Original Coverage & Source Attribution: hrmasia.com
In the past year, HR teams have focused heavily on AI adoption, including determining which tools to select, how to roll them out to employees, and what it takes to get the workforce eager to integrate AI into their everyday lives. Next year, adoption will be in the rearview mirror, says Monique Herena, Chief Colleague Experience Officer at American Express.
“I think 2027 is going to be much more about how work and workflows have to be redesigned to drive value,” says Herena, HR Executive’s 2026 HR Executive of the Year. “It’s not simply who’s got AI and who’s using it, but how it’s changed how work gets done.”
That puts HR at the “centre of everything,” she adds. HR leaders need to prioritise working “courageously” to rethink the skills, capabilities and structures that need to shift to accommodate human-AI workforces.
For instance, when AI takes over an approval process and part of someone’s job becomes automated, HR needs to be ready to help that person and their team work “in a different way.”
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How will employees value the new way of working, reward it and continue to ensure adaptability for ongoing change? Herena asks.
“That’ll be the news of 2027,” she says, “the true evolution of work.”
Nirit Peled-Muntz, Chief People Officer at HiBob, agrees that “courage” will be a core HR capability needed in 2027.
Specifically, HR Executive’s 2026 HR Leader of Distinction says HR leaders will need to “take a strong stance” about keeping humans in the loop despite AI advances.
“We have to be very, very careful to make sure we do not put our people or organisations at risk,” Peled-Muntz says. “It’s so appealing to let the AI take over, but we need to be able to stop, pause and think if it’s the right thing to do.”
Jen Colletta is Managing Editor at HR Executive, where this article was first published.
