Workforce strategy

The right talent mix to drive value

With up to 85% of costs tied up in people, organisations need to predict their strategic and operational requirements and allocate resources accordingly. But the world is changing. The digital workforce is here -- and the new possibilities that man and machine in collaboration bring us are endless and are transforming the role of people at work. The global pandemic further highlighted the need to understand workforce skills in order to enable a quick pivot -- and those organizations that were further along in embracing digitization came out ahead.

By understanding the possibilities of automation, the changing ways organisations harness the potential of human skills, and the needs of the business in a changing global business landscape and throughout the employee lifecycle we ensure organisations can find, nurture and incentivise the right adaptable, innovative and skilled people they need for the digital age.

_{PwC's Global Co-Leaders for Workforce Strategy, Bhushan Sethi and Julia Lamm, discuss how COVID-19 has impacted the way organisations need to approach workforce strategy. They look at the importance of scenario planning, data and upskilling to achieve a successful workforce strategy.}

Does your organisation have the right workforce to meet your immediate and emerging business challenges? Do you know what skills you will need for the future of your business? And do you have an understanding of how today’s complex global environment will impact where and how you deploy your talented people?

Build your workforce strategy

Workforce strategy is how organisations plan and prepare their workforce to deliver on business strategy

Aligning organisational goals to individual performance metrics is a complex balancing act. As organisations shift to enhance focus on ‘how’ work is executed and impact to the business, performance management has come into the spotlight. We believe that robust performance management can offers a clear connection between organisation-wide and individual performance, and brings a broader range of rewards that appeal to changing generations in the workplace, benefits that drive organisation are critically appealing to millennial workers and other stakeholders, such as compelling career paths, relevant skills, and flexible work policies.

View our Fit for Growth webpage here

We work with clients to connect the dots between business strategy and people with the goal of having the right people, with the right skills, in the right places, at the right time and for the right cost -- what we call strategic workforce planning. Our scenario-based methodology ties the analysis of workforce gaps into the talent strategy and planning, connecting recruiting, talent development, mobility and other talent processes to the workforce plan.

Workforce planning informs decisions across the talent lifecycle around build, buy, borrow or 'bot' -- we bring differentiated tools and services to the table, select highlights include:

Sourcing and Talent Acquisition Strategies

We work with clients to support all aspects of their talent acquisition strategies, including recruitment function transformation and data analytics to better understand and predict recruitment/talent acquisition needs, recruitment process outsourcing, and recruiting tactics such as gamification.

Leadership and Succession Planning

Attracting and retaining high performers and the future leaders of an organisation requires a thoughtful and proactive approach, offering those individuals rewarding development opportunities and a clear path to the next level. Leadership and succession planning provides the tools to manage this element of the workforce and minimise risk in leadership roles across an organisation.

Find out more, visit our Global Leadership page here

Diversity and Inclusion

Many organisations have identified diversity as a key element to driving innovation, improved working environments for employees and enhanced customer service. And, studies show that a diverse and inclusive environment drives outcomes and better business performance. Our global D&I framework identifies the four key components of developing and executing a D&I strategy, each of which must be considered at all stages of the talent lifecycle.

Find our more, visit PwC’s Global Diversity and Inclusion page here

We have a dedicated team of L&D experts who have a wealth of experience in developing both the approach and content for learning curricula and in the selection of technology platforms and providers. We help clients think through innovative new solutions to developing workforce skills and behaviours – including applying lifelong learning concepts to overhaul traditional models and how to leverage cost-effective solutions such as Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) – and apply them to deliver business objectives. We do so by identifying and building targeted learning and development interventions such as incentivized learning through spot rewards and bonus, digitized, on-demand and bite-sized learning through mobile apps, podcasts and learning bursts, and digital badging to recognize earned skills and promote through social channels.

Upskill your workforce for the digital world

The impacts of COVID-19 have ramped up the pressure on costs and productivity for many organisations. This new environment is accelerating the need for digital transformation and creating immediate and large-scale workforce and skills challenges.

Automation, data analysis, artificial intelligence (AI) and other emerging technologies can deliver productivity. But technology is only as good as the leaders who identify its opportunities, the technologists who deliver it and the people who work with it every day. That’s where some companies are coming up short: the right mix of skilled and adaptable people, aligned to the right culture and with the right mindset and behaviours can help power their business.

Hear more about how we can help you upskill your workforce here

By understanding what is happening in the wider world of work, along with the interplays of organisational DNA, we can focus on getting the employee value proposition right by generating a purpose that contributes to larger business ideas and goals, delivering value through automation of manual tasks, promoting diversity of learning opportunities and formats to foster personal and professional growth, and motivating employees through benefits and rewards.

Experience-led transformation is the future. Designing experiences for your employees needs to be at the heart of transformation and ensures your employees will be more productive, committed and engaged, driving your profits and ensuring a positive reputation in the market.

Hear more about how we can help with your employee experience here

Consideration of your work environment from an overall workforce strategy perspective enables peak performance by increasing innovation, employee experience and productivity while decreasing or re-allocating costs. We help our clients with their location strategies, labour market analytics, as well as help them understand future ways of working to unlock real estate opportunities, create appropriate remote environments and embed technology and mobility requirements.

PwC’s Real Estate Strategy and Transformation team has delivered a leading edge, proprietary location strategy and site selection tool designed to turn a traditionally ad hoc, manual process into an organized, efficient and holistic approach to location decision making. The tool provides access to high quality data transformed to benchmark key categories (e.g., demographics, cost of living, competition, workforce supply, compensation, etc.) in a hands-on, interactive visualisation.

Visit our real estate transformation page here