Preparing HR for GenAI: Research Questions Across the Employee Lifecycle

AI in HRM: Research Questions That Actually Help HR Teams

AI is reshaping HR work at every stage of the employee lifecycle. What HR needs now is research that is practical, ethical, and directly useful on the ground.

Here is a focused agenda: the questions that should guide pilots, policies, and partnerships between HR leaders and researchers.

The Big Question

Which research questions will help organizations and HR professionals work effectively in GenAI-enabled workplaces-without losing trust, fairness, or the human connection employees expect?

The Employee Lifecycle: A Practical Research Agenda

1) Talent Acquisition

• How can AI improve workforce planning, job analysis, and candidate matching while protecting fairness, diversity, and candidate trust?
• Which bias-mitigation tactics actually work in screening models, and how should they be audited over time?

2) Onboarding and Integration

• What balance of AI onboarding tools and human touch drives faster ramp-up and stronger belonging?
• How can AI support inclusion across remote, hybrid, and on-site teams without creating a two-tier experience?

3) Training, Development, and Performance

• Do AI learning platforms build technical and soft skills that transfer to the job, and how should ROI be measured?
• What safeguards keep performance feedback accurate, explainable, and aligned with company values?

4) Retention and Well-being

• How does AI inform fair pay practices, workload balance, safety, and DEI outcomes-without over-surveillance?
• Which analytics truly predict burnout or disengagement, and what interventions measurably improve well-being?

5) Separation and Offboarding

• How can AI make exit interviews richer and knowledge transfer cleaner while preserving dignity and empathy?
• What methods reduce rehiring friction and support alum networks as future talent or partners?

6) Strategic and Administrative HR

• What governance, documentation, and change-management practices are needed for safe, compliant AI decisions in HR?
• How should labor relations and works councils be engaged when AI impacts job content, schedules, or mobility?

Guardrails That Keep AI Use Trustworthy

Research and pilots should align with clear standards and legal guidance. Useful references include the NIST AI Risk Management Framework NIST AI RMF and U.S. EEOC resources on AI in employment decision-making EEOC AI Guidance.

HR needs evidence-backed methods for model documentation, bias testing, data minimization, and employee notice/consent. These practices should be repeatable and audited.

Academia-Industry Collaboration: What to Work On Together

HR leaders can bring real use cases, data constraints, and outcome targets. Researchers can bring rigorous methods, experiment design, and objective evaluation.

Partnerships should emphasize external validity: run field experiments inside live HR workflows, compare AI vs. human-only baselines, and publish what works and what fails.

What HR Leaders Can Do This Quarter

• Pick two high-friction HR processes (e.g., screening FAQs, internal mobility search). Define success metrics and a clear human-in-the-loop plan.
• Stand up an AI review council with HR, Legal, DEI, IT, and Data. Require model cards, data lineage, and bias/impact reports for each pilot.
• Adopt a feedback protocol: explainability for employees, appeal paths for decisions, and opt-out where appropriate.
• Measure outcomes beyond speed and cost: candidate quality, fairness indicators, time-to-productivity, manager load, and employee trust.
• Upskill your HR team on prompts, evaluation, and governance. A structured starting point: AI courses by job role.

The Opportunity

AI can make HR more consistent, more transparent, and more human-if we ask the right questions and test them in the real world. The six lifecycle stages offer a clear path to do that work now.

Set the research agenda with your partners, run disciplined pilots, and share the results. That's how HR stays essential in an AI-enabled workplace.