Tech smarter: enhancing your technical skills increases your value as an HR professional within your organization

HR Magazine, Oct, 2005 by Alice Andors

Human resource professionals can no longer afford to leave HR technology decisions and implementation entirely to the information technology department. HR and technology are too intertwined. Today, employers use technology to guide employee recruitment and career planning, enhance performance, determine rewards and recognition, handle employee relations, and provide new opportunities for workforce training and development. (For more information, see "E-learning Evolves" on page 74.) In addition, employee data management and payroll administration systems have found a place in even the smallest HR departments. (For more information, see "Easier Money" on page 80.)

From single-purpose software to complex enterprise systems to hosted pay-as-you-go applications, HR technology is an integral part of the HR business. And as HR practices and programs become more sophisticated--and more complex--it has become imperative for HR professionals to develop a deeper level of technical knowledge to make informed decisions when it comes to choosing the technology that is best for their organization and determining how it should be deployed.

Most of these technologies did not exist a decade ago. "We have seen more [technological] changes in the last 36 months than we have seen over the last 18 years," says Suzanne Zuniga, chief operating officer at CorVirtus, a recruitment and hiring consulting firm based in Colorado Springs, Colo.

The blistering pace of technological advancement has helped advance the HR professional as well. "With information and tools at the ready, the role of HR has significantly evolved to focus on strategy vs. administration," says Patricia Duarte, director of human resources at Network World Inc., a Framingham, Mass.-based IT provider of news, analysis, reviews, events and education.

For instance, John Boudreau, professor of management and organization at the University of Southern California, believes that making informed decisions about workforce management begins with HR professionals taking a scientific approach to their own role. He urges HR professionals to be instrumental in moving HR "toward becoming a decision science about talent."

Technology can help, says Duarte, who credits the automation of many HR functions, particularly in larger organizations, with changing the way decisions affecting the workforce are made by freeing up HR professionals to focus more on strategic goals and organizational development and less on administration.

But advances in HR technology go only as far as the HR professional can take them. "Organizations that do well and the HR folks who are most highly regarded have a handle on technology and understand what it can do for their organization. They have a vision of what it can do to help them meet their business goals, of what is possible," says Jeff Moe, president of Auxillium West HR Software, a provider of HR software solutions based in Cupertino, Calif.

Moe adds, "That's the dividing line between the most successful HR people and those who don't reach that higher level."

Bridging the Divide

With the dizzying array of technological HR solutions available, it's hard to keep up. Vendors constantly introduce "revolutionary" new products, and HR staffers still have their "real" jobs to do. So what's an HR professional to do?

"Make a conscious effort to improve your technical skills throughout your HR career," Moe believes.

In fact, the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) Special Expertise Panel on Technology and HR Management noted in a recent report that "understanding of technology will be an increasingly important HR competency in the years ahead," with HR professionals needing "a good understanding of potential future trends in HR technology in order to be prepared and hopefully avoid costly mistakes."

SHRM's 2005 HR Technology Survey Report advises HR professionals to continue to monitor changes and trends in HR technology. The panel predicts growth in the use of e-learning, heightened awareness of HR data privacy (due to the rise of identity theft using employee information), the outsourcing of HR information systems (HRIS), vendor consolidation in the HRIS industry and the transition to paperless pay.

Tracy Wagner, vice president of human resources at Camarillo, Calif.-based Thomson SA, Services Division, which provides physical media, electronic media and network operations services to media and entertainment industry clients, says that while there is no substitute for HR experience, the growing emphasis on technology in HR organizations "may put some practitioners behind the eight ball" if they are not current with industry trends and developments.

Professionals Wagner knows and works with seek training proactively, through their employers and elsewhere, to ratchet up their technology IQ. "I think you are never too old to learn, myself included, so this is a very important part of ongoing training and professional development," he says.