🔁 43% of HR Leaders Are Prioritizing Tech in 2026. Are You One of Them?

Hey HR Pros!

As we look toward 2026, 43% of HR professionals say tech upgrades are their top priority, driven by outdated systems, manual workflows, and fragmented data.
On average, organizations are juggling 6.17 HCM vendors, and 77% store employee data across multiple systems, making accurate reporting and seamless operations harder to achieve.

As AI and automation become central to workforce strategy, HR teams are now rethinking their tech stacks for long-term impact.

Upcoming In This Issue:

• 💼 How One Bank Used AI to Save 8,000 Hours and $400K on Hiring

• ⚠️ 3 in 10 Companies Plan to Replace Workers With AI in 2026

• 🎙️ Featured HR Podcast | Everybody Hates HR Podcast

• 🔒 Why Employees Are Hoarding Knowledge in the Age of AI

🔁 43% of HR Leaders Are Prioritizing Tech in 2026. Are You One of Them?

According to a recent HR Trends survey by Paycom, the average HR team uses 6+ vendors and stores data across multiple systems. The result? Lost time, bad insights, and tech that gets in the way of people work. And the cost? 7.3 hours/week lost per employee, adding up to $183B/year nationwide.

HR is ready to modernize and finally free up time to focus on people, not platforms.

The Challenge: But with so many systems, vendors, and promises out there, choosing the right path forward isn’t always simple.

The Fix: SSR’s HR Software Advisor helps HR leaders make smarter, faster, and more strategic tech decisions. Whether that means reducing vendor sprawl, finding the right-fit HRIS, ATS, Payroll or building a future-ready tech roadmap tailored to your organization’s size and goals.

Talk to an SSR HR tech Advisor to turn today’s pain points into tomorrow’s competitive edge.

💼 How One Bank Used AI to Save 8,000 Hours and $400K on Hiring

When your applicant pool hits five figures for a single role, traditional interviews can’t scale.

That’s exactly what one leading bank in the Middle East set out to fix. By leaning into asynchronous video assessments and AI-enabled workflows, they’ve reimagined how to handle volume without sacrificing candidate experience or recruiter sanity.

Key Takeaways

• 💰 AI-powered interviews saved 8,000 hours and $400K, while slashing time-to-offer by 80% since implementation began in January.

• 🎯 Candidate NPS doubled, thanks to on-demand assessments that reduced missed interviews, delays, and friction for applicants.

• 🤖 Agentic AI is next, with plans to automate preboarding and onboarding so candidates only enter their data once.

• 🔍 “Bot, build, buy, borrow” is the new workforce strategy, blending automation with upskilling and strategic workforce planning.

read the full 970-word article here

⚠️ 3 in 10 Companies Plan to Replace Workers With AI in 2026

More companies are reporting active job displacement due to AI, with a growing number planning deeper automation in 2026.

But while certain roles are under threat, the presence of AI skills is becoming a powerful form of job security. For HR leaders, that means balancing automation with reskilling—and rethinking workforce design around agility, not just headcount.

Key Data Insights

• 📉 30% of companies plan AI-related layoffs in 2026, with 10% expecting AI to replace over half their workforce.

• 💼 Customer service, admin, and IT support roles top the list of jobs most at risk of being automated.

• 📈 67% of leaders say AI-skilled employees have more job security, and hiring will favor candidates with AI fluency.

• 🚀 86% expect AI to boost productivity, with over half anticipating employees will produce “a lot” more work each week.

read the full 720-word article here

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🎙️ Featured HR Podcast | Everybody Hates HR Podcast

🔒 Why Employees Are Hoarding Knowledge in the Age of AI

As fears of AI-driven layoffs grow, more employees are keeping their know-how close to the chest.

From Gen Z newcomers to seasoned pros, a sense of job insecurity is fueling a wave of knowledge gatekeeping that’s eroding trust, stalling teamwork, and threatening culture.

Key Insights

• 📉 35% of employees are hoarding knowledge due to fear of being replaced by AI—and 38% hesitate to share expertise with peers.

• 😟 40% of Gen Z workers feel constant AI-related job anxiety, especially in entry-level roles increasingly targeted for automation.

• 🤖 Companies are using employee knowledge to train AI, then cutting jobs—creating a “me vs. them” mindset across teams.

• 💬 Rebuilding trust means transparency, not pressure—HR must lead with clarity, communication, and a culture of shared growth.

read the full 990-word article here