Workforce planning isn't dead. But as the business world changes, traditional ways of doing workforce planning have begun to show their age.

Today, traditional workforce planning is often ineffective against modern, quick-paced skill evolution. Adopting skills intelligence and AI for real-time strategies can breathe new life into agile, accurate talent management.

Why Businesses Need to Revitalize Workforce Planning

In decades past, workforce planning worked because businesses and workers had time. Organizations had time to determine which skills they needed. They also had time to adapt to changes, which tended to be gradual. Meanwhile, workers had time to develop deep skill sets that adapted to these gradual changes.

Today, neither employees nor their employers have the luxury of time. In most industries, one or more skills become obsolete in just a few years. Skills gaps continue to widen.

These gaps and related talent shortages have a significant effect on growth. Addressing them is among the top priorities in companies worldwide.

Businesses and workers can keep up with evolving skill demands. To do so, however, they need to know which skills are fading out, which are rising in demand and how to access the information they need to keep skills sharp.

When skill profiles changed over decades, employers and employees had years to spot these trends. Now that skill profiles change over years or months, neither workers nor their companies can afford to wait and watch.

In today's workplace, making better decisions requires better information.

Using Skills Intelligence for Real-Time Workforce Planning

As skill demands change in real time, workforce planning must also occur in real time. Using AI-powered skills intelligence tools can help businesses understand the skills available within their organization. It can also help them benchmark these skills against changes and trends in the industry and the wider world. And it can help businesses communicate with their workers to help workers adapt and train.

AI-driven analytics help businesses glean actionable insights from skills data. In the past, skills-based trends developed slowly in part because information on them depended on human perception and analysis.

Today, as information expands exponentially, no human can keep up with the amount of data available. AI-based analytics, however, can sift through this data, spot patterns and present results in a format that business leaders can understand and act upon.

Whether it's analyzing data from within the company or without, AI skills intelligence can:

• Spot trends and patterns in skill use or decline;
• Compare skills profiles within a company to those within an industry or geographic region;
• Identify hidden or overlapping skills within the workforce, offering opportunities for cross-training employees;
• List the skills required to support a new venture or market; and
• Suggest ways to train and mentor employees for continued skill development.

Organizations that utilize AI skills intelligence tools have access to better data and insights. These insights allow them to make better decisions about workforce planning and development.

Breathe New Life Into Your Workforce Planning With These Tips

To put skills intelligence to use in your workforce planning:

Use AI-enabled insights to rethink how your company defines work. Job titles are convenient to place on business cards or LinkedIn profiles, but they're increasingly obsolete when it comes to understanding what people do at work. Two people with the same job title can have substantially different daily tasks - and use different skills - in two different businesses or industries.

Instead, look past the job title. Identify the tasks each person does and the skills required to do each task. Then, use AI-enabled skills intelligence tools to study how those tasks and skills are evolving. Map how those tasks and skills overlap with other roles and departments.

This information can help you identify which tasks are likely to be automated, so you can focus on training staff members in skills that cannot be trusted to automation. It also allows you to cross-train, mentor, promote from within, and preserve institutional knowledge in your organization.

Focus talent management on education and training. No worker, at any level of an organization, can afford to stagnate. From the mail room to the CEO's office, everyone who wants a successful career must commit to lifelong learning.

Boost this commitment among your team by turning talent management into team education. Focus on building skills among your workforce, using AI insights as guidance.

Engage with your staffing partner. Strategic staffing partners specialize in workforce planning. They understand the uses - and limitations - of AI-based tools. They know how to formulate questions about both big-picture planning and individual team member development. Your staffing partner can help you forecast staffing needs, identify skills gaps and provide insights for workforce development. Together, you can execute a strategic plan that anticipates your needs and ensures you have the human capital required to meet your goals. Contact CornerStone Staffing today!