Latest news with #VinayGidwaney
Forbes
09-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
AI HR Is Going To Rock Our Worlds As AI Adoption Soars
BASED ON IIA Vinay Gidwaney E14-633 -AH - Google Drive Businessman touching to virtual screen with infographic and HR wording , Human development and ... More recruitment concept. How do you deal with a human resources department that's run by robots? It's a big question that one that many of us will have to consider as the weeks and months go on. AI automation is now a fact of life. It's not science fiction. It's not theory. It's happening. And that is being felt in the field of human resources – by the people who run these departments, and by the people who trust them to manage their affairs as employees. How does AI assist in HR? Or to put it another way, what does AI do in HR departments? Well, obviously, there's talent and recruitment. There's onboarding and offboarding. There's, for lack of a better term, employee decommissioning, and the entire employee life cycle. It's more than just computers calculating your payroll. Increasingly, the AI agents are going to be doing the kinds of things that Nancy or Susie from HR used to do back when HR people had human bodies and human backgrounds. This resource from the Academy to Improve Human Resources will give you a flavor of the various instances of AI that can add to HR departments. Vinay Gidwaney has experience at the MIT Media Lab and with his company, One Digital, in figuring out how HR for AI works. In a recent talk at Imagination in Action, he talked about a 'lowest common denominator' in HR, and challenges coming down the pike. 'HR departments across the country are unprepared and woefully underskilled in the impact that AI is going to have on the American workforce,' he said. He quoted Jensen Huang of Nvidia saying 'IT will become the HR of AI.' I'm not sure exactly what that means, but in any case, he brought his own analysis that's a bit different. 'We're in the advice-giving business,' he said of his work at One Digital. 'We sit down with small businesses owners, and we help them figure out their benefits and retirement plans for their employees, insurance and so on. And we sit down with American families and help them deal with their financial concerns and find success.' AI, he said, gives 'mediocre advice,' which is one reason that people have to be involved. 'People need to drive it,' he said. Here's a really interesting part of Gidwaney's presentation. He revealed that his company actually has AI coworkers – deep personas that are built for the AI parts of the HR department. 'We have a variety of AI co-workers that we deployed across the organization, and each coworker actually has a biography, they have a resume, they have experiences, they have skill sets, they have qualifications,' he said. 'They even go through regular assessments. So we test them. They have continuing education plans. They even have human supervisors.' He introduced us to Ben, Piper, Artie, Oliver, and a whole slew of AI entities that have their own human avatars, human back stories, and other characteristics, and explained that the human coworkers actually treat them as if they were humans in so many ways. There's even an AI hiring pipeline, where the company either discards AI interns, or promotes them to be apprentices. It's all part of a human-based approach, he said, that has its advantages. 'We want our AI to act and behave like humans within our organization,' he said, 'and it's incredibly important to design and model them in a way that replicates how humans act and behave in the company.' One Digital advises 100,000 HR departments around the country. Gidwaney talked about a system that's ideal in maintaining HR as a discipline. 'How do you have a merit-based process of hiring and promoting people when people use AI and you don't even know about it?' he asked. 'These are the kinds of questions that we want to start to ask when AI comes into the company. It does fundamentally change the culture of your organization. All of a sudden, the work in your organization is being done by something that you as an HR department don't have any control over.' As a CTA, he appealed to the concept of proactive interpretation of how AI will help, and a real reckoning within company culture. 'HR needs to do what they do best, which is help humans succeed at work,' he said, adding that the AI questions shouldn't just be left up to technologists, but asked all of the way through the enterprise. 'And if they're going to do that, we need to own the AI conversation in the company.' You can view the rest of the video from IIA where Gidwaney gets asked about bias and other areas of IT. In answering these questions, he continues to explore how we're going to deal with AI in our ranks – not just on the computer, but in our Slack conversations, and in meetings, and as digital coworkers who we need to acknowledge and recognize. Presumably, not everyone will be happy about sharing the break room and the conference room with various AI 'people,' but again, it's going to be a fact of life rather soon. A while ago I wrote about Toby Lutke's memo to Shopify employees telling them that AI is now mandatory. That is likely to become a pretty across the board reality pretty soon. Now you can also look back at recent blogs I've done on approaches like Alvin Graylin's manifesto, talking about replacing work with dignity as a human identity. We're going to need to do that, too. But we can't stick our heads in the sand and pretend that AI isn't going to be next to us at the table.
