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<p>The Guide to Efficient Workforce Capacity Planning</p><p>Blake Proberts</p><p>CEO and Founder @ Acorn | Linking Learning To Performance</p><p>74 artigos Seguir</p><p>27 de novembro de 2023</p><p>Abrir Leitor imersivo</p><p>In today’s rapidly changing business landscape, organisations must continuously adapt to remain competitive. A crucial aspect of building this capability is workforce capacity planning. But what exactly is workforce capacity planning, and why is it so essential for your company’s success?</p><p>We answer those questions in this blog, as well as outlining the best practices and strategies you can use to make your workforce capacity planning process as effective as possible.</p><p>What is workforce capacity planning?</p><p>Workforce capacity planning is the process of assessing an organisation’s workforce to ensure that it has the optimal number of employees to deliver on current and future needs and demands. It assists in aligning the workforce with organisational strategy, enabling the business to hire the right person with the right capabilities for the right job.</p><p>The impact of workforce capacity planning</p><p>Workforce capacity planning is similar to workforce planning in that it’s a process for long-term strategic planning and ensuring that your organisation meets its business priorities. It does that by identifying the capabilities (the skills, tools, processes, knowledge, and behaviours that combine to deliver on business outcomes) that enable employees to perform their jobs and aligning them with your strategic goals.</p><p>Perhaps most importantly, effective capacity planning improves productivity and efficiency. It enables your business to deploy the right skill sets and knowledge where and when they are needed, minimising any inefficiencies caused by capability gaps and ensuring that employees are able to perform their roles with greater competence and confidence.</p><p>On top of that, workforce capacity planning enables you to identify and eliminate bottlenecks and redundancies in processes. By fine-tuning workflows and ensuring the right tools are in place, workforce capacity planning allows a seamless flow of tasks, accelerating work and productivity. In other words, workforce capacity planning helps in creating a more agile workforce capable of responding swiftly to challenges and opportunities.</p><p>This also means you’ll reduce costs, because you won’t be wasting money from overstaffing or resources from understaffing. In other words, workforce capability planning fine-tunes your resource planning and management to ensure your business is operating optimally.</p><p>Plus, there’s also the fact that 94% of employees say they would stay with their company longer if it invested in their professional development. When you use workforce capacity plans to identify the gaps in capabilities, you can develop training to close those gaps, increasing employee satisfaction and engagement and reducing employee turnover. And, given the cost to businesses when they need to hire, reducing turnover makes for a healthier bottom line.</p><p>Strategies for effective workforce capacity planning</p><p>You might think workforce planning is a big task due to its broad scope. You wouldn’t be wrong, which is why there are some strategies you can employ to make the process easier and more effective.</p><p>When you start workforce capacity planning, you should include:</p><p>1. Decision-making driven by data</p><p>2. Scenario planning</p><p>3. Forecasts of future needs and demands</p><p>4. Communication and collaboration.</p><p>Data-driven decision-making</p><p>It might seem obvious, but it’s essential to mention here. Data collection and analysis involves gathering and analysing data on current workforce capabilities and the business landscape. A good tool to help you here is an environmental scan, which helps workforce planning managers understand the operating environment of their company. This drives managers and leaders to make better data-informed decisions for the future.</p><p>How does an environmental scan do this? Well, it’s a process of analysing the trends (in historical data), competition, customers (and customer demand), and the external labour supply, in order to gain an objective view of your organisational context. These factors fall under four categories:</p><p>1. Internal environment scanning (supply). This is your organisation’s current situation, including hiring costs, revenue per employee, new hire attrition, and turnover.</p><p>2. Internal environment scanning (demand). This is the value your organisation creates, and how it delivers it.</p><p>3. External environment scanning (supply). This includes things like the talent currently available and competitor growth.</p><p>4. External environment scanning (demand). This covers the political, economic, social, technological, legal, and environmental factors that affect your organisation and how it operates.