Revolutionizing Work: A Conversation on Generative AI and HR Innovation

Revolutionizing Work: A Conversation on Generative AI and HR Innovation

Hosts: Steve Boese & Trish Steed

Guest: Anthony Abbatiello, Workforce Transformation Leader, PwC

Today, we met with Anthony Abbatiello from PwC to explore the transformative impact of Generative AI on businesses and the evolving workforce. We dive into the AI era, discovering the disruptive potential of Gen AI, along with responsible AI adoption in HR, emphasizing talent development, upskilling, and employee experience. Listen in to gain insights into the ethical use of AI, making HR processes strategic and employee-centric. Whether you’re a business leader or an HR professional, this episode provides practical tips and perspectives on navigating the evolution of work.

Thank you for joining the show today!  Remember to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts!

This episode of At Work in America is sponsored by Paychex, one of the leading providers of HR, payroll, retirement, and insurance solutions for businesses of all sizes. Are you ready to drive growth and tackle the challenges ahead in the new year? With insights from 600 business and HR leaders, Paychex has just released its 2024 Business Priorities Report revealing the strategies you need to succeed. Packed with insider tips on improving employee benefits to automating workflows, this report is your strategic roadmap to success. Get ahead of the game and download your copy today at paychex.com/awia. Business success this year is just a click away.

Transcript follows:

Announcer 0:00
Welcome to At Work in America, sponsored by Paychex. At Work in America digs in behind the headlines and trends to the stories of real people making a difference in the world of work. And now here are your hosts, Steve Boese and Trish Steed.

Steve 0:28
Welcome to the At Work in America podcast. My name is Steve Boese, I’m joined by Trish Steed, Trish, how are you today?

Anthony Abbatiello 0:35
I’m trying not to freeze today. How are you, Steve?

Steve 0:38
Similarly, also attempting to not freeze it’s in the single digits here. And imagine quite cold where you’re at to.

Anthony Abbatiello 0:46
I’m in Colorado, we have been in the negatives as our real temperature, not just windchill, and it’s been quite bitter. So I’ve been staying inside. But you know what I’m it’s like watching across the country. This is really hitting most of the country right now. People are a little bit tired of the snow and the cold.

Steve 1:04
I think so people are still kind of homebound, but it’s a good time to be to stay warm stay under the covers snuggle up with your favorite podcasts like the At Work in America podcast. Today, actually, we’ve got a great show. It’s on one of the most important topics, if not the most important topic in business in 2023, which is generative AI, which dominated all the news cycles all year long, pretty much. But also talking about like, where’s it going, where to stay ahead of it? How to make it work better in your organization, a little bit of how not to be afraid of it. And that’s going to be great conversation today.

Anthony Abbatiello 1:41
I agree. I, you know, for me and the things I’m hearing, it’s all about educating yourself so that you’re not terrified of use of Gen AI, whether it’s in your personal life or at work. But I do feel like even in the last six months, or not even six months, maybe four months since the HR tech when it was really coming on strong in terms of use cases, I’m starting to see it creep in more and more in personal applications. And I think that’s much like other things we’ve had in the past. Right. That’s what ultimately drives what we’re comfortable with. from a work perspective. How about you?

Steve 2:15
I agree, Trish, I think it’s a great example. Similar to other ones we’ve had in the past, like social media was one of these even iPads, honestly, a technology that really started to take root in people’s personal lives, and their lives outside of work, which then becomes something kind of ubiquitous and important inside the workplace. Right. And so we all got introduced to chat GPT, for example, right? The most famous Gen AI technology, probably on our own personal time, right, just experimenting with it outside of work. And then all of a sudden, many people have realized, boy, this might help me write a report, it might help me summarize a meeting, meeting notes, it might help me do a transcription of a podcast, who knows? Right? It does lots of really valuable things. And now people are trying to find ways to use it and work. And as you said, in our business in the HR business, and the tech business. So many of the providers are trying to find ways to imbue embed it right inside HR technology in it to support HR processes. It’s literally everywhere these days.