Associated Press
20-03-2025
- Business
- Associated Press
OneDigital Expands Impact Studio Nationwide
AI-powered platform revolutionizes workforce strategy, equipping employers with real-time insights, greater control over costs, and the ability to drive long-term impact through data-driven decisions. ATLANTA, March 20, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- OneDigital, the nation's leading insurance brokerage, financial services, and HR consulting firm, today announced the full national launch of Impact Studio, a platform that consolidates the analytics, benchmarking, surveying and workforce data tools used by OneDigital consultants to deliver strategic workforce solutions to its 75,000+ business clients nationwide. By integrating data across benefits, retirement, and employee value data, Impact Studio enhances productivity, drives data-driven outcomes, and delivers a modern consulting experience that seamlessly connects sophisticated technology with human capital. A recent McKinsey study highlights the growing demand for AI-powered solutions that drive smarter workforce decisions. Impact Studio equips OneDigital clients and consultants with AI-driven insights across benefits, retirement, and more—enhancing decision-making, simplifying processes, and delivering a comprehensive view that helps businesses plan for the future. Built on a scalable cloud-based architecture, Impact Studio offers advanced integration capabilities, and seamless data exchange across employee benefits and retirement into a single, intuitive platform—allowing OneDigital consultants to deliver deeper insights and more strategic counsel to their clients. By consolidating multiple systems into one cohesive platform, Impact Studio enhances employers' ability to control costs, maximize investments, and stay ahead of workforce trends. 'As organizations navigate evolving economic pressures, they need a partner who can not only advise on today's challenges but also help them stay 4 to 5 steps ahead for what's next,' said Bill Carew, Chief Operating Officer at OneDigital. 'They need disruptive solutions, especially when it comes to controlling cost and reducing risk.' This launch builds on the successful beta rollout in October 2024, which introduced Impact Studio in five markets. Following its beta launch, consultants using Impact Studio reported a 25% reduction in workforce planning time, allowing them to reallocate time towards identifying enhanced cost-saving opportunities and developing dynamic, forward-looking workforce strategies. The platform enhancements for this full launch include a five-year savings projection model for employee benefits and retirement clients, integrated Employee Perceived Value Study data combined with an enhanced user interface that delivers more easily digestible ai-driven insights. 'OneDigital's approach to technology is centered on supercharging the consulting power of our people,' said Vinay Gidwaney, Chief Product Officer at OneDigital. 'Our product is our people and the strategic consulting they bring to clients—we're not looking to replace them. Instead, we identify ways to make it as easy as possible for them to continue doing great work for our clients. Impact Studio is a great example of how human capital and technology can intersect for a better client outcome.' Impact Studio is designed to evolve continuously, adapting to the changing needs of employers and expanding its capabilities to address future workforce challenges. In addition to its integrated view of health, benefits, and retirement strategies, the platform will soon introduce new features to further enhance its value. Upcoming enhancements include: Human Resource Consulting Tools, such as salary benchmarking and workforce planning solutions, to support dynamic HR strategies. Property & Casualty Insurance Integration, offering a more comprehensive risk management approach for employers. Advanced AI-Driven Insights, leveraging real-time market data to provide proactive, actionable recommendations for workforce optimization. Impact Studio is now available to 75,000+ OneDigital business clients nationwide. To learn more, visit About OneDigital OneDigital's team of fierce advocates helps businesses and individuals achieve their aspirations of health, success and financial security. Our insurance, financial services and HR platform provides personalized, tech-enabled solutions for a contemporary work-life experience. Nationally recognized for our culture of caring, OneDigital's teams enable employers and individuals to do their best work and live their best lives. More than 100,000 employers and millions of individuals rely on our teams for counsel and access to fully integrated worksite products and services and the retirement and wealth management advice provided through OneDigital Investment Advisors. Founded in 2000 and headquartered in Atlanta, OneDigital maintains offices in most major markets across the nation. For more information, visit