</p><p>Scenario planning</p><p>A scenario analysis, or scenario planning is a method used to prepare for different future scenarios. Scenarios are considered in many forms that affect the workforce, including both internal and external drivers. It encourages workforce planners to conceptualise future scenarios and events that will have an impact on the organisation, sidestepping the “what ifs?” of your initiatives with some helpful insight. In other words: scenario planning helps you avoid worst-case scenarios.</p><p>The idea is to imagine scenarios outside of what historical data might predict–while the events of the past can indicate patterns that will continue to occur, they aren’t the be-all and end-all. Most organisations didn’t factor a pandemic into their workforce plans based on the data from previous years, for example.</p><p>Robust scenario planning should look deeper into the data to find the indicators of the unexpected. Yes, we know, we just said that most organisations didn’t see the pandemic coming. That doesn’t mean it was unpredictable—for years, leading scientists had been saying that another pandemic was close at hand. But that’s exactly the point. Scenario planning should dig deeper to find the patterns in historical data that would otherwise go unnoticed. This way, you’ll never truly be surprised by challenges that arise, and you’ll be flexible and adaptable enough to address those challenges.</p><p>Forecast future needs</p><p>This is also known as demand forecasting, and it’s one of your most important workforce capacity planning tools. It’s about forecasting the future needs of your workforce, from future workload to future hiring needs, and even customer demand, estimating both the quantity of the workforce required and its quality.</p><p>One of your best practices here is to think of the capabilities required to successfully deliver your organisation’s objectives and goals. These won’t just be limited to business capabilities (the organisation’s capabilities to perform business functions), but human capabilities (employees’ role-specific capabilities) as well.</p><p>When you’re forecasting future needs, you should make sure you assess:</p><p>· What capabilities you will need</p><p>· The importance of the capabilities</p><p>· The current level of proficiency in each capability</p><p>· The future desired level of proficiency.</p><p>It’s also important to remember that for better forecasting, data should be based on the collective capability of teams and business units, rather than specific individuals.</p><p>Stakeholder management and engagement</p><p>Capacity planning isn’t just a task for human resources—just like any change management program, it needs the input and collaboration of other business units, stakeholders and business leaders. Without that buy-in and collaboration, you’ll lack the support to actually design and implement your capacity plans—in fact, up to 70% of change management programs fail when they don’t have leadership support.</p><p>Even once you identify the relevant stakeholders, you can’t guarantee that they’ll be all-in on your workforce capacity plan. As with building co-ownership between HR and business units in your organisational change initiatives, you’ll need to convince them that capacity planning is important to</p><p>them. Make sure to answer:</p><p>· What motivates this particular stakeholder? Why are they important to your company and its capacity plans?</p><p>· What are these stakeholders’ priorities and how can you align those priorities with your workforce capacity planning?</p><p>· Is this stakeholder likely to support your project, and if not, how will you address that? What pain points can your workforce capacity plans address for them?</p><p>Without involving stakeholders, your workforce capacity plan will be dead on arrival and unable to make any meaningful changes to the workforce or business performance.</p><p>The impacts of not doing workforce capacity planning</p><p>Failing to implement a workforce capacity planning process can have significant and detrimental impacts on your organisation. The biggest impact is that you won’t be able to proactively plan for your company’s future state, and that’s a problem that snowballs out into individual inefficiencies.</p><p>· Poor resource planning and allocation, resulting in wasted resources or an inability to achieve goals due to a lack of resources. For example, understaffing can drive employee burnout, which in turn feeds turnover.</p><p>· 48% of executives name succession planning as their biggest workforce concern, but a lack of workforce capacity planning prevents organisations from hiring high-performing talent, as they can’t identify the necessary capabilities that mark a high-performing employee.</p><p>· Low engagement and morale among employees. This could be from a lack of professional development (due to not knowing what capabilities to develop) or under-utilising the skills and expertise your employees possess (due to poor resource allocation). This all feeds back into employee turnover, as employees are ten times more likely to find a new job if they feel their capabilities are being wasted.