Anthony Abbatiello 3:18
What I love the most, as we explore these conversations with different people who are, you know, I guess emerging experts in Gen AI specifically, is that, you know, years ago, if you think back when we really started talking about machine learning to begin with, and it was the you know, the robots are going to take our jobs. And I think what Gen AI enables us to do is see how it really just enhances our jobs and what we’re doing. And I think you’re right, a lot of what we learn, you mentioned social media, for example, it’s like now that’s that’s a major source of how we learn how to do everything, right, it’s through these various social channels. And I recently had a discussion with our producer, for example, about using Gen AI to look at the ingredients you have in your pantry, type it in and Gen AI can, you know, come back with different recipes you can make with those ingredients. So thinking about things as simple as that gets my wheels turning on all if I can use it for that at home, what can I use it in a business sense? That’s that’s also safe, right and not sharing confidential data. So I’m excited to have this conversation today to learn about more of those work applications.

Steve 4:29
it’s gonna be great conversation. Before we get to that Trish, let’s thank our friends of course at Paychex. This episode of At Work in America is sponsored by Paychex, one of the leading providers of HR, payroll, retirement and insurance solutions for businesses of all sizes. Are you ready to drive growth and tackle the challenges ahead in the new year? With insights from 600 Business HR leaders, Paychex has just released its 2024 business priorities report revealing the strategies you need to succeed with interest rates, rising inflation still going on, dealing with struggles to keep top talent and develop leadership. It can be tough out there. But this report reveals that a whopping 98% of companies are planning to use artificial intelligence to help tackle these issues that could that for the show we’re doing today. And that’s just the beginning. This report is packed with insider tips on improving employee benefits to automating workflows. And it’s your strategic roadmap for success. You can get ahead of the game and download your copy today at paychex.com/awia. Business success this year is just a click away.

Steve 5:44
We are excited to welcome our guests today. It’s Anthony Abbatiello from PwC. Anthony leads PwC’s workforce transformation business delivering HR transformation, talent, strategy, change management, organizational development and reward services to CEOs and CHROs across sectors and functions. Anthony is a master certified executive coach with focused expertise on CEO and executive transitions. Anthony and his husband Chad live in New York City. Anthony, welcome to the show. It’s great to see you.

Anthony Abbatiello 6:16
Nice to see you, Steve. Thanks for having me.

Steve 6:19
It’s our pleasure. It’s been a while. So welcome back to the show. And it’s great to have you back to talk about I mean, it certainly 2023s most important pressing and in the news topic in enterprises, right, which was AI, specifically Gen AI, and to maybe now that we’re moving into 2024, to help organizations and HR leaders and other leaders, make some sense of it, and actually to start to make some smart investments in it, to realize some of the payoff around the hype and, and maybe not be afraid of it as well. So let’s get into some of that. So Anthony, maybe though, before we get into Gen AI, let’s maybe learn a little bit more about you. And your background. Because it’s a fascinating one, we talked a little bit pre show about it, I’d love for you to maybe share a little bit with our audience about about your story.

Anthony Abbatiello 7:09
You know, I’ve been a career long management consultant, I’ve been about 30 years all in consulting, and everything around talent, leadership and human resources. I’m sort of an incredible dork in the sense of I love consulting, and I have an incredible amount of passion around the human capital space. From being you know, a researcher, a practitioner, client service, leading the business, all aspects of it kind of bring me a lot of joy. And you know, as they say, if you if you love what you do, you’ll never work a day in your life. And I feel just incredible honor and great fortune that I continue to have these these challenges in terms of leading these complex consulting businesses that give us the opportunity to help solve the most pressing workforce issues for our clients, and really use the workforce lever the way you know, many organizations use the financial lever, and how they can drive better business results through their workforce both on and off balance sheet.

Anthony Abbatiello 8:11
You know, Anthony, I appreciate the passion that you bring to your work, because I think that’s one thing that we Steve and I both having, we gravitate to other people who are that way as well, right? Like everything that we do revolves around people, and both helping them get better at the work that they’re doing so that they can be both engaged and feel rewarded and appreciated. Right. But also, as leaders, it’s something sometimes, you know, we’ve all had careers that spanned decades at this point. I’d love for you maybe to start off in terms of what you’re doing there with PwC around how have you seen the workforce change? Maybe in the last, say, 20 years or so as that connection between humans and technology has kind of evolved? Before we really dive into the AI piece?

