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Strategic Workforce Planning

Article · December 2020

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Mohamed Berrada
University of Hassan II of Casablanca
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 Research about
Strategic Workforce
Planning

Research paper published by Mohamed Berrada:

Note dictionary in this research paper:

• SWP = Strategic Workforce Planning

• HR = Human resources

• RPL = the recognition of prior learning

• IRE = Individual right to an education

• ITL = Individual training leave

Introduction
Human resources play a key role in the life of any organization, which is why it is important to carefully
choose employees with the necessary cognitive capacities, skills and personalities most suited to the
position to be occupied, in order to maximize the effectiveness of these human resources, and that of
the organization.
For this reason, it is necessary to rely on an optimal organization, on experienced employees and above
all on a dynamic policy of Human Resources Management, Human resources management is defined
as "the set of activities that allow an organization to have human resources corresponding to its needs
in quantity and quality.
The forward-looking management of jobs and skills, STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING is an HR
approach which consists of designing, implementing and controlling policies and practices aimed at
reducing in advance the gaps between the needs and the resources of the company, both quantitatively
(in terms of staff) and qualitatively (in terms of skills). It has a collective dimension (HRs are a strategic
resource in their own right) and individual (employee's career path) and among the tools of the
STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING, we find the skills assessment.
The objectives of this new STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING are now threefold: to manage through
skills, avoid layoffs by addressing problems upstream and ensure the employability of employees.
In this sense, we ask ourselves the following issues "What is a skills assessment, its relationship with
STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING, and the process for its development?
The outline of this report is presented in two chapters. First, we will present generalities on STRATEGIC
WORKFORCE PLANNING, definitions, tools, and steps. Second, we will tackle the explanation of the
usefulness of the skills assessment and its approach.
Strategic Workforce planning: Tools and Processes:

The business of tomorrow must be able to satisfy the "future recruit" on salary, promotion, that is to
say, allow him to obtain a certain social recognition. Young people also want to know about
development prospects and enroll in a career project, have follow-up and support. The quality of
management therefore remains essential.
1. Definitions
Forward-looking management of jobs and skills: STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING is an HR approach
that consists of designing, implementing and controlling policies and practices aimed at reducing in
advance the gaps between the needs and the resources of the company , both quantitatively (in terms
of staff) and qualitatively (in terms of skills). It has a collective dimension (HRs are a strategic resource
in their own right) and individual (employee's career path). According to Jean-Marie PERETTI
The STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING therefore defines the main part of the approach taken by a
company and all the actions aimed at permanently ensuring the adequacy of jobs and resources. More
concretely, STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING consists, based on a strategy defined in terms of
objectives, in developing action plans intended to neutralize in an anticipated manner the quantitative
and / or qualitative mismatches between future needs (jobs) and resources. human (skills available).
It has a double dimension, collective and individual, in the sense that it integrates human resources as
a strategic variable at the collective level, and at the individual level, allowing each employee to be the
actor of his own employability. Maintains that the establishment of a STRATEGIC WORKFORCE
PLANNING system cannot be done without the support of all those who have to make decisions,
whether strategic, administrative or operational. STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING must be an
integrated and shared management mode. Indeed, it is not enough for a strategic development of
human resources to be relevant to be feasible; it must be precisely known by the various actors
concerned and recognized as a mobilizer by those who will have to lead the operations. According to
CITEAU Jean-Pierre
Human Resource Management,
The STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING as a management instrument, borrows two conceptions of the
GPRH (Human Resources Management Planning):
Forecast Employment Management
Anticipated Skills Management.
The forward planning of jobs and skills is an anticipatory and preventive management of human
resources, depending on the constraints of the environment and the strategic choices of the company.
companies must negotiate a STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING agreement every three years on:
Company strategy and its foreseeable effects on employment and wages;
Support measures likely to be associated with STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING (training, THE
RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING, skills assessment, professional and geographic mobility, etc.);
The conditions of access to vocational training and job retention for older employees.
The measures offered to employees within the framework of the employment policy are varied.
The success of the forward-looking management of jobs and skills is based on:
A specific commitment from the management of the company recognizing that the human resources
employment variable is one of the components of the strategic development of the company;
the involvement of operational managers who are the only ones. be able to give concrete follow-up
to the analyzes carried out;
Information given to employees about career development possibilities;
Information, even the participation of staff representation bodies.
2. The stages of Strategic Workforce planning

The implementation of a STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING strategy must contain the following
steps:

1. Anticipate changes in the business at 3/5 years

2. Develop an organizational strategy for the period

3. Deduce the HR consequences

4. Identify essential trades

5. Define functions and jobs

6. Establish skills benchmarks

7. Analyze the gaps

8. Establish internal mobility networks

9. Carry out simulations

10. Establish mobility, recruitment and skills development plans

In general, we can say that a STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING process consists of the following
steps:

1. Strategic Thinking: Analyzing the environment and determining organizational goals.

2. Forecasting HR Needs: Forecasting HR needs requires determining how the strategic objectives will
be operationalized. This step consists of clearly identifying the type of skills, the resources required by
the company as well as the most appropriate time for hiring staff in order to implement the actions
that will make it possible to achieve the ideal situation, according to the timeline established.

