80 to Infinity
A Vision for the Future of Work
What does it mean to look forward, not just a few years, but decades into the future?
For HR professionals, this kind of thinking is essential. The way we work is changing rapidly, and the systems we design today will shape how we live and lead tomorrow.
This report celebrates a huge milestone: the 80th anniversary of SD Worx. For eight decades, we’ve helped organisations navigate change. But "80 to Infinity" is just about looking back. It’s an invitation opportunity to look ahead. We asked our experts to imagine what might come next in the world of work, and how HR leaders could shape it. Each section of this report explores a future vision grounded in expert insight, creative foresight, and human potential.
“No one can know exactly what lies ahead. But exploring that future is how we prepare. And shaping it is what HR does best.”
— Bruce Fecheyr-Lippens, Chief People Officer, SD Worx
1. The Thriving Workforce
From engagement to vitality
In the future, wellbeing will not be a perk. It will be a strategic differentiator and the foundation of a thriving workforce. Success will be measured not only by output, but also by the employees’ quality-of-life. Work will be designed around human energy, and organisations will be judged by how well they enable people to thrive.
“In an optimal future of work, jobs will be designed in a way that ensures well-being is a natural outcome, and follow-up is no longer needed.”
— Marc Vermeesch, Internal Prevention Adviser, SD Worx
Personalised, predictive and holistic
AI-powered tools will anticipate individual needs, offer real-time support, and guide employees toward healthier ways of working. From stress detection to personalised learning paths, technology will empower HR to act early and effectively.
However, well-being will go beyond prevention. It will be about creating the conditions for purpose, connection, and continuous growth. HR will shift from managing workforce health reactively to designing proactive, personalised wellbeing strategies to support physical, mental, social, and financial health.
With the help of predictive analytics, organisations will be able to prevent burnout and tailor development paths based on energy, passion, and purpose. The most future-ready organisations will do more than simply support well-being, they will design for it.
The evolving role of HR
HR will become the architect of cultures that enable flourishing. Rather than managing workforce health reactively, HR will design proactive strategies across all dimensions of wellbeing. It will be a shift from productivity to vitality – putting people’s whole selves at the centre of business success. Organisations that thrive will be those that help people thrive.
2. Teams Beyond Boundaries
From static structures to infinite ecosystems
The traditional team is being replaced by a dynamic, skills-based workforce. Human employees, AI collaborators, freelancers, and digital agents will work together across borders, contracts, and time zones. The idea of a fixed team will dissolve into fluid, outcome-oriented networks.
“In decades to come, your closest collaborators might be an AI experience manager in Munich, an ethics officer in Oslo, and your own digital twin.”
— Jan Laurijssen, HR Evangelist – Researcher - Consultant, SD Worx
Trust at scale, technology with empathy
As teams become more distributed and digitally diverse, HR will design the environments where collaboration and creativity can thrive. This will mean curating ecosystems that blend automation with emotional intelligence, while ensuring that the human element remains central.
You’ll be less focused on headcount and more focused on capability and talent curation blending internal teams, freelancers, AI assistants, and virtual collaborators to deliver outcomes. This shift calls for new workforce models, skills mapping, and cross-boundary collaboration strategies.
The most effective organisations will be those that enable high-performing, hybrid teams to co-create value in tech-enabled environments grounded in trust. AI will increase efficiency, but it will also elevate the importance of connection, purpose, and emotional intelligence.
The evolving role of HR
HR will continue to evolve from managing employees towards orchestrating ecosystems. This includes designing trust frameworks, enabling cross-boundary collaboration, and creating high-tech, high-touch experiences where people and AI can co-create value. HR must lead in creating hybrid workplaces that are both efficient and profoundly human, not designed to replace us, but to empower us.
3. Living, Breathing Payroll
From transaction to transformation
Payroll will no longer be just about accuracy and compliance. It will become a strategic enabler of employee experience. Future payroll systems will operate in real time, adapting to individual lives as they unfold. Milestones, health insights, and personal goals will inform compensation. Tomorrow’s payroll will know your workforce better than ever before. It will notice and enable your team to adjust their income goals, to invest in their next adventures, or to pause and reset.
Transparent, intelligent, and empowering
Payslips will evolve into experiential touchpoints, part of an interactive payment environment.
“Payment experiences will offer clarity and control. They won’t just show what’s changed – they’ll explain why, answering questions before employees even need to ask them.”
- Eimear Byrne, Ireland Country Leader, SD Wor
Payroll will integrate seamlessly with well-being programmes, performance insights, and career journeys. It will become an intelligent, responsive conversation. Not just a monthly transaction of earnings, but a tool for empowerment and growth. People will no longer need to chase down HR for answers; instead, payroll will proactively guide their financial understanding.
The evolving role of HR
As payroll evolves, so does the role of HR. HR is already shifting from processing payslips to designing adaptive reward ecosystems. Compensation will reflect more than just hours worked – it will express value, contribution, and care. This will require systems that are intelligent, transparent, and capable of integrating with broader employee experience strategies. HR will take the lead in ensuring that payroll becomes an empowering, ethical and human-centred system.
The future of work will not follow a straight line
It will emerge through imagination, intention and shared action. Payroll, talent, and wellbeing will become interwoven and alive – part of a greater system that adapts and grows with us. Our role as HR professionals and organisations is to start imagining that future now. The choices we make today will shape what work becomes, and who we become through it.
The Reinvention of HR:
Key Milestones to Come
01
HR is everywhere
The HR function no longer sits apart. Instead, its mindset and methods are woven through every part of the organisation. From product teams to AI design labs, HR practice and practitioners are embedded in daily work, transmitting values, culture to help businesses stay human as they evolve.
02
People and machines, working as one
Meaningful collaboration between humans and intelligent systems is a core design principle in every workplace, central to every employee experience. New specialisms gain traction, such as trust design, ethics facilitation, and emotional intelligence coaching. These aren’t so much soft skills as the skills that hold everything else at work together.
03
From human resources to human restoration
In a world transformed by climate, technology, and shifting values, helping people to do better work becomes a practice of stewardship. The goal is to help people reconnect with purpose, create space for healing, and design work that sustains life – individual and collective. It’s no longer about managing resources. It’s about caring for what matters.