Anthony Abbatiello 9:02
It’s a great question. Because, you know, I think if you look at the workforce and how it has evolved, you can almost track it to the evolution of the human resources function, right? If we go back to you know, HR really isn’t that old, it’s really only been a capability and function maybe last like 40 years as a max, but if you go sort of pre you know, 1980s You know, we were a personnel and you know, and the workforce was really about production, you know, we oftentimes call it you know, the, the age of the generals, right, the General Motors, the General Electric’s the types of companies that were very much about pulling together, you know, understanding the production and moving into this industrial revolution. So it was all really about, you know, that that movement around the workforce being about output and production, kind of advance it and into the 90s We started to see a bit in the 80s, with some, some computing starting, but in the 90s, right, we get to this point of technology being brought into the workforce, and the idea of a knowledge worker came in, and then you start to see that the workforce really starts to bring not only the production, but also the decision making, right, the insights, creating knowledge content, and then sharing that really at the aid with the aid of technology. And then, you know, sort of post.com Boost, you know, bubble burst, I guess, would you say, but right around that time, right, everything got distributed into the early 2000s, where the workforce became not just about production and about knowledge, but then also about the distribute the distribution of knowledge, and also the interconnectivity around the globe.

Anthony Abbatiello 10:52
So being able to do work offshore, or with within other regions, or countries, not everything being, you know, solely around the four walls of the organization. And I think today, we’re certainly in, you know, I often say the, you know, the war for talent is over, right, the the workforce one, and, you know, it’s now we’re in this age, where we are, it’s a talent driven workforce, right, you know, after, after COVID, you know, well being is that is at the core, you know, organizational culture is at the core skills and capabilities are at the core of, of organizations. And, you know, when you look at, we survey CEOs, you know, every year and you know, the skills and the culture of the organization and future skills are always one of the top three issues that CEOs are facing today. And they don’t see that just as an HR functional concern, they see that as part of the CEO agenda and how we’re driving the business. So I think you know, that that overarching view now of of now getting to the the workforce really being in the driver’s seat, I think the CH ro has moved from, you know, begging the table to say we need a seat at the table to now needing to grab the spotlight more, which we could talk about. But that’s really about, you know, think because the understanding the levers of the workforce, and how that’s going to drive the business result is something that is now in the forefront with analytics with different data. And you know, the CEO, the management teams really can understand how they can use that lever to to drive productivity and performance of the business.

Steve 12:34
That’s it, I appreciate you sort of sharing your perspective on this, this large arc, right of kind of the relationship between the organization its people and the function right over the last 50 odd years or so, maybe 60 odd years or so, some might consider I don’t know if you’re one of these or not, I’d love to hear your perspective on it that what we seen in 2023, if we talk about the disruptions, maybe that you mentioned sort of the introduction of personal powerful computing, the internet comes a little bit later. And then, you know, boom, pandemic happens, right, disrupting every workplace and workforce pretty much around the globe. And now in 2023 Gen AI emerges, I don’t know if it’s a scale of disruption similar to those other events. Are those big macro trends or not? I don’t know some people think it is, though. And you’ll see data is early, maybe even yesterday, I saw this piece of data coming out of the World Economic Forum where all 40% of jobs potentially are going to be disrupted in the next, I don’t know, five to 10 years by Gen AI. And if that’s really true, that comes to pass, then certainly, Gen AI will be a disrupter on the par with things like the internet emerging and the pandemic, I’d love your maybe bigger picture perspective on Gen AI, as a disruptive force, and an opportunity, and then maybe we can talk about some of the more specific types of programs, interventions and strategies that HR folks can, can can pursue this year.

