Five Ways to Improve Strategic Workforce Planning

Many companies recognize the importance of strategic workforce planning, and most also acknowledge that it isn’t easy to integrate it into organization-wide business processes. Companies face myriad challenges in establishing planning initiatives, ranging from anemic support to inadequate analytics. i4cp recently released the Strategic Workforce Planning Playbook, written by senior analyst Carol Morrison, which is based on findings from an extensive i4cp study into workforce planning and practitioner insights from several i4cp member organizations, including ConAgra Foods, Toyota Financial Services and Luminant. The report was developed in coordination with i4cp’s strategic workforce planning research working group, which includes companies such as CVS, FedEx Ground, GE and PetsMart, among others.

The playbook addresses five major challenges commonly faced in organizations seeking to implement strategic workforce planning for the first time. Stemming from these challenges, here are five ways to improve strategic workforce planning:

1. Establish a business case for workforce planning and build support by leveraging the power of a team approach.

There are a handful of issues that impede an organization’s ability to move forward with workforce planning programs. Lack of a burning platform, lack of senior leadership endorsement, and the perception of workforce planning as an activity that is exclusive to HR make it difficult to gain the necessary support because the value of the function is not clear to stakeholders within the organization.

The first step in the process of gaining support from senior leaders is establishing a business case that clearly demonstrates why workforce planning is or should be a compelling issue for the organization. Bringing attention to the risks associated with failure to plan, and pointing out workforce planning’s crucial role in strategic execution are great selling points. Assembling a multidisciplinary team to design and carry out workforce planning is beneficial in gaining a wider range of knowledge and expertise, facilitating more effective communication across business units, and helping to gain cross-organizational buy-in, while also helping to overcome the HR-exclusive perceptions about workforce planning.

Learn more about overcoming lack of support for strategic workforce planning, and read how Toyota Financial Services ties workforce planning to strategic execution.

2. Begin with lower-cost activities, and roll out workforce planning initiatives in a thoughtful and measured manner to gain greater budget support.

Lack of resources is an obstacle that workforce planning leaders across all sizes and categories of organizations cite as their main challenge. In addition to budgetary issues, planners report problems related to a lack of technology, lack of planning know-how, and lack of business unit participation in planning initiatives.

Beginning with a business strategy analysis is an effective way of laying the foundation for workforce planning without necessitating big investments of money or staff time. Defining a few carefully chosen metrics that can facilitate a later demonstration of workforce planning ROI also may help build awareness and gain greater budget support. For many planners, pilot programs are a useful approach to achieve a measured rollout of workforce planning, while also enabling teams to build on small successes.

3. Work to standardize people-related data and to better coordinate technologies.

About one in four practitioners responding to an i4cp survey on workforce planning pointed to data problems as stumbling blocks to planning success. Data-related challenges include questions about reliability, technological issues, and a complete lack of the workforce information planners need to conduct their work.

Standardizing definitions of workforce measures is a great first step on the road toward effective reporting of planning data. Some planning teams find it beneficial to include IT and finance professionals among their members, or simply make it a point to work closely with those functions when addressing data issues. Standardization and coordination of workforce data also are key steps in eventual automation of planning processes.

4. Use models and research as starting points for information, but be flexible – customize workforce planning to your organization.

The vast amount of information published on workforce planning can be overwhelming for workforce planners who are just beginning initiatives. Even when planning leaders know how they want to proceed, the function requires accomplishment of many activities, necessitating significant expenditures of time and effort.

Because there are many approaches and options related to workforce planning, experienced planning professionals emphasize the need for flexibility. Customizing workforce planning to an organization may require adapting ideas and practices from multiple sources. Dedication to continuous evaluation and adjustment is a necessity, too.

5. Recognize that communication is both benefit and strategy in workforce planning; use multiple approaches to communicate.

Surveyed planning professionals reported multiple communication issues related to workforce planning. The notion of planning as an HR-exclusive activity remains a persistent issue in many organizations. Ineffective communication across business functions, and ineffective communication about the workforce planning process also impede efforts.

More effective communication emerges as both benefit and a strategy in workforce planning. Planning activities necessitate interactions about talent between planners and business leaders (strategy), and often result in better communication about those workforce issues (benefit). Effective communication must include education about the workforce planning process, along with open communication about talent-related challenges across the organization.

More detail and examples of how real corporations are implementing strategic workforce planning processes are now available exclusively to i4cp corporate members in the Strategic Workforce Planning Playbook.