Toroti Akogun Is Reimagining What HR Professionals Can Do With AI

Toroti Akogun is a human resource professional, HR consultant, and entrepreneur helping people build careers in human resources and businesses build better systems for managing their people. Through HR Primer and Primer Professional Services Ltd. (Primer PSL), she works with aspiring HR professionals, business owners, and organisations to strengthen their HR capabilities. More recently, she has been exploring how artificial intelligence can help HR professionals work smarter, building practical tools that solve everyday workplace problems.

Imagine being able to build an applicant tracking system, automate employee onboarding, or create a chatbot that answers questions about company policies without having to employ a software developer to build each solution from scratch.

And if you ask me, this is where things get interesting.

For Toroti, AI is not just something to talk about at conferences or add to a professional profile because it is currently trending. She is interested in what happens when people learn to use these tools to solve real problems in their workplaces and businesses.

Through her AI Opportunity Chats in 2026, she demonstrated practical applications such as an applicant tracking system, an automated onboarding app, a policy generator and an employee chatbot. The idea was to help HR professionals and business owners see what is possible and begin exploring how they could apply these tools in their own work.

Her approach is particularly interesting because she is not coming to AI as someone who has only just discovered the world of human resources. She has spent years working in HR operations, talent development, performance management, employee relations and organisational systems. She understands the everyday demands of the work, and that experience informs the solutions she is now building.

Think about the number of hours HR professionals spend responding to routine questions, managing records, coordinating recruitment, tracking performance and following up on administrative processes. Some of these responsibilities are necessary, but they can also take time away from the work that requires human judgement, communication and a deeper understanding of people.

Toroti is exploring how AI and automation can help reduce some of that burden. Her work includes tools for policy questions, mentor and coach bookings, performance tracking and job alerts, alongside automated application, onboarding, assessment and feedback processes for development programmes. She has also designed dashboards to help leaders make sense of information and prioritise decisions.

What stands out to me is that she is connecting the technology to the actual work people need to get done. Because let’s be honest, knowing the theory and knowing how to do the work are two different things.

This practical approach also runs through her work with HR Primer, where she supports people who want to build their careers in human resources. Through programmes such as HR Primer Launchpad and HR Primer Intensive, she helps professionals develop the competencies they need to move beyond knowing the right terminology to being able to apply what they know.

Her work through Primer PSL extends to organisations as well. She helps businesses establish HR structures, develop policies and employee handbooks, strengthen performance management, and create systems that support their people as the business grows. She has also worked on leadership development and graduate trainee programmes.

The connection between these different areas is worth paying attention to. Toroti is not simply teaching people how to use tools, nor is she only helping businesses organise their HR functions. She is bringing professional development, practical HR experience and technology together in ways that can help people and organisations become more effective.

But this did not begin with AI.

Toroti’s professional journey started in education. She worked as an English Language teacher at Government Girls Day Secondary School in Gusau, Teribeta College and Starfield College before moving into human resources.

Her background in education is an important part of the picture. Teaching involves more than knowing a subject. It requires communicating ideas, understanding how people learn, helping others develop their abilities and finding ways to make knowledge useful. Those are also valuable skills in training, coaching and talent development.

Her subsequent career in HR gave her opportunities to apply and develop these skills in different organisational settings. At Karbak Ventures, she set up the HR department from scratch and managed a workforce of 90 staff. She developed policies, procedures and standardised processes while supporting recruitment, training and performance management.

She later worked across roles at RusselSmith Group and Custodian Life Assurance before joining Renmoney Microfinance Bank, where she worked in people operations and people success. At Renmoney, her responsibilities included managing compensation and benefits for more than 600 employees, supporting learning and development, and improving HR processes. During her time managing online learning platforms and campaigns, the organisation recorded an average of 488 learning hours per month. She also automated the confirmation appraisal process.

At Sankore Investments, she developed a people strategy and culture framework and automated five HR processes using Kissflow. Her later work at Smile360 Dental Specialists included performance management, manager training, skills matrices and HR policy development.

Looking at this journey, you can see the experience behind the work she is doing today. She has worked with the people, processes and systems that make organisations function. Now, she is bringing that experience into her work with AI and automation.

And I think this matters because there is a difference between learning a new technology and understanding where that technology can actually be useful. A tool may be impressive, but the real question is whether it solves a problem, saves time, improves a process or helps people make better decisions.

Toroti’s experience gives her a practical starting point for asking those questions.

In April 2024, she stepped into her current role as Founder and Lead Consultant at Primer PSL, building her work around HR consulting, learning programmes and practical technology solutions. Of course, building a business is a different kind of work in itself. It requires more than expertise in your field; it also demands the willingness to keep learning, testing ideas and putting your work in front of people.

One principle that has influenced her approach is “Done is better than perfect,” a lesson she took from the Profit Year Bootcamp. It speaks to a challenge many professionals face when they are trying to build something of their own: waiting until everything feels ready before taking the next step.

She has also spoken about the encouragement she received from her mentor, Elizabeth Okonji, to pitch for opportunities rather than disqualify herself before she had even tried.

I like this detail because it reminds us that building a business is not only about having the technical skills or a good idea. Sometimes, you also have to learn to stop disqualifying yourself before anyone else has had the chance to consider you.

For professionals who are exploring AI, this willingness to experiment is particularly relevant. The tools are evolving, and no one can know everything. What matters is being willing to learn, identify a problem worth solving and develop the confidence to test possible solutions.

Of course, that does not mean every process should be automated or that AI should replace human judgement. HR deals with people, livelihoods, sensitive information and decisions that can affect someone’s career. Any technology introduced into that environment needs to be considered carefully, with attention to privacy, fairness, accuracy and accountability. The goal should be to support better work, not simply to automate for the sake of it.

For me, the bigger story here is what can happen when we take the experience we have gathered over the years and begin to see new possibilities for using it.

Toroti’s journey from teaching to HR, and from traditional HR operations to building AI-powered tools, shows how professional experience can become a foundation for new ideas. She is not abandoning what she knows to chase a technology trend. She is building on what she already understands and exploring how new tools can help her do more with that knowledge.

Through HR Primer and Primer PSL, she is working with both the people who want to grow in the HR profession and the organisations that need stronger systems to manage their people. Her work with AI adds another dimension to that mission, opening up practical possibilities for professionals and businesses that may not have the technical resources to build complex solutions from scratch.

As AI continues to change how work gets done, the opportunity is not reserved for software developers or technology companies. Professionals who understand the problems in their own industries also have something valuable to contribute. They can identify the gaps, ask better questions and help shape solutions that respond to real needs.

That is the space Toroti Akogun is exploring: where human resource management, professional development and practical technology meet.

And perhaps that is the most important lesson in her story. Sometimes, the next stage of your career does not require you to throw away everything you have learnt and start again. It may begin with looking at the experience you already have, recognising the problems you understand deeply, and asking a different question: what more can I do with what I know?

For Toroti, AI is becoming one way to answer that question.