Getting Ahead on Human Resource Planning for a Successful Workplace

labor October 17, 2020

Victoria Brunette

Writer

What Are Human Resources

Human Resources, or HR, are the people that make up a business. They are your wait staff, your management, your bartenders, your cashiers, etc. You might hear the phrase human capital, when someone is referring to Human Resources. If you own a business, your employees are part of your capital and you depend on them. They need attention and maintenance just like any other part of your business.
Most businesses have a Human Resources department, colloquially referred to as HR. HR deals with the administrative sides of business like hiring, firing, labor law compliance, ethical standards and training, and administration of employee benefits. When comes to human resource planning, guess what? They're in charge.
The HR department has a number of duties...
1. Determine Staffing Levels Needed The Human Resources department is responsible for understanding how many employees the company needs to succeed. Take Company X for example, Company X is struggling to meet all of its orders on time. In response to the performance issue, HR audits and analyzes the current employee rolls. It looks at the various employees in different roles. In this example, HR finds that Company X needs to hire two new delivery drivers to satisfy the current demand. HR then makes the recommendation to the company leadership and seeks approval to hire.
2. Recruiting and Training New Staff HR departments are the ones responsible for handling all matters regarding the hiring and on-boarding process of new employees. They handle the advertising for positions as well as interviewing. After they have candidates selected and offers accepted, it's typically Human Resource's job to provide training, not only for the position, but for legal awareness as well. This includes everything from discrimination law, equal opportunity law, and a variety of other labor regulations.
3. Manage Union Relations and Collective Bargaining Often times, HR departments are the ones that manage union relations. If you work in a business that is unionized, you more than likely are a member of the union; which engages in collective bargaining with the company. Collective bargaining is the overall process, not necessarily via a union, where employees negotiate things like salary, working conditions, leave, workers compensation and rights, and benefits. Collective bargaining agreements typically regulate the hours employees can work, pay scales, overtime scales, training for health and safety, and grievance procedures.
Human Resources typically represent the company when dealing with unions during collective bargaining. They come to agreements with unions on many of the above-mentioned items regarding working conditions.
4. Maintain Employee Records and Performance Reviews Human Resources is the hub for keeping track of employee records. HR tracks everything including vacation records, awards, discipline, performance reviews, and complaints. HR records management is crucial to any company making informed staff decisions. If a company is having staff issues, they can turn to their HR department for guidance.
5. Oversee and Maintain Payroll, Benefits, and Compensation Human Resources process all the time and attendance records of businesses employees; they make sure you get paid on time! They are also in charge of administrating and keeping track of benefits and things like overtime compensation. Have a question about your health insurance benefits? The Human Resources department is the place to go. Do you have a feeling that your overtime pay is lower than it should be? Again, go see HR.
6. Handle Employee Disputes and Issues of Discrimination A lesser-known function of Human Resources, but still an important one, is managing employee reports on instances of workplace discrimination and bias. The HR department is typically somewhat insulated from the rest of the company. This is to allow for a non-biased appraisal of the claim. HR adjudicates such claims by running their own investigations to determine if regulations or labor laws were violated.

What is Human Resource Planning and Why Do You Need It?

Human resource planning is the process of evaluating the future HR needs of a business or organization. Planning ideally acts as a bridge between human resource management and the overall vision and goals of the business. Companies always put together a comprehensive financial plan, but rarely do they organize a human resources plan to meet their vision. For example, if a business has ambitious plans to expand into another state, this is where human resource planning would come into play. Surely the finance department has calculated the costs of the expansion already. The HR department for this business would be in charge of forecasting size and type of workforce needed for the expansion. Human Resources would also have to consider other things like labor laws that might be different across state lines. Ultimately, HR has to craft a strategy to recruit talent to meet the needs of the business as it expands. Below are the various stages of human resource planning.
1. Assessment In this first stage, HR must take stock of the ins and outs of its workforce. How many employees are there? What are their skills? What do they excel at? HR should develop a comprehensive catalogue of skills capacity of the workforce. This is useful in evaluating which employees need more training or more responsibilities; include things like other jobs and certifications.
2. Forecasting Now let's talk about the strategic goals of the business. What positions will be opening in the near future? What types of skills will the business need? How many people will we need to meet or exceed the business' goals? Do we have enough now? These are questions that need to be answered during the forecasting phase.
3. Analysis During the analysis phase, you need take all of the answers to the questions above and compare them to the business' current HR standing. This is where you identify the gaps based on your company's projected needs. Maybe it's clear your business needs a certain type and amount of new employees. You'll find these answers during the analysis phase.
4. ProposalIn this stage, HR delivers its recommendations to the business. Maybe the business needs more talent in a certain field, and x number of employees to close a skill gap to meet the company's goals. As another example, maybe HR is highlighting the costs that new labor laws will impose on the business if it's moving into a new jurisdiction.

