Redefining HRD Roles and Practice in the Machine Learning Revolution
This chapter will seek to answer the question: to what extent do learning and development (LD) practitioners incorporate both the learning of humans and machines within their areas of responsibility? Initially, it considers some of the key ideas relating
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Introduction The challenge to the human resource development (HRD) community is how far it should proactively take responsibility and get involved in shaping future skill development and human interactions with technology? Or will the community, as it has in the past, retain a passive observer position? There is much talk of the displacement of humans by technologies. There is disruption to current approaches to skill development and
P. Harrison (*) Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK e-mail: [email protected] L. Nichol University of Worcester, Worcester, UK e-mail: [email protected] J. Gold York St John, York, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2020 M. Loon et al. (eds.), The Future of HRD, Volume I, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-52410-4_6
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the identification of what new skills are needed requires attention. For people to retain relevance, more attention is needed on those skills that resist automation and technology replacement by the fourth industrial revolution (4IR) package. The various technologies of artificial intelligence (machine learning, robotics and others) together form a package of considerations referred to as the fourth industrial revolution (Schwab 2017). It is claimed that society is currently in the midst of a significant transition period that is bound to bring disruption to our lives (Mason 2015). For example, there is much talk of the displacement of humans by technologies with Deloitte (2018) reporting that employment in 44% of occupations in the UK is falling and that this creates uncertainty about which jobs will continue to exist. Brynjolfsson and McAfee (2014) asked the question “will humans go the way of horses?” pointing to the way the replacement of people by machines has a long tradition although humans have tended to benefit from this process in terms of real wages and jobs available. The present uncertainty is another manifestation of this. However, the disruption to skill development and learning of those new skills requires attention. As Webster and Ivanov (2019) argue humans will continue to retain key employment abilities concerned with creativity, interpretation and human interactions but might be less required in the production process. Therefore, for people to retain relevance there needs to be more attention to those skills that resist automation and technology replacement by the 4IR package. Deloitte (2018) identified analytic, strategic and communication as human skills that are needed to provide resilience as the transition occurs. A key issue for those involved in human skill development, the human resource development (HRD) or learning and development (LD) community, is how far they should proactively take responsibility and get involved in shaping future skill development and human interactions with technology? Or will they, as in the past, retain a passive observer position? Using the future and forecasting approach often used within organisations to stimulate strategic planning, two futures workshops
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