Human Resource Planning

Definition

Human Resource Planning is the process of systematically forecasting the future demand

and supply for employees and the deployment of their skills within the strategic

objectives of the organization. Human resources planning is a process that identifies

current and future human resources needs for an organization to achieve it goals. It

responds to the importance of business strategy and planning in order to ensure the

availability and supply of people--both in number and quality. Human Resources

Planning serves as a link between human resources management and the overall

strategic plan of an organization .

Planning Process

The planning processes of most organizations define what will be accomplished within a

given time frame, along with the numbers and types of human resources that will be

needed to achieve the defined business goals. This is typically accomplished by defining

competencies that are required by workers to achieve business goals, matching people

with these competencies to the right tasks, and assessing the overall process for progress

and improvement.

Competencies

Competency-based management supports the integration of human resources planning

with business planning by allowing organizations to assess the current human resource

capacity based on employees' current skills and abilities. These skills and abilities are

measured against those needed to achieve the vision,mission and business goals of the

organization. If the available people lack necessary competencies, the organization plans

how it will develop them.

Planning to Develop Competencies

Targeted human resource strategies, plans, and programs to address gaps in the

organization's workforce are designed, developed and implemented to close the gaps.

Plans and programs can include:

targeted hiring/staffing

employee learning and education

career development

succession management

Evaluation and Improvement

These strategies and programs are monitored and evaluated on a regular basis to ensure

that they are moving the organization in the desired direction, including closing employee

competency gaps. Corrections are then made as needed.

Human Resource Recruitment

Recruitment refers to the process of attracting suitable candidates to apply for a vacancy arising within an organization. When an organization needs individuals with certain skill sets, it taps the market.It may require individuals to join the organization to supplement the existing skill or complement the existing skills. In both the cases after careful job analysis and manpower planning an organization develops a candidate profile. This comprises of the technical skills sort and the attitude. Depending upon the status of teh job market an organisation deploys its sources of recruitment(Company website,search agencies,head hunters,campus placement,newspaper advertisement and others).The primary function of these sources is to identify the right kind of people for the vacancy and motivate them to apply to the organisation. Recruitment is followed by selection . They are related but not the same though the term recruitment has a blanket usage for attracting,selecting and bringing people on board, which is practically wrong. The stages of the recruitment process include: job analysis and developing some person specification; the sourcing of candidates by networking, advertising, and other search methods; matching candidates to job requirements and screening individual's candidature.

Depending on the size and practices of the organization, recruitment may be undertaken in-house by managers, human resource generalists and/or recruitment specialists. Alternatively, parts of the process may be undertaken by either public-sector employment agencies, commercial recruitment agencies, or specialist search consultancies.

ProcessJob analysisIn situations where multiple new jobs are created and recruited for the first time, a job analysis might be undertaken to document the knowledge, skill, ability, and other personal characteristics (KSAOs) required for the job. From these the relevant information is captured in such documents as job descriptions and job specifications. Often a company will already have job descriptions that represent a historical collection of tasks performed. Where already drawn up, these documents need to be reviewed or updated to reflect present day requirements. Prior to initiating the recruitment stages a person specification should be finalized to provide the recruiters commissioned with the requirements and objectives of the project.[2]

SourcingSourcing is the use of one or more strategies to attract or identify candidates to fill job vacancies. It may involve internal and/or external advertising, using appropriate media, such as local or national newspapers, specialist recruitment media, professional publications, window advertisements, job centers, or in a variety of ways via the internet. Alternatively, employers may use recruitment consultancies or agencies to find otherwise scarce candidates who may be content in their current positions and are not actively looking to move companies. This initial research for so-called passive

candidates, also called name generation, results in a contact information of potential candidates who can then be contacted discreetly to be screened and approached.[2]

Screening and selectionSuitability for a job is typically assessed by looking for (KSAOs) that are required for a job. These can be determined via:screening résumés (also known as curriculum vita or CV); job application; Biographical Information Blanks which is an assessment that asks for a more extensive background than an application; or a interviews. Various psychological can be used to assess to assess a variety of KSAOs, including literacy. Assessment are available to measure physical. Many recruiters and agencies use applicant tracking systems to perform the filtering process, along with software tools forpsychometric testing and performance based assessment.[3] Performance based assessment is a process to find out if job applicants perform the responsibilities for which they are applying. [4] In many countries, employers are legally mandated to ensure their screening and selection processes meet equal opportunity and ethical standards.[2]

In addition to the above selection assessment criteria, employers are likely to recognize the value of candidates who encompass "soft skills" such as interpersonal or team leadership, and have the ability to reinforce the company brand through behavior and attitude portrayal to customers and suppliers. Multinational organizations and those that recruit from a range of nationalities are also concerned candidates will fit into the prevailing company culture.[5]

Lateral hiring"Lateral hiring" refers to the hiring of someone into a position that is at the same organizational level or salary. It could mean hiring someone from another, similar organization, possibly luring them with a better salary and the promise of better career opportunities. An example is the recruiting of a partner of a law firm by another law firm. A lateral hire may also refer to an employee moving from one position to another within the same organization.

Approaches

There are a variety of recruitment approaches and most organizations will utilize a combination of two or more of these as part of a recruitment exercise or to deliver their overall recruitment strategy. There are five common models:

In-house or human resources personnel may in some case still conduct all stages of the recruitment process. In smaller organizations, recruitment may be done by individual managers or recruiters. More frequently, whilst managing the overall recruitment exercise and the decision-making at the final stages of the selection process, external service providers may undertake the more specialized aspects of the recruitment process.

Social Media Recruitment is the new trend which can implement in the current recruitment process. Social media helps to drive passive candidates and indirectly helps to create brand

awareness about the company. A few tools commonly used by social media recruiters are LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc.

Outsourcing of recruitment to an external provider may be the solution for some small businesses and at times for large organizations.

Employment agencies  are established as both publicly funded services and as commercial private sector operations. Services may support permanent, temporary, or casual worker recruitment. They may be generic agencies that deal with providing unskilled workers through to highly skilled managerial or technical staff or so-called niche agencies that specialize in a particular industrial sector or professional group.

Executive search  firms recruit for executive and professional positions. These firms operate across a range of models such as contingency or retained approaches, and also hybrid models where advertising is also used to ensure a flow of candidates alongside relying on networking as their main source of candidates.

Internet recruitment services include recruitment websites and job search engines used to gather as many candidates as possible by advertising a position over a wide geographic area. In addition, social network sourced recruitment has emerged as a major method of sourcing candidates.