In practice it draws on headcount planning, attrition and hiring forecasts, and increasingly on attendance and space data. A plan that adds two hundred people means little until it says where they will sit, which days they will come in and what that does to desks, rooms and parking.
The watch-out is planning people and space separately. HR plans heads, real estate plans square metres, and the two meet only when the office runs out of desks on peak days. Sharing one view of attendance patterns and utilisation lets both plans move together instead of surprising each other.
Common questions
What does Workforce Planning mean in simple terms?+
Workforce planning is working out what people the organisation will need, in what roles and locations, and how to close the gap between that and what it has today. It sits above day-to-day scheduling: headcount, skills, hiring plans and the budgets behind them.
How is Workforce Planning done in practice?+
In practice it draws on headcount planning, attrition and hiring forecasts, and increasingly on attendance and space data. A plan that adds two hundred people means little until it says where they will sit, which days they will come in and what that does to desks, rooms and parking.
What goes wrong with Workforce Planning?+
The watch-out is planning people and space separately. HR plans heads, real estate plans square metres, and the two meet only when the office runs out of desks on peak days. Sharing one view of attendance patterns and utilisation lets both plans move together instead of surprising each other.