The word “disruption” has been a near-constant in HR circles since the COVID-19 pandemic started sweeping the nation this spring. From making remote work an overnight reality to redefining flexibility, HR leaders are working to keep up with the changes, relying on tech along the way.

Those many shifts that have already happened — and the countless more to come — will be the focus of industry analyst Josh Bersin’s keynote address at the 2020 Virtual HR Technology Conference & Exposition^®. 

Each spring, Stacey Harris spends considerable time and effort getting the Sierra-Cedar/Sapient Insights HR Systems Survey off the ground. The project is the HR industry’s longest-running, most distributed research effort, collecting insights on the adoption and deployment of HR technology, and the innovative tech strategies organizations are implementing.

Complimentary Virtual Experience to Feature Live Q&A Sessions, AI-Powered Peer-to-Peer Matchmaking, Interactive Online Marketplace & More

Complimentary Virtual Experience Offers HR Community the Opportunity to Connect with Technologies and Guidance for Today’s World

A few months ago, I set out to articulate the most pressing short- and long-term challenges facing HR and business leaders from the coronavirus pandemic: business agility, wellbeing and leadership. Today, considerable uncertainty, stress, anxiety and even “pandemic fatigue” remain as the crisis continues to weigh on employees, HR professionals, leaders—heck, everyone.

Just a few weeks ago, many of us felt things were trending more positively: Cases of COVID-19 in the earliest and hardest-hit regions of the country had started to slow, while other regions were beginning to re-open workplaces and return to something close to “normal.”

John Sumser, founder and principal analyst for HRExaminer, has witnessed change in the HR-technology realm that puts him among the pantheon of advisors and observers.

But he’ll be the first to admit that nothing could have prepared him for the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on HR, including on executives and decision-makers who are representing employers of all stripes, sizes and industry sectors.

Laurie Ruettimann doesn’t mince words.

When asked her outlook on gender parity in corporate leadership, she didn’t sugarcoat things: “I’m not optimistic. According to the World Economic Forum, a woman would have to be born in the year 2255 to get equal pay at work. I’m irritated. How about we speed this up, OK?”

That straight talk will be at the heart of the closing session of Women in HR Tech this fall, as Ruettimann moderates a discussion on the long game of achieving gender parity in leadership ranks, which will feature PlanSource’s Nancy Sansom and Memorial Sloan Kettering’s Tomya Watt. The speakers will discuss the progress and pitfalls of gender equity in the workplace and share their personal experiences climbing the corporate ladder, a journey that, for Ruettimann—a corporate trainer, speaker and author—has taken some interesting turns, which she recently shared with HRE.

Pandemic, massive racial and political unrest, economic disruption, men in space, generational conflict, cities burning. You could be forgiven if you think we’ve been transported back to the 1960s. For a long time, nothing much happened. Then, whammo. It’s all happening at once.

The progress toward a society rooted in equality stalled some time ago. It took a political administration that says the quiet part out loud to pull the covers off the thing we didn’t want to see: We live in a class-driven society. And the primary determinant of class is skin color. Our organizations are reflections of the structural forces that drive unequal access to resources, education, jobs, and technology.

In my last column, I set out to articulate what the team at H3 HR Advisors was considering the primary challenges facing HR and business leaders as they continue to deal with the coronavirus impact today and to plan for a still-uncertain tomorrow. One month later, while perhaps a few elements of the complex array of moving parts impacting work and business have become more clear, many — if not most — have not. And, while perhaps some of us are working more actively toward the restoration of the “normal,” most of us are probably not quite there yet.

Much has been written in the past weeks and months about the business impact of the COVID-19 crisis. I, along with many others, have written extensively about the almost-overnight transition to remote work, as well as many other changes companies implemented to adapt. Now, I will be focusing on considerations for returning to work.