Anthony Abbatiello 14:03
Yeah, you know, I think that when it comes to Gen AI, the AI overall it represents, you know, a tremendous opportunity, I think, you know, in our we did a poll surveyed in August of this year, and I think, you know, close to 70% of executives all see that Gen AI will have the opportunity to create new business models. And, you know, I think more than half of the world’s workforce sees this as an opportunity for disruption. And I think we’re the dissonance exist, or I think a dissonance exists between executives sort of older generation and younger, you know, because more than, you know, 50% of the workforce, especially at the, you know, Gen Z’s and the millennials really see it as an opportunity for a positive impact, the ability for them to perform their jobs better, to have better career mobility and to be able to be more productive, right. They see that as, certainly disrupt To get, but really bring them more of an opportunity for production and product and have more productivity. I think, well, business executives who probably represent more of, you know, the Gen Xers and baby boomers, you know, many, many of those like me, not not mean age, not mean, they all say the, you know, they I think there is that dissonance exists is that they see that disrupting jobs to the negative, right they it does present opportunity, but they see that impacting jobs in a way where it’s it is going to eliminate jobs. And, and I think while it’s still maybe too early to tell, the early signs really are it’s it probably could automate or create more efficient tasks, but wholesale taking away jobs and not creating new ones. I don’t think we’re gonna see that at all. And I think, you know, the opportunity that really does exist is great for every organization, and every level of the workforce, whether you’re a senior executive, and how you are driving, you know, the performance of the business or, you know, your line worker, you’re a deathless worker, you’re a knowledge worker, you know, and you’re using Gen AI as a as a support decision support as a Knowledge tool, or you no further automating, you know, the job at hand.

Anthony Abbatiello 16:17
I’m so glad that you mentioned that, Anthony, because I think that one of the questions we got a lot when we’re either you know, out at events or just you know, out working with different clients and maybe their customers is around this idea of isn’t going to truly be decision support. And something that enhances the way I’m performing versus kind of to Steve’s question, which is like taking away my job, right? So I love that you’re, you’re saying no, you’re very positive on this, right? What can leaders do? Because something? You know, again, some of us who have been in the workforce a long time, we get a little nervous when these things these disruptors happen? What advice would you give to leaders to maybe educate themselves differently or to get more comfortable? Is there a thing they can be doing to sort of take that more positive tone in terms of this is something that can really enhance your workforces performance?

Anthony Abbatiello 17:11
Yeah, you know, I spend, you know, a lot of my time in discussion with CEOs with business unit leader or CHROs and, you know, I basically am saying two things as it relates to this. The first is, is the education part, you know, educate yourself, educate your organization, right, give the opportunity for upskilling for yourself, for your teams, for your workers, to understand the impacts and the opportunities with with generative AI, what it can actually bring, dispel the myth and rumor and building that that skill set in the organization. The second is experimenting, you know, every organization and every leader right in in our, you know, peer group, every leader has the opportunity to, or should have a greater opportunity to experiment to fail, fail fast, fail, fail early, learn faster, and really have an opportunity to drive a learning from that. So getting some experiments with Gen AI in their area will only help in the adoption and the evolution. And I think that’s where the the myth and the you know, where that dissonance exists, where that will start to close. And we’ll see more opportunities, whether they’re, you know, small experiments, or they’re bigger and larger ideas, the best way to understand and get comfortable with the opportunity that I really, truly believe exists around nai is to start to, you know, open up the learning around it, dispel the myths, and try some experiments in areas and, you know, there there isn’t an organization that I talked to, that doesn’t have some degree of, you know, chat GPT or an issue around generative AI, you know, raising your hand if you’re a business leader, raise your hand, you know, you know, get step up to that opportunity, especially in HR where, you know, similar to the customer facing functions, right, they’re the first that are really seeing the impact and bringing this to market faster. HR is right there with them, right this you know, the sales and marketing and you know, the the HR functions are the ones that should be driving this, embedding it into the organization to only then turn it into more opportunity that they can have with their external facing clients.

Steve 19:28
Well, Anthony, one of the things we’ve seen a lot of in the HR tech space, specifically over the years is more focused on data privacy, data security. And I think by extension, as we talk about the Gen AI story a little bit in the Gen AI technology is responsible use of technology in the enterprise, specifically around people’s personal information, but as well just in general when we start talking about things like because HR decision making right and the talent management processes get into things like hiring and promotions and compensation, right. And behind all of those we know, right, we have biases and inequities. And you know, the entire dei conversation of the last few years is wrapped up in a lot of this. It’s a big topic. And I’m going to try to at least ask a more pointed question, which is, maybe we’ll start with this, as organizations begin to consider these experiments, as you said, and get starting to get themselves and their employees better educated around these capabilities. How would you want them to think about or approach things like responsible use of these technologies, to to make sure that we’re not a exposing data, we shouldn’t be exposing of the enterprise and then be making sure we’re not substituting processes and technologies that lead to some maybe bad outcomes for another new set of technologies that might lead us into the same place?

