Home >> Workforce Planning >> Workforce Planning Guide >> Phase I

Strategic planning and workforce planning are complementary activities. Both are intended to provide an agency with a roadmap to the future organization. Moreover, both undergird the implementation of a performance culture.

Strategic planning results in a medium- to long-range set of goals and strategies designed to help an organization manage the challenges of operating in an efficient and effective manner within the business environment. Said another way, strategic planning defines a set of actions than an organization must take to deliver the results that fulfill the reasons for which it was created.

A well-written strategic plan describes the activities that must be undertaken to accomplish the organization’s stated desired results. To accomplish this, the organization must establish a culture in which results are the most important consideration. This must be the most important rule by which the organization operates.

Therefore, at the organizational level, the strategic plan is the guiding document for a high-performing culture. Without a strategic plan, there are no “rules of engagement”, no accountability expectations and no results requirements.

Likewise, a workforce plan provides a framework for making staffing decisions based on the organization’s strategic mission, goals and objectives. It is a method of aligning an agency’s business needs with fiscal management and human resource functions to gain an understanding of human capital requirements.

It follows, then, that the workforce planning process forecasts the staffing levels and the sets of skills and competencies needed for an organization to accomplish its work now and in the future. The strategic plan specifies what is to be done, and the workforce plan delineates who should be employed to do the work effectively. Together, the strategic plan and the workforce plan become cornerstones of a performance culture.