Your competition is already planning for 2018. What about you? There are three months left in the year -- here's how to make the most of them, and create momentum to make next year your best yet:

The whole point of strategic planning in Q4 is to set a course for success in Q1. However, you need a strategy for your strategic planning, or the entire process can derail before it has a chance to gain momentum. Your plan should include setting goals, anticipating opportunities and building in flexibility to respond to market conditions. No strategic plan is complete, however, without a staffing and recruiting plan. After all, without the right people in place, you have no hope of realizing your strategic goals.

Set Up for Success

The right approach can make a big difference in whether your 2018 plan is a success or a failure. Use these tips to create momentum and set yourself up for success:

• Assemble a diverse team: The people you assemble to develop your plan for next year should represent every area of the company to ensure a complete cross-section of representation.
• Include a "devil's advocate": Make sure to include someone in the group who is comfortable asking, "What could go wrong," and who challenges people to consider all the angles.
• Write your plans in clay: Make sure everyone knows the strategic plan for next year is not written in stone. Conditions can change on a dime, and it is critical the plan be flexible enough to roll with those changes.
• Schedule check-ins: At your first planning meeting, schedule a minimum of four "checkups" in 2018, and a maximum of 12, or one per month. This ensures the group will revisit the plan regularly, check in on their progress and adjust as necessary.

Developing Your Strategic Staffing Plan

Once you have your planning team in place and you've set expectations, it's time to start developing your staffing strategy for the new year.

• Reflect: Before the first planning session, have leaders sit down with their managers and find out what went well and what went wrong with hiring/staffing/retention in 2017. Were teams logging too much overtime? Did the unforeseen closing of a large deal lead to a shortage of staff? Did managers have trouble finding people with specific skill sets? Did positions sit open for too long? Were there too many bad hires? It's important to understand where you've been before you can plan where you're going.
• Assess Your Needs: Once you know what went right and what went wrong, have each group assess their needs for 2018. How many sales will need to be made to achieve goals? What skills are lacking on the current team? What types of personalities excel in each group? Compare your company goals against the strengths and weaknesses of the current staff and determine what your needs will be in 2018.
• Develop a Recruiting Plan: Now that you know what you'll likely need in terms of people and skills for next year, your team must figure out how to source and hire those people. Different markets, different job titles and different skills may require different approaches. For example, if you're going to need skilled laborers, you might not find them on LinkedIn. Start planning methods and strategies to reach potential candidates in the right places at the right times.
• Collect Updated Job Descriptions: Make sure every job for which your team will be hiring has an updated and accurate job description so you'll ultimately hire the right people.
• Review Compensation Strategy: It is critical to get out into the market to determine the current rates for jobs you'll be hiring for next year. You don't want to pay the least of all your competitors, but you don't necessarily need to pay the most, either. Determine if there are ways to improve perks and benefits to attract great people if you can't quite compete on salary alone.

Your Shortcut to Effective Planning

Staffing needs should be an essential part of your end-of-year strategy sessions; however, if you've struggled with recruiting, hiring and retention in the past, it can pay to bring in a fresh set of (expert) eyes to help you assess your situation and develop strategies for success in 2018.

Working with a strategic staffing partner to help plan can be an effective way to learn new ideas, uncover the reasons why you've experienced specific roadblocks in the past and strategies to overcome them once and for all. A strategic partner can help you seamlessly execute your plan so your internal HR team can focus on other strategic goals for 2018.

Planning for 2018? Consider including CornerStone Staffing in your strategy sessions. We can help you achieve your goals.