Anthony Abbatiello 20:56
I mean, you know, go back to the, to the original uses of some of the, you know, the previous Machine Learning Technologies, because they were taught by humans, they were they learned the human bias, right. So, you know, the people that were selected for a certain job were selected based on humans. And so the technology learns that along the way, so when we talk about, you know, the responsible practices around AI, particularly as it relates to, you know, HR, you know, the workforce related functions, there’s a couple of things. You know, I think the first one is, you know, that point about bias and fairness, just understanding the measures of fairness and how to test the systems and the approaches. You know, you mentioned the the privacy and security, so making sure that they have the right cybersecurity methods in place before they go out to, you know, release any of the newer technologies, and that there’s that level of data privacy, what is data that should be shared, how it should be used, you know, and one that I think oftentimes is overlooked, is, you know, how they interpret the and explain the data and the outputs of this, you know, and that’s really about how will the information that is returned to me be used in decision making and decision support. And I think oftentimes, we were enamored by the speed and the efficiency of what is delivered through some of these generativity AI tools. And we don’t think about how that, how we’re going to sustain that ability to interpret and explain those results out into the organization. So that having a very thoughtful approach to this and, you know, this sort of sounds like it flies in the face of what I was saying before about, you know, just go try and just get an experiment. I mean, those two things can coexist, right, you do need to have some degree of experimenting, and you can experiment with it, you could do so in a way that still, you know, keeps the privacy, the security, the bias, and the interpretability of these outputs with fairness, you know, and governed in a way that doesn’t, you know, immediately put the organization or the people.

Anthony Abbatiello 23:18
Thank you for sharing that, because that, as Steve mentioned, that is something that comes up quite often, when we’re talking with with various leaders, I would love to hear how you’re thinking about the way that that use of generative AI, and, and the relationship with skills and upskilling I know that at PwC, as a former employee, obviously upskilling and constantly kind of moving toward that, that organization that is learning based is very important. It’s just in the fabric at PWC. And how things were kind of woven together? How are you all approaching that when you think about the way that we’re upskilling our workforce, and using Gen AI and educating them on Gen AI? What should organizations be focused on there?

Anthony Abbatiello 24:05
Yes, and Trish, I love that you gave us our own commercial. So thank you for that. We you know, we it’s something that we value very dearly and you know, this as you know, as a former PwC or write your we really respect and value the lifelong learner. And so part of what, you know, the the approach both that we’re taking that we’re doing with our, with our clients, you know, it is it is twofold. One is we want to democratize the AI upskilling so that everyone can learn and understand and be equipped to apply AI capabilities or the the lens of AI responsible AI to the work that they’re doing with clients, whether it’s, you know, it’s on our trust side, or within consulting, as well. We want to educate our leaders right and equipping our stakeholder elders are leaders for Responsible Use and oversight. So they know, you know what to look for, and how they can enable the professionals within the organization within our organization, on how to use generative AI, you know, the basics of how it works, how we need to govern, and go back to that point of bias interpretability, you know, privacy, the security around that all of those factors around responsible AI really rest in the, you know, the accountability of the leader. So both parts, and parties really learn and grow as part of the process. We, for PwC, we announced a massive investment last year one of those things is, you know, for within the US, particularly where we’re upskilling, all 75,000 of our professionals with the my are my AI Academy, so that everyone could, you know, have access to become, quote, unquote, certified as an AI professional, and understanding what those capabilities are. And our leaders as well are getting the understanding of that upskilling and understanding to so that they are equipped, and that we can equip the leaders within the organization for Responsible Use and oversight at the same time. So, you know, at the end, we want this to become part of the vernacular of our professionals, but also for them to be able to have those meaningful discussions about impact and opportunity with the clients that they serve.

