Where to start - Assessing your workforce planning maturity and capabilities.

The extent to which the timeframe, scope and focus of workforce planning proactively aligns with the organisations strategic goals and objectives.

Tips for HR practitioners: Shifting the focus of business leaders from immediate workforce needs to bigger picture, longer term planning can be quite a challenge for HR practitioners, but they can start by taking a few key actions to build maturity in this area:

• Engage stakeholders to create awareness about the value of long-term workforce planning and its alignment with organisational strategy.

• Develop and present basic forecasting models that consider medium- and long-term workforce needs, including anticipated retirements, growth projections, and emerging skill requirements.

• Collaborate with business leaders to align workforce planning with broader business goals, ensuring HR priorities support future organisational needs.

• Pilot scenario planning to explore how different strategic directions or market conditions might impact workforce needs, encouraging a proactive rather than reactive mindset. 

For organisations with low maturity in sponsorship and accountability, workforce planning is often viewed as a tactical or administrative HR activity rather than a strategic priority. Leaders may provide verbal support but lack tangible investment, leaving HR teams to drive workforce planning without adequate resources or leadership accountability for the implementation of workforce planning actions and initiatives. In more mature organisations, workforce planning is a critical business activity, viewed by executive and senior leaders as a system-wide process that integrates with organisational strategies and plans. Cross-organisational collaboration and governance ensure ongoing accountability, measurement, and review, with a strong emphasis on the implementation of workforce planning initiatives and clear roles and responsibilities.

Tips for HR practitioners: Building strong sponsorship requires HR practitioners to shift perceptions and demonstrate the value of workforce planning. Key actions to strengthen sponsorship could include:

• Develop a compelling business case that highlights the return on investment of workforce planning and its role in mitigating risks your organisation. Bring the business case to life through using a current workforce risk or a risk the organisation may need to mitigate in future.

• Secure an executive sponsor who will advocate for workforce planning at the leadership level and incorporate workforce planning into governance structures.

  ·       Showcase success stories where workforce planning has driven successful organisational responses and use data and analytics to highlight its impact.

• Establish regular forums where executives review your workforce planning insights and make data-driven decisions about future workforce needs.

Organisations with low maturity in this component treat workforce planning as a siloed HR activity which is often disconnected from broader business planning processes. Workforce plans may be developed in response to urgent needs but fail to consider long-term goals or enterprise-wide impacts. In contrast, organisations with higher maturity integrate workforce planning seamlessly into strategic planning, business planning, risk management, and budgeting processes. This integration ensures that workforce planning is a key consideration in all major business decisions and initiatives.  

Tips for HR practitioners: To improve integration, HR practitioners can take the following steps:

• Undertake environmental scanning research to identify trends that will impact the organisation including labour market analysis and present to key stakeholders ahead of planning activities to demonstrate your knowledge and value.

• Prepare and present your identified workforce planning priorities to business leaders and demonstrate how these are directly aligned to the achievement of corporate strategies and operational plans.

• Embed workforce planning into annual business cycles, budget discussions, and risk management processes to reinforce its strategic value.

• Create a dashboard and reporting mechanisms that provide visibility into workforce risks and enable leaders to make data-driven decisions.

Workforce planning is often undertaken on an as-needs basis, handled as an additional task by HR generalists who lack the time, expertise, or tools required to develop strategic workforce plans, in low-maturity organisations. Resource constraints may result in fragmented or reactive planning efforts. More advanced organisations invest in dedicated workforce planning teams or access external expertise with specialised skills in data analytics, forecasting, and scenario modelling. These roles are equipped with modern tools and technologies to support evidence-based planning and enable agile and proactive responses to workforce challenges.

Tips for HR practitioners: To build resource capability, HR practitioners can:

• Develop a business case for either dedicated roles or access to external expertise focused on workforce planning, highlighting the need for specialist expertise to deliver long-term value.

• Develop a business case to build internal capability through targeted training programs and practical learning experiences, such as workforce planning simulations facilitated by internal or external workforce planning specialists.  Ideally, build this capability as you’re building a workforce plan.

• Proactively build workforce planning capability as you’re building a workforce plan for the organisation.

Organisations with low maturity in this area often lack workforce planning expertise within the HR team. Practitioners may have a limited understanding of forecasting, analytics, and modelling techniques, resulting in basic or manual processes. At higher maturity levels, HR teams include highly regarded workforce planning specialists with advanced capabilities in shaping and leading strategic workforce planning initiatives These specialists act as strategic advisors, helping leaders make informed decisions based on workforce insights. 

Tips for HR practitioners: To develop specialist workforce planning capabilities, HR practitioners can:

• Undertake environmental scanning research to identify trends that will impact the organisation including labour market analysis and present to key stakeholders ahead of planning activities to build credibility and demonstrate the value of workforce planning.

• Identify key technical capabilities required for effective workforce planning and implement targeted development programs.

• Provide hands-on learning opportunities, such as scenario modelling workshops, data visualisation training, and forecasting exercises.

• Create knowledge-sharing forums where HR specialists can collaborate, share best practices, and learn from industry leaders.

• Leverage partnerships with universities, industry associations, or consultants to access training programs and certifications in workforce analytics.

At low maturity levels, people leaders often only engage in workforce planning activities to resolve a specific business challenge. It is not unusual to find that people leaders need time to build capability, skills and confidence to engage effectively in workforce planning. In contrast, high-maturity organisations leaders drive workforce planning activities and demonstrate a high level of workforce acumen in developing outcomes and measuring the impact of these actions.  

