Workforce Planning
By combining business forecasts with workforce data, retailers can make informed hiring, staffing, and labour allocation decisions.
What is workforce planning?
Workforce planning is a strategic process that aligns workforce needs with business goals. Rather than focusing only on day-to-day scheduling, it looks at future staffing requirements by considering factors such as sales growth, customer demand, employee turnover, seasonal hiring, and business expansion.
Modern workforce management platforms support workforce planning by providing forecasting tools, workforce analytics, and labour modelling that help retailers anticipate future workforce needs.
Why is workforce planning important?
Retail staffing needs change throughout the year due to seasonality, promotions, store openings, and changing customer behaviour. Without effective planning, retailers may experience staffing shortages, excessive labour costs, or operational disruptions.
Workforce planning helps retailers:
Ensure adequate staffing levels.
Support business growth and expansion.
Improve hiring decisions.
Optimise labour budgets.
Prepare for seasonal demand.
Reduce the impact of employee turnover.
A proactive workforce planning strategy helps retailers respond more effectively to changing business conditions.
What factors influence workforce planning?
Retail workforce planning typically considers a combination of business and workforce data, including:
Sales and customer demand forecasts.
Labour budgets.
Employee turnover.
Hiring plans.
Store openings and closures.
Seasonal staffing requirements.
Employee skills and availability.
Productivity and labour performance metrics.
Using these inputs, retailers can estimate future workforce needs and develop hiring and staffing strategies that support business objectives.
Workforce planning vs. workforce scheduling
Although closely related, these processes operate on different time horizons.
Workforce planning focuses on determining how many employees, and what skills, the business will need in the future.
Workforce scheduling focuses on assigning those employees to specific shifts based on forecasted demand and operational requirements.
In other words, workforce planning determines who the organisation needs, while workforce scheduling determines when they work.
Best practices for workforce planning
Retailers can improve workforce planning by:
Using demand forecasting to anticipate future staffing requirements.
Reviewing workforce plans regularly as business conditions change.
Monitoring employee turnover and hiring trends.
Aligning workforce planning with labour budgets and business objectives.
Integrating workforce planning with workforce management, scheduling, and workforce analytics tools.
When supported by workforce management software, workforce planning helps retailers build a more agile workforce, optimise labour resources, control staffing costs, and ensure every location has the people needed to deliver a consistent customer experience.