3. HR Availability Forecast: Before hiring new resources, it is recommended to analyze the availability
of the current workforce. By assessing the skills available and the mobility of existing staff, it is
possible to identify those employees who are already able to meet new needs or who, after
appropriate development, would be able to meet them. (Workload plan for a job or position to be
verified)

4. Analysis of the gaps: In quantitative and qualitative terms.

5. Planning of HR actions: in the event of a QUANTITATIVE DIFFERENCE:

• Hiring

• Internal recruitment

• Reduction

In the event of a QUALITATIVE DIFFERENCE:

• HR restructuring

• reconversion

• Redeployment

• Training, development

3. The interests of Strategic Workforce planning:

Analysis of the existing

Rationalization of HR actions and therefore to make them more legitimate within the company

Improved involvement of employees who become actors in their professional development

Strategic role of the HR function reinforced because it allows to influence the strategic choices of
the company.

Coherence of adjustment measures

4. Strategic Workforce planning Tools

The STRATEGIC WORKFORCE PLANNING can, indeed and consequently, be implemented thanks to a
varied instrumentation. This is thus largely based on so-called "classic" training systems such as the
training plan, the individual right to training (IRT), the validation of acquired experience (THE
RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING), the assessment skills or individual training leave (ITL) as well as
more general human resources management tools such as professional interviews, tutoring or the
professionalization period / contract. These different tools are more or less strongly mobilized within
companies, depending on the approaches implemented, but also according to the size of the
structure, its culture or its HR strategy.

Employment nomenclatures
It is an ordered list of the "typical jobs" of a given company or professional family. The typical jobs thus
listed are classified by family or under professional family. These lists make it possible to specify areas
of development for employees. These standard job nomenclatures exist, they are developed by CEREQ:
The Center for Studies and Research on Qualifications and the current employment pole.
Concept of typical job
It is a methodological construction forged designating a set of concrete positions that have sufficient
proximity, in terms of activity content and skills, to be studied and dealt with in a comprehensive
manner. The standard job therefore presupposes sufficiently common work situations to be able to be
occupied by the same individual.
A typical job is defined according to four axes:
technicality: specific techniques implemented in the job;
information: information from employment and treatment;
relationship-communication: relational universe of employment;
economic contribution: added value of employment.

b. decision support tools:

We distinguish between qualitative tools and quantitative tools:
Quantitative tools:
• the age pyramid
• dynamic analysis of job flows
• "classic" statistical tools

Qualitative tools
• prospective analysis of typical jobs
• continuous professional guidance: it is done by:
1. Developing an assessment of individual skills and preferences,
2. Developing a professional project, step 3 building an individual action plan.
communication tools:
• job maps, prospective maps
 • internal mobility matrix
• repositories of jobs and skills
•internal communication

5. The Limits of Strategic Workforce planning

Skills management difficult to implement compared to the identification of skills, observation of the
development and even recognition of skills which may vary from one situation to another.
Predicting business needs is often difficult in a constantly changing environment.
The wishes of employees are not necessarily taken into consideration.

Conclusion

The central object of Strategic Workforce Planning is the anticipation of business strategies.
Anticipating problems is indeed the major quality of a manager. But the originality of the Strategic
Workforce Planning is twofold: involve the employee representatives in this reflection and, on the basis
of this anticipation discussed jointly by the representatives of the management and those of the
personnel, to implement the necessary steps to identify the new needs. and adapt human resources to
it.
In a world of work marked by very rapid technological development and by the globalization of the
economy, the competitiveness of companies increasingly depends on the quality of the skills they have
been able to develop and bring together.
Skills management is therefore a priority which implies not only knowing how to identify key skills, but
also being able to predict those which will become central, these objectives presuppose developing
forward-looking management of jobs and leading careers with an emphasis on individual potential.
The skills assessment can be requested by any member of a company, and its results are communicated
to the employer or recruiter only at the initiative of the person who is the subject of the assessment, It
is therefore to allow everyone to think about their direction, and to give themselves the means to
develop their professional life, the circular relating to the skills assessment clearly specifies its objective:
to cope with the increased demand for professional mobility, whether it originates from industrial and
technological changes, the evolution of human relations at work ... or transformations the organization
of work and the environment and allow everyone to manage their professional development based in
particular on constraints, but also on the opportunities of the labor market, make a skills assessment,
therefore the main goal of defining your professional project and to define it in a rapidly changing world
of work.

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