The alignment of business and workforce strategies is a “hot” topic in the HR and business domain. Many HR thought leaders and HR professionals have identified this as a key issue for those seeking to extract maximum value from their most important intangible asset – their people.

This book provides a road map for those seeking to achieve this alignment. It firstly explains what is meant by a workforce strategy, as opposed to workforce planning. Then a three layered model of organisational critical capabilities, core competencies and individual job competencies of the firm is introduced from which the strategy of the business can best be conceived. The focus is then on strengthening these capabilities and competencies by identifying their underpinning key drivers.

These drivers are in turn integrated with a new skills’ based approach to segmenting the workforce, analysing and differentiating roles, including the identification of critical roles. Limitations in the traditional approach to segmenting the workforce on a hierarchical/job level basis, and job evaluation basis and job family basis are exposed. Those roles that are more closely linked to these key drivers then assume greater importance and focus (including associated levels of investment) in order to maximise the performance of people in those roles.

Other themes that are addressed in this book include workforce configuration, outsourcing, psychological contracts, engagement and retention, brand and Employment Value Propositions, measurement and reporting of HR data (including workforce analytics and the tree categories of HR data).