Getting the best talent for your organization isn’t always easy and takes time in order to ensure you select the right employees for the business. However, too often organizations wait until the last moment to hire talent. They are reacting to customer complaints, turnover issues, or other problems that affect headcount.
In order to ensure effective workforce planning, you must know the answers to the following questions:
- What skills and expertise do you currently have within the organization? Where are the gaps? Where do you have too many of a particular skill or expertise represented?
- What are the goals of individual departments/business units and the organization long term strategy? How will those goals and strategies affect our workforce today and in the future?
- What skills and expertise will the organization need in the future based on growth, new products and services, increased competition, expansion/mergers, etc?
- Are you paying employees’ salaries consistent with our competitors? Are benefits consistent with competitors? Do salaries and benefits enable the company to capture top talent? How will benefits and salaries need to change in the future?
- What is the average age of the workforce currently? Where do you believe you’ll see gaps as workforce retires?
- What is the average retention rate? Where do you see retention issues?
The answers to these questions are not always easy but they are essential to understanding how to effectively plan your workforce for now and the future. Effective workforce planning enables for engaged employees, improved succession planning and a decrease in the need for downsizing due to poor planning.
