Questions and answers on the subject of workforce planning in the skilled trades sector
What is the definition of workforce planning in the skilled trades?
By definition, workforce planning in the skilled trades involves determining the anticipated need for employees for the business for a specified period of time.
What is the difference between qualitative and quantitative workforce planning?
While quantitative workforce planning focuses on the number of employees required, qualitative workforce planning is concerned with the qualifications of the employees.
Why should operations managers calculate staffing requirements?
In the skilled trades, there are several reasons why staffing needs should be calculated. These include:
- Change in the financial situation (for example, more or fewer Jobs than usual)
- Seasonal effects (for example, strong seasonal fluctuations in the Job situation)
- Change in operational orientation (for example, expansion of the service portfolio)
How do you calculate staffing requirements?
To calculate the net staffing requirement, the headcount is subtracted from the gross staffing requirement. The number that results from the calculation shows how many additional employees you need or have too many.
In Job to understand what workforce planning means, it is important to first define the term workforce requirement. Personnel requirements are the number of employees that a craft business needs to fulfill all Jobs as well as other operational tasks that arise. Planning personnel requirements ensures that sufficient employees are available to the business on a continuous basis. This means that plant managers must regularly compare staffing levels with the Job situation.
Under these circumstances, the personnel requirements change
In principle, personnel requirements always change when the Job situation improves significantly or deteriorates. If the assignments exceed the available work hours of the employees or if individual employees go on maternity leave or retire, the personnel requirement increases. This means that new skilled workers should be sought. However, if Jobs fall sharply, the need for personnel decreases. Employees may have to be put on short-time working or even laid off in Job not to jeopardize the continued existence of the business. Plant managers cannot, of course, be clairvoyant about their staffing needs. However, there are methods for calculating personnel requirements.
Before you start entering numbers into the calculator, you should determine for what time period you want to determine your staffing needs. This can be one year, for example, but also three or five years.
Once you've set the time period, you're ready to get started, calculating your gross staffing requirements.
How to calculate your gross staffing requirements
The gross personnel requirement tells you how many employees you need in total. However, terminations, retirements, maternity leave and other departures are not (yet) taken into account here.
Using a simple formula, you can easily determine gross staffing requirements:
To calculate your projected headcount
How many Tradesmen and craftswomen will work in the period for which you are planning, calculate with the following formula: Headcount (current) + New additions - Departures.
How to calculate your net staffing requirements
After you have calculated your gross staffing requirements and the headcount, determining the net staffing requirements is quickly done. To do this, simply subtract the forecast headcount from the gross headcount requirement.
Regardless of how your bill turns out, one thing is certain: not only does good workforce planning impact the success of your operation, but so does smart scheduling!
Scheduling takes a lot of time? It can be done better: in the Meisterwerk app, you create Jobs and select your employees or teams for individual projects and appointments with just a few clicks. When, where and with whom your staff is scheduled can be seen directly in the craftsman app. Changes are also applied in real-time and can be communicated via direct message.