Tips for HR practitioners:  HR practitioners can support managers to build people leader capability by:

• Delivering practical training on what workforce planning is and its value to people leaders.  Increase capabilities through ongoing training in forecasting techniques, workforce analytics, scenario planning, risk identification and controls and implementing workforce plans.

• Equipping managers with accessible user-friendly tools and templates to support data-driven decision-making.

• Providing coaching and support to help managers interpret workforce data and identify opportunities where workforce planning would add value to their planning and workforce outcomes.

• Recognising managers who demonstrate strong workforce planning practices to reinforce positive behaviours and present their experiences at informal or formal sessions either within or external to their organisation.

There is often limited understanding and buy-in across the HR team, with minimal integration of workforce outcomes into HR priorities and practices in organisations with low maturity. It is not uncommon for workforce planning to be viewed as an isolated HR activity managed by a small group or person without input from other HR areas in organisations. This limits its impact and prevents workforce planning from being embedded across all HR practice areas and the organisation. 

More advanced organisations adopt a collaborative approach, utilising workforce planning to inform its priorities and strategies.  These organisations save valuable time in engaging with the business areas and can be highly proactive and agile in their approach to services they deliver.

Tips for HR practitioners:  To improve ownership and collaboration across the HR function, HR practitioners can: 

• Foster a shared understanding of workforce planning by providing training and resources across the HR team.

• Establish direct involvement in key activities during the initial development of workforce plans and ensure governance structures are implemented post development that define roles and responsibilities for implementing workforce planning across the HR team (i.e. incorporating in People or HR Plans and HR action plans).

• Use technology platforms to improve collaboration and ensure all HR services are aligned with workforce planning outcomes.

• Develop shared metrics and reporting frameworks that encourage accountability and support decision-making across the HR team.

Organisations with low maturity often lack formalised workforce planning processes, relying on ad hoc or reactive approaches to address immediate needs. Processes may be unstructured and reactive to immediate needs. In more mature organisations, workforce planning processes are structured, repeatable, and integrated with business operations These processes are grounded in evidence-based practices making them both adaptable and scalable.

Tips for HR practitioners: HR practitioners can implement and improve workforce planning processes by: 

• Developing clear frameworks and workflows to standardise the workforce planning process across the organisation. Start with an initial project to both develop and then iterate prior to organisational rollout.

• Embedding workforce planning into annual business cycles to align planning activities with budgeting and strategy development.

• Introducing tools and templates that streamline data collection, collaboration, forecasting, and reporting to improve consistency and efficiency.

• Continuously monitoring and refining processes to respond to changes in organisational priorities or external market conditions.

Organisations initially tend to focus on forecasting of immediate needs, such as filling vacancies and rely heavily on manual data analysis. These organisations struggle to anticipate future workforce gaps or develop strategies to address them. Higher maturity organisations utilise strategically aligned and dynamic scenario modelling to assess the ongoing impacts of the internal and external change drivers.  Forecasts are at the business and organisation level with regular reviews to analyse evolving demands. 

Tips for HR practitioners: To strengthen forecasting and gap analysis, HR practitioners can:  

• Start with basic forecasting for key roles and expand to longer time horizons as capability grows.

• Use workforce analytics tools to automate forecasting and improve data accuracy.

• Incorporate scenario planning to explore how different strategic directions or market disruptions may impact workforce needs.

• Collaborate with finance and strategy teams to align forecasts with broader business planning.

Organisations with low data maturity often rely on manually collected workforce data primarily focused on headcount and FTE reporting, analysis tends to focus on addressing immediate challenges and needs. More advanced organisations have comprehensive and trusted workforce data models and include business, finance, operations and labour market data to support analysis, forecast modelling and scenario testing.

Tips for HR practitioners: HR practitioners can improve data capabilities by: 

• Centralising workforce data in a single source of truth to improve accuracy and accessibility.

• Investing in analytics tools and AI that automate data collection, analysis, and visualisation to generate insights quickly.

• Conduct training HR teams and managers to interpret and use data effectively for decision-making.

• Establishing metrics and KPIs to track workforce trends and measure the impact of planning activities.

Low-maturity organisations typically rely on spreadsheets and manual processes for workforce planning, which can be time-consuming and error-prone.  At higher maturity levels, organisations invest in fit-for-purpose workforce planning tools to enable agile iteration of workforce plans, support collaboration and integration with broader business fluctuations and organisation needs.

Tips for HR practitioners: To build capability in this area, HR practitioners can:

• Assess current systems to identify gaps and prioritise the development of a business case to investment in modern workforce planning tools.

• Implement integrated systems that connect workforce planning with finance, operations, and talent management systems.

• Provide training to ensure HR teams and managers can use AI and other tools effectively.

• Use interactive dashboards and visualisations to communicate insights and engage stakeholders.

Organisations with lower maturity tend to not have governance structures in place for workforce planning.   Reporting may be reactive and focus on past performance rather than future trends. High-maturity organisations establish clear governance frameworks and use robust reporting frameworks to track performance, measure progress, and optimise strategies. There is clear accountability and ownership of the implementation of workforce planning initiatives as outlined in the workforce plan.

Tips for HR practitioners: To improve governance and reporting, HR practitioners can: 

• Develop formal governance frameworks that define roles, responsibilities, and reporting requirements.

• Establish KPIs and dashboards to monitor workforce trends, risks, and outcomes.

• Integrate workforce reporting into executive reporting cycles to ensure visibility and accountability at the leadership level.

• Use predictive analytics to track progress against workforce goals and adapt plans as needed.