Hubworks- Harnessing Technology for Human Resource Planning

Effective human resource planning involves knowing about every aspect of your business. From how efficient your staff is, to knowing how to best schedule them, you need to know the details. Hubworks has a variety of software and mobile apps to keep staff management, and thus Human Resources, streamlined for your business. In the past, companies have had to rely on analog and hard copy records management as part of their Human Resource record keeping. These methods are costly and prone to error and loss, costing businesses time and money. With Hubworks' array of different computer applications, human resources planning and management are made easier. Let's take a look at the apps Hubworks has to offer.
Zip Clock With Zip Clock, Hubworks offers dynamic, biometric employee time clock software. If you own a business with multiple hourly employees, you are surely aware of the headache that can come from managing how workers clock their time. With Zip Clock, you can cut down on time theft by being able to view employee performance at any time. Zip Clock produces performance reports so you can track exactly when your employees are clocking in and out. By looking at a performance report for a certain period, you can compare the actual time worked by an employee to what they were scheduled to work exactly.
A big part of human resource planning and management is labor law compliance. As a mobile application, Zip Clock allows you to check your employee's' hours at any time. You'll know if they are approaching overtime caps before it's too late. Zip Clock will automatically notify your employee or yourself when it's time for them to either take a break or clock out. This feature saves you from potential labor law violations and the hefty fines associated with them.
Zip Clock will also notify you if you have an employee that misses a shift. This allows you to quickly get a replacement. The app will offer you options based on your other employees' availability.
Zip Schedules Figuring out the best schedule for your staff can be confusing, but is a necessary part of human resource planning. With Zip Schedules, managing your employee roster and scheduling shifts has never been easier. This app, like Zip Clock, streamlines the schedule creation process. Scheduling, typically done on a confusing spreadsheet, is far more complicated than it needs to be. Managing all the different shifts is often a time-consuming headache and can often require consultants and outside help. Zip Schedules is an intuitive computer app that does all the hard work for you. Managers can create employee schedules in a matter of minutes within the app. You can save favorite template schedules for use later; say goodbye to starting from scratch each week. Creating a schedule is as easy as simply dropping a shift on an employee slot in the app.
Zip Schedules handles schedule change requests effortlessly and allows for seamless communication will all team members. In the past, notifying employees about upcoming training or policy changes was time-consuming and costly. Zip Schedules allows managers to instantly send out blast messages to their staff for any type of notification. Since everyone can have the free mobile app, everyone will be on the same page.
Another feature of Zip Schedules is that it sends schedules out to all employees as soon as manager publishes it. The app does all the heavy lifting for managing time off requests, leave, and other sudden availability changes. Managers can accept or deny requests at any time on the app from their mobile device.
Being able to effortlessly draft schedules means your business will always have the right amount of people working. The forecasting feature in Zip Schedules predicts your staffing needs based on past sales reports. No one wants to under, or over, schedule his or her staff. Both result in losses for the business due to avoidable inefficiency. The right amount of staff means good service and lower labor costs.
Let's take a look at some of the top ways your human resource planning could benefit by using Zip Schedules.
1. Cloud-Based No matter the type of business you run, more and more people work from home or off-site. This is why having your schedule available online is ever more important. They're easily sharable from that specific point, and are available anywhere- smartphone, laptop, desktop, or tablet. Like any aspect of business and human resource planning, it benefits being in the cloud.
2. Notify Employees Zip Schedules allows you to notify your employees instantly. Mobile devices are a huge part of people's lives these days, and Zip Schedules is optimized for a variety of platforms. Managers can send out any type of notification like a schedule change.

3. Easy Changes What happens if you made a mistake or need to change something on a spreadsheet schedule? You're out of luck; the whole schedule will likely have to be rewritten. Thankfully, Zip Schedules replaces crowded spreadsheets and clunky schedules with an easy, all-in-one, way to manage your employees' shifts.
Zip Shift Book Zip Shift Book's purpose is to track all the events that happen during a shift; the manager, in turn, uses this information. Zip Shift Book's digital records can be attached to any employee's performance records for use in the future. This type of information is invaluable when dealing with things like disability and harassment claims. Everything is stored in the cloud, and thus accessible at any time, anywhere. Managers can be the only ones with permission to view the files.
In the event that an employee needs records for claims, think medical or insurance, they can easily be requested from management. Zip Shift Book keeps all shift information neatly in one place. It makes for a handy reference for human resource planning. The HR department can analyze employee performance and look at any past issues when making determinations about the needs of the company.
Zip Clock, Zip Schedules, and Zip Shift Book are three great tools businesses can use to optimize staff management and Human Resources. The data they compile can be used by HR to make informed decisions about labor needs and the cost of doing business under different employee schedules. Don't rely on clunky, old filing cabinets filled with disorganized stacks of papers. They are prone to error and your business deserves the best tools on the market.

Develop an Effective HR Plan for Your Business

Human resource planning is the link between where a company is, and where it wants to go. Having a plan for your Human Resource needs is often neglected. Companies will always put the financials together for something like an expansion, but not all will remember to put the time into appraising their Human Resource needs. Human resource planning means knowing the ins and outs of your workforce. You need to know what their skills are and what they excel at, who you've disciplined the most, or who has called off work the most.
When it comes time to for your business to make a move, you'll want to know the financial impact, but also the staff needs. Maybe you need to hire several new workers. Maybe they need to be of a specific skill set. Accurate human resource planning will prepare you for the next big step in your business. The various apps offered by Hubworks will help you along the way. Apps like Zip Clock and Zip Shift assist you in the daily management of your team. Hubworks apps also collect invaluable data that will come in handy when you do get around to crafting a plan for your staff. If you want to read more about Human Resources and its role in hiring and firing employees, check out this article on the 14 secrets to hiring the right employee.