of that puzzle is the learning management system or the learning management function of the talent development system. And I'm serving as the project manager for that effort, ensuring that we remain on schedule in adopting that element of the system, ensuring it's up to our specifications, ensuring that our workforce is adequately trained on it prior to rollout, and then ensuring that once we get it on board, that it remains up to date, remains effective, and just reassessing our configuration and implementation of it after the fact. So, that's one fairly large effort that I've been involved with from start to finish and have been pleased so far with being involved there.
Aly Sharp: Sounds awesome.
Kevin Abbed: Yeah. Sounds like something that's really going to drive change in your organization.
Well, William, thank you so much for taking the time to share your HR journey with us and your thoughts about the intriguing topic of AI.
William Spencer...: Thanks, Kevin. Thanks, Aly, for having me.
Aly Sharp: And with that, we're going to bring this episode of Career Compass to a close. We'd like to thank SHRM and the SHRM Foundation for providing us with this platform. But more importantly, we'd like to thank you all for joining us and hope you stay with us till next season as we discuss more topics like this episode.
Kevin Abbed: For more exclusive content, resources, and tools to help you succeed in your career, consider joining SHRM as a student member. You can visit us at shrm.org/students to learn more about impacting today's evolving workplaces. With nearly 325,000 members in 165 countries, SHRM impacts lives of more than 235 million workers and families globally. Thank you again for listening, and we'll catch you on the next episode of Career Compass.