Workforce Planning and Development

Workforce Planning and Development
Confused about workforce planning and development?
’Have’ to develop a workforce plan?
…don’t overcomplicate it!
The process of workforce planning can appear overwhelming and complex however in its simplest form it is a planning process, which consists of some key steps. It helps you examine and ultimately understand your workforce requirements in the future, your current workforce and the gaps between. Dependent upon the scope of your workforce planning task it can be done on a small, medium or large scale. Although workforce planning is an ongoing process it is helpful in the beginning to approach it as a discrete project to assist in attaching timeframes, responsibility and importantly resources.

The direct outcome of Workforce Planning is Workforce Development. Workforce Development consists of a range of strategies across multiple levels to respond to the broad range of workforce issues that organisations face (identified through your planning process). Strategies can be very diverse spanning areas including learning and development, job design and re-design, succession planning, leadership, training and education, flexible workforce models and practices and career pathways.

A workforce plan is broader than a training plan, and whilst it is critical that someone is identified as the ‘leader or coordinator’ of the process, effective workforce planning spans the entire breadth and depth of an organisation and involves a broad range of stakeholders.

There are a myriad of workforce planning resources that can support your work to keep you moving and maintain momentum. A couple of workforce planning handy hints:
  • Start somewhere – don’t wait for ‘everything to become clear or known’… it won’t!
  • Approach your workforce planning process as a development opportunity for the organisation and the people within it
  • Identify someone to lead or coordinate your process and ensure they are given dedicated time to progress
  • Link your workforce planning to your strategic objectives and business planning systems
  • More than analysing your workforce data, a range of information (of which raw data is one kind) helps tell the story and plan for the future

How we can help:

Having worked in a peak workforce agency we have experience in designing and implementing both workforce plans and workforce development strategies. The specific approach to developing and implementing an effective workforce plan will be different for each organisation depending on context. We tailor our approach and work with you to design and implement processes and strategies, which ‘fit’ your environment and meet your needs.
  • Development of workforce plans (whole or components)
  • Workforce planning process design
  • Pre-work to make the case for workforce planning
  • Coaching of staff in workforce planning and development
  • Professional mentoring and supervision
  • Scoping and implementation of development strategies
  • Whole of industry / sector workforce initiatives
  • Training needs analysis and skills audits (including utilisation)