According to the expert, CHROs and CIOs must intentionally share ownership of different priority capabilities in the agentic AI-driven future, such as managing the risks, bias, safety concerns, and human impacts when AI agents interact with people and processes.
HR and IT should also share responsibility in crafting a skills-based approach, determining the total cost of work analysis, redesigning work, and coming up with new human-AI performance management amid agentic AI adoption.
Without blended HR-IT teams, Whittle warned that the growing agentic AI adoption may lead to role confusion, where CHROs are left to manage workforce consequences from AI deployments that they did not help shape, while CIOs become accidental owners of workforce challenges created by AI.
Another consequence of not having blended HR-IT teams is the one-sided workplace transformation, where HR prioritises people without enough focus on technology, or IT may prioritise innovation without fully considering the workforce implications.
“These challenges can leave organisations stuck between AI experimentation and enterprise-scale impact,” Whittle said.