Guidance from SHRM’s annual conference keeps HR’s focus on AI and well-being

As you might have heard, an estimated 25,000 people descended upon Orlando, Florida for four days this past June to attend the annual Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) conference. And, this year, HR Brew was right there with them, shivering in the air conditioning and melting in the humidity alongside people leaders learning best practices for handling AI disruption, tackling rising costs, and promoting employee well-being.

Celebrities who headlined some of the events included boldface names like Oprah (who spoke about building company culture); actor James Marsden (who gave his best career advice: being easy to work with); and professional athlete, actor, and comedian Terry Crews, who engaged an audience of several hundred HR pros by sharing his journey to becoming a health and fitness advocate and global ambassador of well-being for wellness platform Wellhub.

Alongside Mike Daoust, SVP and head of North America at Wellhub, Crews and Daoust agreed that employee well-being should no longer be a perk, but a standard. “Fun is the point. Burnout comes when you are not having fun, when you are not enjoying what you are doing…I made a rule, I said, ‘Man, I got to enjoy what I’m doing. It does not have to be painful,’” Crews told the audience.

How is HR handling AI change? During panels and between-session coffee chats, many CHROs expressed confidence that there’s always going to be a human aspect to the world of work. But, amid AI transformation and increased economic uncertainty, their focus is on employee well-being and mental health.

In response to AI implementation, many workers said they’ve sacrificed sleep to meet performance goals (55%), emotionally checked out (51%), and resent senior leaders during these times of change (45%), a report from mental health platform Headspace found. And, 70% of the roughly 700 workers surveyed said their companies adopted new AI tools in recent months.

SHRM’s president and CEO Johnny C. Taylor, Jr. took the stage on day three of the conference to encourage CHROs to become “chief work officers” who oversee the work that gets done by both people and technology. Amid this shift, Taylor said HR pros need to prioritize the company’s CEO, because CEOs are relying on HR to ensure the work gets done—whether it’s by a person or technology.

“If you want to do the job that you’ve done for the last 10, 20, hell, five years, then you’re in trouble…Embrace AI and use it to do the strategic value-added stuff that makes HR really valuable,” Taylor told HR Brew at the conference. He later added: “If you stand still and say, ‘I’m not going to embrace it, and this is bad for mankind,’ you will be left behind.”