It’s a cliché but it remains true that a council’s most important asset is its people. Without the
right people, it is unlikely that even the most comprehensive finance and business plans will
deliver the step change in performance being demanded of local government.
The vast majority of an authority’s improvement comes when the right people with the right
knowledge, skills and behaviours are deployed appropriately throughout the structure.
Workforce planning is about how you achieve that match. Crucially, it can make the links
between business strategies and your people plans for recruitment and retention, staff
development and training. It is about how you get to where you want to be.
It also provides the opportunity for longer term thinking about future service pressures and needs,
and what you need to do now to get workable strategies in place – not only for people
development, but for financial and change management too.
We believe that workforce planning therefore has a central role to play in delivering improved
services, and is an important issue for the corporate management of councils.ded of local government.