Some of you have seen the movie Up in the Air. For those who haven't, George Clooney plays a corporate downsizing expert who believes that firing someone over the Internet is sort of like, well, breaking up via text message.

It's hard to argue with his logic, especially for those of us who are most attracted to the human aspects of our Human Resources jobs. Now don’t get me wrong, I love The Jetsons just like the next 80s schoolgirl and look forward to videophones, robots and moving sidewalks. But there are some things that technology can't do. Right? Not so fast.

I recently came across two companies that are using video technology to revolutionize the HR industry in a positive way. HireVue allows companies to record one-way and two-way video interviews in a controlled environment. So before you invest time and money in on-site interviews, you can share video interviews with colleagues to screen for personality and culture fit. The result is better hires, quicker time-to-fill and lower cost. BriteTab offers similar advantages for candidates through personalized online resumes that support both video and metrics. For a free trial with BriteTab, simply enter “Tara” as your coupon code now through April 30, 2010. (Hey mom, I’m a coupon code!)

Neither company is trying to replace the face-to-face interview. In fact, it's quite the opposite. Both companies are bringing personal interaction to earlier stages of the hiring process with favorable impact on candidate selection, employee workloads and travel budgets.

And if that's true, if video is a critical component of the future workplace, then I'm definitely not as comfortable in front of the camera as I should be. I changed my major in college--from Broadcast Journalism to Television, Radio and Film Writing--to avoid the camera. I use Skype to communicate with family in other states and shoot Flip videos of my kids horsing around, but I'm always the one behind the camera … by design. And I’m not alone.

Amber Naslund, Director of Community for Radian 6--whom I find to be smart, outgoing and super likable--recently added this comment to her Twitter stream:

I love Amber’s attitude and plan to adopt it as my own. It's easy to condemn technology and let our fears ground us in the status quo. What is not so easy is to change, to take calculated risks and embrace innovation.

Now I won't give away the ending to "Up In The Air" but I will say that George Clooney didn't get nominated for an Academy Award in the Best Actor category by being the same person at the end as he was in the beginning. No, he doesn’t suddenly condone firing via video (and neither do I) but he does evolve and we should too.