“Is it time for the AI Agent to become part of the org chart?”
Bringing together a group of leading HR executives from across Munich to champion a conversation all around the future of AI and the role of Agentic AI. Annapurna was delighted to partner with one of the leading organisations in this space, Eightfold, for an open and interactive roundtable.
Hosted by James Ballard (Co-Founder at Annapurna) and joined by our experts in the room, Christian Grimm (VP DACH at Eightfold) and Chris McNaughton (Strategic Account Executive at Eightfold), we covered a variety of topics as we looked to understand the skills and mindset HR teams need to possess to effectively integrate agentic AI into their workflows.
Becoming a dynamic, innovative function that drives productivity at scale is the aim, but how do we get there?
The conversation covered a variety of angles, bringing about the following takeaways:
HR must shift from operational execution to strategic orchestration, with AI as a capacity multiplier, not a replacement.
HR is still spending too much time on routine operations, leaving little room for strategic work. Agentic AI presents an opportunity to automate low-value tasks, but only if HR rewrites processes with autonomy, fairness and accountability in mind.
The future HR function won’t do more with less; it will do more of what matters by offloading repeatable workflows and redeploying human time into relationship-building, decision-making and organisational impact. As efficiency drives operations more than ever, the strategic role of implementing AI to serve the business better has never been needed more.
Success with agentic AI aligns with a shift in mindset, skills, and confidence
A recurring theme throughout the evening was fear and the worry from employees that if AI takes over tasks, “my work is gone.”
HR teams themselves lack clarity on what AI can actually do and where its boundaries should be. This knowledge gap is slowing adoption. Leaders emphasised the need for widespread education across the workforce, building a mindset that sees AI as augmenting rather than replacing HR. Empowering HR teams with new skills, new KPIs, and new ways of working is essential to unlock value and maintain trust.
How do we truly understand the value of AI? Can we build a culture of empowerment for our employees who want to self-educate themselves? How can we showcase the easy wins to help bring people on the journey?
AI in HR must be anchored in value creation, ethical clarity, and the employee experience.
Efficiency cannot be the sole goal. Leaders stressed that AI should challenge business strategy, elevate self-service, strengthen engagement, and enhance fairness…not just reduce headcount or remove “safe routine work.”
As AI scales interviews, supports talent matching and redesigns employee journeys, HR must redefine its role as the steward of human experience. The organisations that win will integrate agentic AI thoughtfully while preserving humanity, transparency and ethical guardrails.
The role of AI in organisations and its ability to create efficiencies is undoubtedly one of the greatest paradoxes that is facing leaders in the current climate. The capability of the technology and the opportunity it provides can only be reaped by organisations that dedicate resources to identifying its potential. HR departments say they don’t have enough time to do new/exciting things, such as AI, and this paradox is in itself the point of inception we are at. The ROI of AI will be seen if everyone is focused on the same aim and not striving to be fully efficiency-focused but questioning the business strategy itself.
