Continuing Querlo’s HR interview series, Francesco Rulli, Global CEO of Querlo, spoke with Colin Mincy, Chief People Officer at Human Rights Watch, about the challenges and opportunities during covid and in the post covid era and the role of Artificial Intelligence in the future.
Human Rights Watch is one of the world’s leading independent organizations that is dedicated to protecting human rights. With its headquarters in New York City, the organization currently has about 500 employees and is present in over 30 locations around the world. Their work includes conducting fact-finding investigations of human right abusers and monitoring countries to ensure they are not in violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The first priority, as we think about the post covid era, is to figure out how to responsibly get people back to work. This includes having contingency plans if anything goes wrong and making sure employees are comfortable transitioning from remote work back to working in offices. Colin described how at Human Rights Watch they had already been used to video conferencing and connecting through technology, but it used to be voluntary and less stressful before the pandemic.
Looking ahead, it is difficult to find a silver lining as we approach this new era. However, Colin did note that he and Human Rights Watch have learned a lot about how to manage work and remote teams that they normally wouldn’t have to know. The process of onboarding people, which includes ordering equipment for them in a timely manner and allowing them to have conversations with the key people that a new hire would need to meet, is now being done much more thoroughly. Additionally, in team meetings, people now take the time to ask one another how they are doing and if they are able to balance their work and home responsibilities.
Technology has always been a useful tool, and it became even more important during the pandemic as people had to find a way to continue work. However, Colin described AI as being a step beyond. He believes it will be a very useful way to maximize efficiency in a more precise way. For the recruitment process in particular, companies will be able leverage AI to identify characteristics of their ideal candidate, figure out where to find them, and get a better understanding of how they will work with their current teams. Overall, AI will be able to improve the experience of the candidate and the efficiency of the process.
