The six steps of workforce planning are understanding business goals, analysing the current workforce, forecasting future workforce needs, identifying workforce gaps, developing an action plan, and monitoring and adjusting the plan.
Together, these steps help organizations make informed decisions about the people and capabilities they need to support current and future business objectives.
1. Understand Business Goals
Workforce planning should begin with a clear understanding of the organization’s business strategy and priorities. Consider where the organization is heading, what it wants to achieve, and what changes may affect its workforce.
Business growth, restructuring, digital transformation, new products, and expansion into new markets can all influence workforce requirements.
Connecting workforce planning to business goals ensures that people decisions support broader organizational priorities.
2. Analyse the Current Workforce
The next step is to understand the workforce the organization already has. This involves reviewing employee numbers, roles, skills, experience, performance, turnover, and other relevant workforce information.
The analysis helps identify existing strengths and potential workforce risks. It can also show whether certain teams have skill shortages, excess capacity, or roles that may become difficult to fill.
3. Forecast Future Workforce Needs
Organizations then need to determine what their workforce may look like in the future. This includes considering both the number of employees required and the capabilities they will need.
Forecasting may take into account expected business growth, employee turnover, retirement, technological changes, changing customer demands, and other factors that could affect workforce requirements.
Scenario planning can also help organizations prepare for different possible business conditions.
4. Identify Workforce Gaps
Once the current workforce and future requirements are understood, organizations can compare them to identify gaps.
A workforce gap may involve insufficient headcount, missing technical skills, a shortage of experienced leaders, or a lack of employees ready to take on critical roles.
Identifying these gaps allows organizations to determine which workforce issues require attention and how urgently they need to be addressed.
5. Develop and Implement an Action Plan
The next step is deciding how to close the identified gaps. Organizations may use a combination of recruitment, employee development, reskilling and upskilling through structured Professional Development Courses, succession planning, internal mobility, retention initiatives, or external talent.
The action plan should establish clear responsibilities, timelines, resources, and priorities. This turns workforce analysis into practical steps that can be implemented.
6. Monitor and Adjust
Workforce planning is an ongoing process. Organizations should regularly review their workforce data and measure whether their actions are addressing identified gaps.
Useful indicators may include headcount, turnover, recruitment requirements, skills availability, internal promotions, employee development, and succession readiness.
If business priorities or workforce conditions change, the plan should be adjusted accordingly. Regular reviews help ensure that workforce planning remains relevant over time.
How the Six Steps Work Together
The six steps form a continuous cycle. Organizations first understand where the business is going, then assess where the workforce is today. They forecast where the workforce needs to be, identify the gaps between the two, develop actions to close those gaps, and regularly review the results.
For example, if an organization plans to expand into a new market, it may assess its existing talent, forecast the skills and headcount required for the expansion, identify shortages, recruit or develop the necessary talent, and then monitor whether the workforce is meeting the new business requirements.
Why Are the Six Steps of Workforce Planning Important?
The six steps provide a practical structure for connecting workforce decisions with business strategy. They help organizations move beyond reactive hiring and take a more proactive approach to managing people and capabilities.
Effective workforce planning can support recruitment, talent development, succession planning, retention, and organizational growth. Most importantly, it helps organizations prepare for future workforce needs rather than waiting until critical gaps become urgent problems.
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