Question 1 of 5 from the most asked questions on Workforce Planning at HR Tech

The short answer is YES. We actually don’t see operational and strategic workforce planning as mutually exclusive. In order to have an operational plan that is meaningful you need to know what the targeted future is. Financial, Marketing and Policy areas do not prepare annual operational plans without a 3-5 year view. The workforce plan shouldn’t be any different.

As we explained to many of our HR Tech booth visitors, when someone is recruited to your organization they are usually recruited with the intention to have that employee for a minimum of 3-5 years. However without strategic workforce planning, and only an annual operational plan, you haven’t got anything to guide the decision making, except that you need them right now with the skills needed for right now. Hire decisions are not just for the right now; every hire decision is affecting your organization’s future (that includes the decisions not to hire, but more on that in our blog how the economy affects a Workforce Planning initiative).

A strategic workforce plan with a 3 to 5 year timeframe aligned with your business strategy is needed for every organization to be sustainable. An operational plan needs to be sourced from a 3 to 5 year vision of the workforce. CAPTure our product, presents the long term view and the granular snap shots as to what your workforce looks like for certain timeframes of 1 year, 6 month, 3 month and even 1 month, which in turns powers you to be able to progress check.

We believe Strategic Workforce Planning is an imperative to good operational workforce planning. Wouldn’t you agree?