I have been working with HR across three companies, including my current role at Netigate. I have a strong background in product and technology, which complements my work here. At Netigate, I hold a dual role. On one hand, I’m part of the People and Culture team, focusing on areas such as engagement and building our employer brand. On the other hand, I work on delivering software-as-a-solution engagement for our customers. My responsibilities span payroll, recruitment, culture building, and much more.
Looking back at 2024, the big development in Employee Experience and HR has been the continued rise of generative AI, building on the momentum from last year. It’s shaping how we approach processes and engagement. Another significant focus has been navigating the challenge of bringing people back to the office—or choosing not to.
The market remains slow-moving, and engagement levels have stayed relatively flat compared to previous years. However, one constant is that employees are increasingly asking for opportunities to develop skills and grow their careers. A notable trend from this year has been the recognition of a general lack of growth opportunities, which has carried over from last year.
The lack of growth opportunities is due to several factors. Sadly, many companies have shifted to cautious spending, prioritizing savings over investments in hiring, training, and new solutions. However, there’s a growing trend toward upskilling and developing existing employees.
The tech recession has also slowed growth, limiting expansion opportunities. Internally, movement within companies has been slower, with fewer roles opening up for employees to explore. It’s similar to the housing market—people want to move but feel stuck due to limited options. This highlights the need for more flexibility and opportunities for growth within organizations
In 2025, the focus will shift toward efficiency gains, with organizations exploring solutions to enhance employee productivity through better tooling. While there will likely be some failures along the way, People teams will be at the forefront, driving this organizational shift. It’s comparable to the Agile movement 15 years ago, where the right type of coaching was key—and I believe we’ll see a similar emphasis now.
Another major area will be the ongoing ‘hybrid work’ debate. Companies will start investing more in solving the challenges of hybrid setups, and it will be fascinating to see how hybrid models evolve compared to fully in-office approaches.
Our team is focusing on becoming organizational coaches, helping set up efficient work streams and ensuring there’s not too much time between iterations. On the technical side, we’re exploring use cases for tools like Co-Pilot, OpenAI, and other AI-driven solutions across different departments.
We’re noticing significant ‘shadow use’ of AI, with teams—like Legal—asking how they can adopt AI responsibly. The goal is to identify limited, effective user cases. Marketing, for example, is a big area where we’re exploring how to create natural, human-like content with AI.
Interestingly, we see that most organizations only use about 5% of a tool’s capabilities, so we’re also working on maximizing the potential of the tools we already have.
When it comes to employee satisfaction and engagement, the main drivers—such as management, development opportunities, and company culture—haven’t changed much over the past decade. However, during the pandemic, many companies adopted frequent pulse surveys (weekly or bi-weekly) to monitor engagement, which led to survey fatigue. As a result, we’re now seeing a shift back to quarterly or yearly surveys, though this can delay the identification of issues.
A key trend is leveraging existing organizational data beyond surveys. For example, HR systems already provide insights like average tenure, while tools like Teams or Slack can highlight work patterns that indicate fatigue, such as double bookings or late working hours.
Another factor is turnover. If 10% of employees typically want to move each year, but the market only accommodates 5%, it compounds, leading to higher turnover down the line. While we’re not seeing the same ‘Great Resignation’ as during the pandemic, I wouldn’t be surprised if turnover increases by 20–30% across companies.
The priority should be identifying and retaining key employees crucial for achieving business goals. Leaders must avoid panic and focus on creating strategies to retain the right people as the market shifts.
The biggest challenge with employee experience is acting on feedback and implementing meaningful changes. Often, organizations already have a sense of the issues if they’re listening to employees, but they may be limited in their ability to act due to structural or business constraints. This can lead to frustration and survey fatigue among employees.
While certain issues, like addressing bullying or harassment, can be tackled directly, others—such as career development—are often tied to the broader business environment and harder to address. Change is what employees want most, but it’s also the hardest to achieve.
My advice? Start with meaningful conversations between managers and employees. Research shows that regular, focused conversations—15 minutes weekly or 30 minutes bi-weekly—can have a huge impact. These discussions should cover company goals, offer support, and check in on individual needs. It’s a simple, cost-effective way to make employees feel heard and valued.
Lastly, honesty and transparency are key. For example, if an employee expresses interest in a role that isn’t available or that they are not considered a good fit for, acknowledge their aspirations and discuss what can be done in the future. Even when the answer isn’t ideal, being open builds trust.
I’ve been experimenting with AI technologies to explore how they can enhance HR processes. The approach has been iterative—building solutions, implementing them, and learning from the results. I started with simple use cases, focusing on what generative AI excels at. For example, we’ve developed HR bots that handle FAQs like, ‘Where can I find information on vacation policies?’ These tools integrate with platforms like SharePoint to structure and retrieve information quickly, improving efficiency.
Language capabilities have also been a key focus. In global companies with diverse nationalities, generative AI has proven invaluable for translating and sharing information in multiple languages, like German or French, to ensure everyone stays informed.
We’ve also experimented with AI in recruitment, such as verifying CVs to reduce bias. While AI can help identify patterns, it’s important to remember that it can also have biases, so everything must be double-checked.
One exciting area is integrating data from various sources, such as HRM tools, pulse surveys, and Glassdoor reviews, into a central database to identify patterns. For instance, we can analyze trends over the past 10 years to see if things are improving or where challenges remain. However, caution is needed—AI often jumps to conclusions, like interpreting emotions without context, so understanding the data correctly is critical.
We’ve also created a bot for labor law queries, such as finding probation period rules in Germany. By sourcing accurate information and validating it with experts, this tool has become highly useful. I see more HR tools adopting these AI-driven solutions in the future, particularly for document analysis and structuring information in meaningful ways.
People analytics is becoming increasingly important, especially in Europe, where more HR teams are seeking to adopt these tools. While American companies have been ahead in this area, people analytics is still primarily used by larger organizations, often for succession planning.
The advantage of people analytics is that it lowers the barrier to forward-looking planning. For example, if employees are asking for new roles or resignations are expected, analytics can help HR teams predict trends. In tech, for instance, recruitment cycles are longer, and it can take six months to recruit developers. People analytics helps anticipate these needs early, so HR teams can start planning recruitment well in advance—like knowing they’ll need to hire 2–4 developers in the next six months.
By using data-driven insights, HR can collaborate more effectively with finance departments, integrating their forecasting and planning to take a more proactive role. People analytics also helps HR teams support department managers with actionable insights, allowing them to coach their teams and address potential gaps before they arise