Anthony Abbatiello 26:28
I love that you are approaching it that way. I was very excited to hearing about the my AI Academy. Hopefully, that’s something that will be available to the alumni network. If not, I may have to put in a patch there. Yeah. Yeah, I’m gonna I’m gonna go for that. No, I mean, I I agree, I didn’t, hopefully it didn’t come across like a commercial. It’s, I mean, it from my heart. I mean, I spent a lot of years with PwC. And we weren’t calling it skilling or upscaling. At the time, it was, it was always about, you know, filling the gaps was kind of what we refer to it as in the region I was working in and, and I still I carry that with me throughout my career, right, I’ve always been looking for what is the gap between what you know, and what you need to know? And how can you then sort of take care of that. And so I love that it’s, it’s really evolved into this mindset, right, that you all have and like, like you say, it’s not just the PwC employees and leaders, it’s your clients as well, right. So you’re, you’re pushing that learning attitude out, which I applaud you for, it’s a difficult thing to do. And PwC certainly has the resources and the knowledge to be able to do it. So congratulations on that. I can’t wait to hear how that Academy really enhances what you’ve been doing already.

Anthony Abbatiello 27:44
Yeah, we’re excited about it. And it’s definitely, you know, we tend to as you know, we tend to trip learn on ourselves first before we bring it to our clients. But and that’s what’s happening, you know, now that we’ve rolled that out, you know, we have so many, you know, opportunities where clients are trying to do the same thing. So we’re bringing the same capability now to them, as well. So internally and externally having, hopefully having continued success.

Steve 28:07
You have any one as one last question from me, you know, I see a lot of technology each year as part of what I do with the HR tech conference and some other things that we work on all year long search with our partners and clients. And so as you’d imagine a ton of AI solutions last year, right, in the course of doing what we do, as you have worked with clients and PwC is kind of assess the landscape of technology right now. Specifically talking about HR, human capital, these kinds of applications, is there one or two things that are standing out to you and kind of these early forays into Gen AI, or clients of PwC are experimenting with and maybe having some success with that stand out? Like because I’ve seen a lot of locations, but I you know, I’m not sure what’s really moving the needle so much yet is there is it, you know, creating job descriptions? Is it creating, you know, skills taxonomies is or is there something that’s standing out to you that say, Hey, boy, this is really interesting, what’s happening here?

Anthony Abbatiello 29:09
Yeah, I mean, funny enough, I’m going to be publishing my predictions for 2024 today. So I’m gonna give you my second prediction is about, really about Gen AI. And this moving from idea to action, particularly around as it relates to the workforce. And so I’d say there’s, there’s kind of three camps around this, the first camp is there were things that are happening that were already happening already, you know, that that, you know, the Gennai boom happened in 2023. And, you know, it kind of brought some more light to it, but I think things about really about recruiting and sourcing those have been out for a while, you know, we do have, you know, talent, intelligence and, you know, others that are out there that, you know, that have helped in the past to automate the recruiting process. So, I think I put that into camp number one, sort of Camp number two is, you know, the adjacencies to what’s existing today, right. So easier, there were a bit into it, you know, past idea. And I think a lot of that is, you know, in the space around skill development, you know, where you where you would have the the ability to dynamically generate, you know, skill development paths, you know, learning journeys that are more tailored to the individual, and can certainly help with the development of the third, where I’d say is where it gets more innovative into the HR, really, as it relates to the workforce. I think the two areas in that in that third camp, the first is just around the employee experience, you know, how we’re using Gen AI assistance, you know, creating, you know, more tailored delivery and interaction for the workforce, I say, the true workforce, because it could be the employees and their, you know, their contractors, or gig workers and the like, to engage and, and create a meaningful experience for them around the way that works. So think of it that this, these are the things where, you know, we’re we’re shift swapping, we’re using Gen AI to say, okay, Anthony wants to change, you know, and have different shifts or things that have been out there already, but they’ve been more manual. Now having, you know, that experience out there, or, you know, serving you up content, you know, for to perform your job, or to provide you with, you know, different alerts around rewards, benefits, wellness, that really kind of bring that holistic experience.

