Workforce Management and Human Resources Planning

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Key considerations for managers

  • Human resources (HR) planning should be the main tool at the departmental and regional levels in:
    • assessing the current and future human resources requirements;
    • identifying the key competencies that will be required to fulfill future organizational mandates; and
    • facilitating placements of affected indeterminate employees wishing to remain in the public service to ensure that future workforce adjustments impact on employees affected by transition initiatives are minimized.
  • Managers, in carrying out effective business and HR planning, need to make every effort to effectively manage human resourcing issues. HR issues can be managed through activities such as forecasting natural attrition and by ensuring decision making is based on sound business case analysis of the costs/benefits of proposed actions.
  • As each organization reviews its respective workforce, a key component to developing HR plans and strategies will be knowing the demographics and trends, particularly as they relate to the current composition of their workforce.
  • An enhanced commitment and focus on sound human resources planning will ensure the best alignment of human and financial resources with business needs. This will help achieve expected results and priorities and continued delivery on organizational mandates throughout the transition.

Key planning activities

  • Identify the business/operational reasons for the change and the anticipated effects on the workforce (i.e. confirm number of affected positions and employees by group and level, tenure and location).
  • Identify the skills/competencies necessary to perform the work in relation to the skills/competencies of the existing workforce and its current and future needs.
  • Conduct an assessment of affected employees against future skills requirements and identify the potential for retraining and re-assignment.
  • Determine absorption capacity and explore all options for workforce reassignments before invoking workforce adjustment. This could include redeployment of affected employees to other organizations with vacancies. It could also include, where feasible, increasing the use of part-time employment and other flexible work options (e.g. pre-retirement transition leave, leave with income averaging).
  • Review all ongoing hiring on a case-by-case basis to ensure that any staffing meets the core business priorities. Staffing decisions should also take into consideration the organization’s current and future business requirements (including official language obligations).
  • Conduct a continuous review and strategic management of temporary resources (e.g. casuals, term employment and assignments/secondments) with a view to ensuring business continuity to Canadians during the transition.