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What Are the Different Steps of HR Planning?

By T. M. Robertson
Updated May 17, 2024
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A basic HR model contains around six different steps of HR planning. These steps include creating organizational goals, designing an HR management system, calculating the required workforce, acquiring the necessary human resources, developing training programs, and comparing organizational performance with the set goals. While these steps may differ slightly between different organizations, the basic premise remains the same. The goal of implementing these steps of HR planning is to create an organization with a developed plan, a competent workforce, and goal achievement. Through analyzing organizational performance against the original goals, areas that need improvement may surface and can then be addressed.

Creating organizational goals is the first of the steps of HR planning. In this step, the overall direction of the company and its primary goals are laid out so the company has a definitive direction to pursue. Later on, the overall company performance will be measured against these goals to determine the level of success in each area to determine where improvements need to be made. Designing an HR management system is the next step. This is an important step as it's where the organization's polices and procedures are determined, along with its overall chain of command.

Calculating the required workforce is the third of the steps of HR planning. This is where the organization decides how many workers it needs, in addition to each position's competency requirements, which includes items such as education and experience levels. Hiring competent workers is especially important for organizations where specific skills are needed to perform basic jobs, such as in skilled trades. After the workforce plan is created, the next step is to acquire the necessary human resources. This means hiring and appointing workers into their assigned positions.

Developing training programs is the fifth of the steps of HR planning. It's important to create a plan that provides continued educational training for employees, along with benefits, compensation packages, and reward programs based on their performance, to keep them happy and satisfied with working for the company. The final step in the process is comparing organizational performance with the goals outlined in the first step. This comparison allows the organization to measure how well its operations are meeting their original goals, and also shows them areas that aren't succeeding so they can make the necessary adjustments accordingly. Companies often use tools such as computer-generated performance reports or scorecards for these types of comparisons.

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Discussion Comments

By Crispety — On Jul 17, 2011

@Cafe41 - I agree because I know that you really have to be careful because a company can get sued so easily.

I also think that there should be multiple layers of training that could offer a mixture of seminars for the higher level employees as well as computer based training for the more entry level employees.

Training the managers on performance appraisals and motivating employees is also important for the growth of the company. It only takes one bad manager to destroy the morale and productivity of an entire department.

Along with the compensation and benefits planning, I think that there should always be additional incentives for those overachievers because others will take notice and will perform better in order to be able to get a chance at the reward.

I do have to say that the goals have to be achievable because if not, it will be meaningless to the employee. There should also be outings and company picnics so that the group can bond better which will help overall employee morale.

I always enjoyed company picnics and holiday parties and I think that most people do too.

By cafe41 — On Jul 16, 2011

@Suntan12 - I agree and I also think that a company has to have legal representation from the get go to make sure that the company is protected from potential litigation.

Some companies have an attorney on retainer, while others have a whole legal department on staff. My husband’s company has a whole legal department on staff which makes it convenient when having to draw up new contracts or terminate employees.

They are also involved in financial disputes when a client’s bills goes into collection status. They usually tell the human resources department which sensitivity seminars the company should have in order to make sure that the employees behave in an appropriate manner towards each other which helps to prevent lawsuits in the future.

Legal representation is one of the most important steps in the strategic planning of a company especially if the company does business in other states or even other countries.

This makes the legal representation even more important because a company has to be familiar with the laws in the areas in which they do business.

By suntan12 — On Jul 16, 2011

I used to work in the staffing industry as a recruiter and we always helped our clients in their strategic planning process by making

Since our firm was a contract staffing firm, our contractors helped fill the need that these companies had and only worked when they needed help.

They paid us a rate per hour that the contractor worked and we then paid our contractor. They did not have to pay any benefits, and could let go of the contractor whenever they wanted and end the contract.

This saved the companies a lot of money and allowed for maximum productivity. It also helped the human resources department focus on other issues aside from hiring.

A lot of these positions that we filled were high level information technology positions that were difficult for most of these companies to fill.

Since we focused strictly on the information technology field we had a full database of available contractors which meant that their projects did not suffer. I think that the staffing in an organization is one of the key steps in the strategic planning process of a business. This is one area that can make or break a company.

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