10 tops tips for effective Workforce Planning

Nicole James • September 3, 2019

I once worked for a retail clothing business, which had a store on the beach in Newquay. The footfall changed with the weather – the store manager was excellent at roster management and would flex her staffing levels based on the sunshine. She’d developed great relationships with her team that meant they understood business needs and were in a position to offer flexibility. Hospitality, retail, leisure and contact centre environments are all good at looking at anticipated demand levels and flexing their staffing rotas as appropriate (in the short term at least).

Workforce planning on a long term basis is a little more challenging. There is an element of crystal ball gazing but it’s still possible. I worked with a Buying Director who had a team of about 120 employees. We developed an ideal structure – it was something we were never going to get to overnight but it meant we knew where we were trying to go. Every time someone left or moved roles we edged a little closer. We knew which roles could be challenging to fill and focused our energy on developing employees in these areas. The recruitment team knew which roles could be tricky and they could proactively talent bank external individuals before a vacancy came up.

Workforce planning is about planning for business change – whether that’s an increase/decrease in people required to do the work or a change in skill sets needed. The aim of workforce planning is to align your business needs with your people strategy. As Benjamin once said, “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail”. The fundamentals of workforce planning are:

1. Understand your business priorities and plans

2. Identify your ideal structure – both headcount and skill sets

3. Analyse your current resource capability

4. Review the gaps and where challenges may exist. Understand where you may become over resourced or have changing needs

5. Take actions to address skills gaps, shortages and mismatches

6. Review and repeat

Effective workforce planning doesn’t need to be complex. Here are my top 10 tips for successful workforce planning:

1. Understand your business – if you’re working with an HR Consultant then transparency is key. Share your business strategy, work together to understand your ideal structures.

2. Look at short term and long term plans - You need to be clear on your business priorities in the immediate future and the longer term. That doesn’t mean to say that things are set in stone. Plans can change.

3. Consider the different types of worker - Don’t forget your workforce is made up of many different types of worker – gig economy, workers, contractors, freelancers, employees outsourcing etc. Factor this into your current workforce analysis and future ideal structures.

4. Go beyond headcount and budgets – I’ve seen businesses claim they have a workforce plan when in reality they have a financial budget. Workforce planning is more than headcount and cost. You need to consider the skill sets required and the numbers of people with those skill sets that are required.

5. Use accurate and quality data – you need to concentrate on the essential data needed for the task. It may be better to identify important business problems (such as expansion, downsizing or relocation) and work backwards from there as to what data is required to understand the resource implications. Inaccurate and poor-quality data will result in a half baked plan.

6. Factor in turnover – Your employees aren’t frozen in time and some will choose to move on. You need to consider replacement of leavers as well as new roles and business changes. If you’re looking to downsize in future then don’t automatically backfill. Using attrition is a cost effective way to reduce your workforce overtime. It can also avoid the need to make redundancies.

7. Grow skills internally – establishing succession plans, identifying skills gaps and training to meet future business needs will create a sustainable business. Growing talent internally is often cheaper than recruiting for talent externally.

8. Create Insights that inform and challenge assumptions – Share useful information with your leadership team. Challenge their thinking and help them to understand the role they play in delivering the plan. Communication with your leaders is critical to ensure effective delivery.

9. Practical actions – a workforce plan is only useful if it’s followed and implemented. Make sure that you identify practical actions that will help you progress to your ideal structure.

10. Review regularly – a workforce plan shouldn’t sit in the draw gathering dust. It should be reviewed each time a change takes place or your implementing something to ensure that you keep on track and no updates are needed.

In a nutshell, workforce planning will ensure that you have the right people, in the right roles, with the right skills, at the right cost and at the right time to deliver your business results. Have a chat with us about how we can support your business strategy by creating a workforce plan.

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