From AI agents to better jobs: five ideas worth taking home from UNLEASH Paris 2026

I came home from UNLEASH Paris 2026 with a notebook full of ideas, follow-up conversations and, thanks to the exhibitors, soft toys for my children. HR conferences do know how to make an exhibition hall fun.

Across seven stages and a busy show floor, AI was everywhere. But it went beyond just pie-in-the-sky ‘AI is coming’ and started instead to describe with new clarity the what, the how and the when, and urged HR leaders to lean in, and position themselves for leading through this coming era.

Between Josh Bersin‘s keynote, a Workday roundtable and conversations with leaders from Workhuman, 50skills and HiBob, here are five themes I’m taking away.

1. Rethink the work, not just the tasks

Josh Bersin offered a picture of HR in 2030: a more connected function supported by networks of specialised AI agents that can share information and help people make better decisions.

His argument was bigger than cost savings. With labour markets facing demographic pressures, he sees AI as a way for businesses to grow and employees to do more valuable work.

Kristjan Kristjansson, co-founder and CEO of 50skills, encouraged me to think about a job as a collection of tasks, rather than a fixed title. Some tasks will change or disappear, while new kinds of work will emerge.

For HR teams, the starting point is to ask what outcome a role or process should deliver before deciding what to automate.

2. Meet the AI business partner

One of my favourite ideas came from KeyAnna Schmiedl, Chief Human Experience Officer at Workhuman.

Finding that departmental AI ambassadors weren’t quite enough, Workhuman created an additional responsibility: the AI business partner. These people help departments identify sensible opportunities for AI, then translate between colleagues who understand the work and engineers who understand the technology.

Workhuman is developing a tailored course with University College Dublin. The responsibility currently sits alongside people’s existing jobs while the company assesses what’s needed. Interest has come from across the business, including an executive assistant, which I thought was particularly brilliant as often the PAs and EAs career progression depends on the person they support. But this role could very much suit them as it takes a lynchpin and translator type to do it.

I love the simplicity of this role. Organisations have needed people who can bridge business and technology for years. AI might finally make that skill impossible to overlook.

3. Employee self-service could become A Lot More helpful

At a Workday roundtable, a demonstration brought the possibilities down to earth.

An employee asked when they could take sabbatical leave. Instead of hunting for policies or raising an HR ticket, an AI assistant found the relevant information, explained eligibility and next steps, and linked to the source policy. Where a request couldn’t be resolved automatically, the discussion showed how it could go to a human HR colleague.

That’s the sort of improvement employees would notice, and that might save a lot of time.

Contributors from Philips and Accenture also discussed the essential foundations behind the interface: reliable people data, skills information and sensible safeguards. The exciting technology is only part of the story, and I’ll be writing a full piece on this in the coming weeks to explore it fully.

4. After the technology comes the storytelling

KeyAnna shared something that will resonate with anyone working in internal communications or change.

For Workhuman, 2026 has been about putting tools and people systems in place. Her priority for 2027 is helping employees understand how those pieces fit together, including their opportunities to develop and grow.

That means closer collaboration between HR, internal communications, employer brand and marketing.

Implementing technology doesn’t automatically create a better employee experience. People need to know what’s changing, why it matters and how it helps them. So the good old fashioned craft of storytelling is once again going to be in the spotlight. Sometimes the next big transformation priority isn’t another platform. It’s explaining the ones you already have. Leaders will need a strong, united narrative around the vision of the future, what new platforms are, what the benefits are for the business and employees, and it’s a great opportunity for Internal Comms here.

5. AI could make jobs better, if we use the time well

There was a welcome note of optimism about careers.

KeyAnna argued that entry-level roles needn’t disappear as AI takes on routine tasks. They could be redesigned to give new starters more meaningful experience and coaching. She suggested careers might look less like ladders and more like rock walls, with different ways to grow.

HiBob’s CEO shared an example of an employee who, he said, reduced a task taking two days each month to 11 seconds using AI. It’s a striking possibility, and it raises again the question we have been exploring lately of what happens to the time saved.

Kristjan offered a related caution: some heavy AI users he knows are more tired than ever, constantly switching between tasks and agents.

For me, this is an employee experience opportunity. The goal shouldn’t just be to squeeze more work into the day. It should be to make work better.

The conversations are only beginning

What made UNLEASH enjoyable was the mix: big ideas on stage, practical demonstrations, conversations over coffee and an exhibition floor with plenty of personality.

I left optimistic, and with a clearer sense of what practitioners need next, real examples, sensible experiments and opportunities to learn from one another and get a chance to see and experience the true art of the possible, which the demos did really well.

UNLEASH heads to Miami from 13 to 15 April 2027, bringing HR and business leaders together again to explore AI, skills, workforce strategy and the future of work. Find out more about UNLEASH Miami.

Employee Experience Magazine attended UNLEASH Paris 2026 as a media partner.