Strategic Workforce Planning Training Course

Course Overview

Learning Objectives

• Analyze the purpose and value of strategic workforce planning and distinguish it from operational manpower planning and headcount budgeting on Day 1.
• Develop future capability requirements by translating organizational strategy, transformation initiatives, and national or corporate priorities into workforce implications.
• Apply workforce segmentation to classify roles as strategic, core, support, or specialized, and identify critical roles that require priority attention.
• Assess internal workforce data, including demographics, skills, mobility, performance, and retirement risk, to understand current capability.
• Evaluate external factors, including labor market trends, technology, automation, regulation, and competition for talent, and their impact on future workforce needs.
• Apply scenario planning techniques to model workforce requirements under different strategic and environmental conditions.
• Develop forecasts of future workforce demand and supply for critical roles and capabilities.
• Assess capability gaps and surpluses in terms of skills, roles, numbers, locations, and timing.
• Design a talent strategy mix using build, buy, borrow, and automate options, including reskilling, redeployment, and succession pipelines.
• Align the strategic workforce plan with organizational design, talent management, learning, localization, and budget processes.
• Develop governance arrangements, key workforce indicators, and a planning cycle to monitor and update the plan.
• Design a strategic workforce plan outline for the participant's organization or business area by the end of Day 5.

Who Should Attend

Learning Outcomes

• By the end of the course, participants will be able to:
• Explain how strategic workforce planning supports long-term strategy execution and organizational resilience.
• Translate strategic objectives and transformation initiatives into concrete future capability and role requirements.
• Segment their workforce and identify the critical roles that have the greatest impact on strategy and risk.
• Analyze internal workforce data to identify capability strengths, vulnerabilities, and retirement or turnover risks.
• Interpret external labor market and technology trends and assess their implications for their organization.
• Build and compare workforce scenarios that reflect different strategic and environmental assumptions.
• Forecast future demand and supply for critical capabilities over a multi-year horizon.
• Prioritize capability gaps based on strategic importance, risk, and time to close.
• Select the most appropriate mix of talent strategies to address priority gaps.
• Link workforce plans to reskilling programs, succession pipelines, recruitment strategies, and organizational design.
• Define workforce indicators and governance mechanisms to track and update the plan.
• Present a strategic workforce plan outline that is clear, evidence-based, and suitable for executive decision making.

Course Outline