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Not entirely out of business, of course.

But we should put our current way of doing things out of business. Then, we can make way for a newer, awesomer HR.

I think the future of human resources is five or six specialized functions (there may be overlap with a few of these):

1. Leadership Readiness. Right now, we’re kind of a crutch for crappy managers. Instead, we should focus our time and attention on preparing future leaders before they move into leadership roles.
2. Employer Branding. You don’t control your employer brand – your employees do. But you can help drive conversations internally and externally about the culture. Which means HR also needs to be a…
3. Cultural Agitator. You also can’t control your culture. But you can lead conversations and workshops that help create cultural change.
4. Sourcing. Part of enabling leaders means teaching them how to effectively build teams. But that doesn’t mean they should spend their precious time sourcing candidates. Sourcing specialists should do that. HR sources. Leaders select.
5. Compensation. Organizations need to have a corporate strategy around how they pay their people (average, above average, below?) and capture data to help drive that strategy. And then leaders need to have the flexibility to execute on that strategy to build their teams as they see fit.
6. The Other Stuff. You know – benefits, payroll and so on. Someone’s gotta do it! Maybe that means in-house. Maybe that means outsourced. But at the end of the day, this stuff will probably always be part of the HR function.