Data has always been important, especially in the Human Resources (HR) industry.

2021 will see the Human Resource (HR) industry across Asia-Pacific finding better ways to sift through employee data by getting back to the basics. Data collected by Artificial Intelligence (AI) will become increasingly important for non-technical careers each year. If a HR professional does not understand the data they are inundated with, they would not be able to drive their company forward—and if an HR team is not data literate from the start, it is already behind. To change this, teams must start with the right data. As they sift through information, often much of what they are looking at is not relevant. Identifying the relevant and important data from the rest of the data is imperative.

As an industry, HR needs to come up with a better way to conduct the process of identifying relevant data, especially as it is related to diversity and inclusion. With a recent focus on this sector, data plays a huge role in making sure needs and numbers are met, so employees feel comfortable in their work environment and safe enough to express themselves. The onus is on the HR team and the company to go above and beyond to build the culture of inclusion and hold itself accountable to report on factors within this sector that aren’t necessarily required.

At its core, HR is focussed on people—and the smartest AI system in the world cannot change that. In order to understand the right data, teams—ironically enough—will need to get back to the basics. This means they should be more in tune than ever with what their companies need, where they are going, and how to build a talent strategy to support that. Data will increasingly serve as a tool driving effective decision-making and measuring outcomes. The change, however, is done by and for the people.

As Chief People Officer, Matt Norman leads the global people team and is responsible for building DigitalOcean’s people strategy to support the company’s continued growth, culture, innovation, and profitability. In this role, he oversees talent acquisition and development, compensation and benefits, diversity and inclusion, facilities, and employee engagement programmes.