HR in 50 Years

Human Resources in the Next 50 Years

Human resources will likely evolve significantly over the course of the next fifty years. There are many trends that are already working to transform the field. Some of the most salient trends in human resources are globalization, technology and training, corporate social responsibility, standardization, and many more. The field of human resources will most likely be almost completely transformed in the next half a century and have new trends that emerge as well. However, based on the present sates of the field, there are some predictions that can be made.

It is highly likely that technology will be one of the greatest drivers of change over the next fifty years. Just in the last few generations technology has been a disruptive force that has revolutionized virtually every industry and business function. It is likely that human resources will completely be revolutionized by technology nearly indefinitely. There are two primary reasons for this prediction. One is that technology increases the capacity of workers to accomplish more with less time and resources; both those within human resources as well as in the rest of the organization. Therefore, with the assistance of technology is likely that human resource professionals will have more responsibility than ever before.

Another reason that technology is predicted to play such a large role in the future of human resources is that it will require that the employees be training nearly continuously to continue keeping pace with future developments. This trend has already grown immensely and will likely accelerate indefinitely as technology continues to advance.

Another trend that currently affects human resources that will continue to grow is globalization. Organizations are now struggling with many issues related to globalization and diversity that is being driven by the trend. As the world continues to globalize, organizations will inherently contain more diversity within them as well as deal with more diversity in the external environment. However, at the same time, globalization and international business is also working to create a globalized business culture. For example, English has been the first choice for languages in the international community and this will likely to remain the case. Thus students in many foreign cultures are being taught the factors involved in the international business community such as the English language and other cultural factors. Therefore, the international business community might be more standardized than it is today as different cultures merge into one business culture.