Getting the 'How' right in Strategic Workforce Planning @ RPO and ...

I attended a Strategic Workforce Planning (SWP) workshop this week hosted by ArcelorMittal, for the Ochre House HR Network.?As per a previous blog, ArcelorMittal have made great progress in SWP and although this topic is widely discussed, in my experience, no one has ever shown ?how? to do it.?Before we go into the details, here are some key facts:

• Ochre House conducted a survey and they found that 20% of organisations do long term SWP (mainly in the technology/engineering industry sector)
• Approximately 40% of organisations are looking into this popular topic
• Metrics and SWP are the two most popular items that businesses are discussing today

Nick Kemsley from Henley Business School has conducted significant research in this area and he talked about some of the fundamentals, approaches, and what this topic is really about. He explained that we need to understand how we look at the issue and then think through whether we have the capability and buy in at the right level to deliver it. It is not about systems and analytics but about people.

Many organisations start to look at this topic when they feel pain that affects the business strategy. This was the case for ArcelorMittal also. They were faced with two situations; one in?Canada and?another in?South Africa which forced them to start planning for the future. In Canada, for example, the City of Hamilton grew around the Steel industry and this was the home of steel production, however, Steel plants started closing down and there was a shift away from making steel and engineering jobs to other vocations. As a result ArcelorMittal started talent pipelining right from grassroots, putting on relevant courses at colleges encouraging the next generation of Engineers and offering student sponsorships. If they?d had a SWP process in place, they would not have had to experience this pain and cost.

Many people get confused between resource planning (3-6 months), demand planning (1 year) and strategic workforce planning (3-5 year business planning). All three are relevant and necessary, but the whole SWP starts with the following:

• You need business sponsorship from the top ? you can pilot with a certain function, geography etc. however, it needs to be driven from the business leader who should communicate what their 3-5 year business plan is. ?This plan can then be broken down into yearly goals that are reviewed on a frequent basis.
• HR are there to facilitate the discussion and dialogue and ask the right questions. SWP is like the ?brain? of the HR strategy as it touches everything in the organisation, and as HR professionals, we need to focus on this.
• Critical roles need to be identified ? again, the definition of a critical role will vary from industry to industry, but these are not always the senior management team roles, these are the roles that if taken away will have significant impact to a business e.g. in Disney, this would be the car park attendant!? If there is no car park attendant, no one can park and get into the premises!?Therefore the critical roles are not about seniority or cost, it is about how the role affects on-going business.? Future roles for tomorrow also need to be taken into consideration, e.g. if the strategy is to change product lines in a couple of years, then focus should be on planning for those future roles in new product line areas.
• Also, the question should be asked around how rare a particular skill set is.?The rarer, the harder it is to find, therefore the more planning required.
• Flexibility needs to be taken into consideration ? this is not just about hiring plans against attrition, but it would include flexibility, multi-skilling during peaks and troughs and how those should be dealt with without on-going hiring and firing.
• There should also be a disaster scenario ? what would happen if demand slowed down for example?

So in summary for a successful SWP strategy:

• Develop?SWP against a long term business strategy -?include retention, cross functional development, flexibility, graduate recruitment, changes in workforce demographics.
• Analyse where the gaps are and what needs to be planned for
• Forecast the demand?forecast the supply
• Define the strategic direction and work on the action plan

It was a great session, and?there is a?lot that can be learned from ArcelorMittal who will be presenting again at the next Strategic Workforce Planning think tank in Holland.

Source: http://talk.ochrehouse.com/strategic-planning/strategic-workforce-planning/

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