Anthony Abbatiello 31:45
The second is around the delivery, right, taking the page of the, from the customer facing functions and bringing that into HR. So, you know, the, you know, marketing and customer facing organizations, they use this single pane of glass right there, we start about a spa bug, and, you know, having that spa capability within for the workforce, using generative AI to shape what that you know, how we deliver that. And that’s beyond just the digital assistant, right? I want to, you know, today’s my, you know, my, I’m getting married, or I’m having a child, or, you know, all that, and what comes along with that, not just walking them through the process, like as in a chatbot, but actually delivering that, you know, that first full contact, and being able to solve and actually learn with generative AI, they’re learning about that individual about that case, and or about, you know, the other knowledge that exists around that. So it actually has the ability now to start to look at, oh, people like Anthony, who have gone through x. Right. You know, they’ve also asked this question, I’m going to pose the question back to Anthony, because he may also be that we’re actually creating a different level of efficiency around the HR function. That, you know, many, many of the, you know, contact centers today are being able to use where they have Jen AI assistants who are actually, you know, they’ve actually been programmed to have a motion sentiment thought, you know, they’re using, you know, arms, and, oh, that’s a good question. Right? They’re changing their, their expression, right, and all of that being part of the delivery of the HR experience, right? Nobody wants to sit on the phone with anyone anymore. No one has time for you know, to do that everyone wants a quick text message, and be able to have that level of interaction. So I think in that third category, you know, having both the workforce experience and more innovative and efficient delivery of HR, to the employees and to the workforce.

Steve 33:56
That’s fascinating, because I’ve seen, as I said, I preface the question with I’ve seen a lot of, you know, examples of AI tech for HR, I’ve seen many of the examples you talked about, but I’ve not seen some of those, those manifestations that you described there about, you know, imbuing these tools with little more humanity, which is really fascinating area to consider, and I’ll be looking out for that. For sure. That’s, that’s so interesting. This has been fascinating stuff. I can’t wait to read your predictions. Anthony, we’ll make sure we’ll get a link out in the show notes to them. As they’re coming out. We’ll make sure people can find that. Is there anything else you want to close with? folks want to find you connect with you or maybe access some of the PwC as a great Gen AI kind of resource hub? I’m looking at it right now over on my on the monitor, but is there anything you’d like to just share with folks to learn more and or connect with you?

Anthony Abbatiello 34:50
Well, firstly, you know, going to pwc.com you can search on my name Anthony Abbatiello. Or I’m on LinkedIn. On Twitter, I only post about things related to the workforce, no cats or kids. Sorry, but just about my passion for workforce and all things human capital. And again, I you know, I close with that whole point where we started it just it this is the year for, we’ve talked about it talked about it talked about it, let’s, let’s get to action, let’s try to experiment. And, you know, to the extent we can, you know, I’ll be out and, you know, encouraging CEOs role is really to embed and enable that experimentation, that that agility around Gen AI this year, because as we come out of 2024, and we’re sitting here, hopefully a year from now, we can say, yeah, here are some meaningful examples where Company X tried this or company wide, right that I see them, they’re not under for public consumption yet. But I know they’re there. And those actions, those those experiences are going to really help shape the way we’re going to continue to evolve the HR function. And you know, my goal is to get the CHRO in the spotlight, not just in the room, but in the spotlight in the boardroom, the way many of their peers have been. And I think this is going to be you know, one of the great stories we’re going to tell.

Anthony Abbatiello 36:21
I love it. Thank you so much for coming on and sharing all of this with us like Steve alluded to, I mean, you you take even things that we are aware of and sort of illuminate them in a much different and more detailed way. So I appreciate that. My big takeaway Steve and Anthony from this is the whole education piece and experimentation, right? I haven’t heard it phrased quite that way. And I love the sort of the optimism that goes along with that. And making people feel like this is really something you can do. You can learn, you can understand, and you can apply. So I really appreciate you coming on today.

Anthony Abbatiello 36:53
Thank you for having me. I love the show. And I’m an avid listener and you guys got me through a very long car ride last week, so thank you.

Steve 37:03
We appreciate that. It’s great to see you again. I think maybe we’ll put a tickler on calendars. Like we should check in with you like next January right to see how the year turned out I think. Yeah, for sure. Okay, so Anthony Abbatiello from PwC. Wonderful conversation. Thanks so much. We’ll make sure we get some links in the show notes. Some of the resources Anthony mentioned as well as how to find him. Thanks to our friends at Paychex of course for sponsoring the show. They’re awesome to us and great, great to have them with us again in 2024. Trish, great to see you great stuff. A great way to get the year started here on the HR Happy Hour Media Network. Thanks so much.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai