by Paul Phillips

Constant planning is what most business people do so they are ready for changing circumstances.

Is human resource planning or workforce planning up there with the budget? Possibly not. Quite often, with workforce planning, it will be treated as another budget line item and not taken much further.

The reality is, if it is to be done properly, there are long lead times and it should be a regular feature of any manager's role.

Workforce planning for many people is just about looking at new jobs coming up and how they might fill the vacancies. For those less fortunate, it may be about how they lose surplus staff.

However, to do it effectively requires a little more forward vision coupled with a rigorous approach to ensure you have captured all the information possible - and that will never be enough!

A few of the steps you may wish to include are listed below.

Strategic Plans
Revisit your plans for the business and look at each objective and strategy from a workforce perspective. Do you have the people to carry out the plans? Do you have enough of them? Do they have the experience, are their conditions appropriate? Do they have the right competencies? (a combination of knowledge, skills, aptitude and motivation)

Are they going to stay with you to see the plans through? When do you need to start recruiting? Is there enough in the budget? New people may cost more.

Succession Plans
Have you reviewed your succession plans - not just for immediate replacements but looking ahead at future needs and recruiting accordingly?

Maybe when you recruit your next Accounts Clerk you should be looking for your future Financial Controller. Immediate replacements are a must as anyone may leave your business for a number reasons and some of them may cause a sudden departure. What happens if several people leave at the same time?

Building some depth in your talent pool is good insurance. Often it is better to have a surplus of talent and lose people due to lack of opportunity rather than have people suffer because of overwork, stress and uncertainty caused by too few resources. Do you have development plans to bring people up to the level your business needs?