</p><p>· Capability gaps, both from employees leaving the business and a lack of clear capacity planning to provide targets for training to address. This can lead to an inability to effectively adapt to change.</p><p>· Reduced productivity and performance due to a misalignment between employee capabilities and the business’s strategic priorities, barring your organisation from taking opportunities and creating an organisation that is sustainable in the long term.</p><p>Key takeaways</p><p>Workforce capacity planning, or workforce planning, is an essential activity allowing organisations to prepare themselves for the future. It involves planning for future customer demand, the number of employees needed (including hiring plans and costs), project demand, and training and development needs to build organisational capability.</p><p>It’s a large process, and it can be daunting. You can make it easier for yourself with four workforce capacity planning strategies:</p><p>1. Decision-making driven by data</p><p>2. Scenario planning</p><p>3. Forecasts of future needs and demands</p><p>4. Communication and collaboration.</p><p>Efficient Workforce Capacity Planning: A Comprehensive Guide</p><p>· Written by: Rinaily Bonifacio</p><p>· Last updated: 7 May 2024</p><p>In this article, we will explore the essentials of capacity planning, understanding its importance, and highlighting the fundamental components that form its strategy.</p><p>Table of contents</p><p>1. What is workforce capacity planning?</p><p>2. Key components of effective workforce capacity planning</p><p>3. Benefits of workforce capacity planning</p><p>4. The process of workforce capacity planning</p><p>5. Best practices for implementing a successful workforce capacity planning strategy</p><p>6. Software solutions for capacity planning</p><p>7. Conclusion</p><p>8. Frequently Asked Questions</p><p>What is workforce capacity planning?</p><p>Workforce capacity planning is more than just a strategic approach; it's the foundation that ensures businesses operate efficiently. It involves aligning a company's human resources with its operational requirements.</p><p>This coordination is essential to meet customer demands, achieve business objectives, and maintain a competitive edge.</p><p>Workforce capacity planning identifies discrepancies between existing staff skills and upcoming work demands, ensuring a smooth transition that integrates business strategy with human resource capabilities.</p><p>Key components of effective workforce capacity planning</p><p>1. Demand forecasting:</p><p>Just as meteorologists use data to predict weather patterns, capacity planning uses insights to forecast the future workforce needs of an organization. By examining past data, projected demands, and business priorities, organizations can prepare for the varying demands they will encounter.</p><p>2. Supply analysis:</p><p>Consider your workforce as a well-organized system, where each individual's skills, availability, and potential have a specific place. Supply analysis is about understanding the current state of this system. By doing so, organizations can pinpoint areas of surplus or shortage, facilitating informed decisions about hiring, training, or reallocating talents to achieve the desired balance.</p><p>3. Gap analysis:</p><p>Gap analysis is akin to a health check for your organization’s resources. It determines the difference between current capabilities and anticipated demands. Recognizing these gaps early on provides organizations with opportunities to hire, train, or innovate, ensuring that they are never caught unprepared.</p><p>4. Resource allocation:</p><p>Resource allocation is the strategic distribution of workforce resources to meet business demands. By matching employee availability with project needs and factoring in future constraints, organizations can maximize productivity and efficiency. Think of it as a detailed plan that ensures every project has the required manpower and skills at the right time.</p><p>Benefits of workforce capacity planning</p><p>Enhanced resource utilization: Capacity planning acts like a conductor who knows which instruments to bring to the forefront. By matching workforce supply with demand, you avoid overstaffing or shortages, creating a harmony in your operations.</p><p>Improved agility: Capacity planning serves as a flexible tool for your business, allowing swift adjustments. Whether you're grasping a fresh opportunity or facing sudden obstacles, capacity planning enables quick and effective responses.</p><p>Reduced costs: By adopting capacity planning, businesses ensure optimal use of resources, much like a chef ensures no ingredient is wasted. This approach leads to cost efficiency by curbing unnecessary labor expenses and optimizing resource use.</p><p>Informed decision-making: With capacity planning, businesses gain clarity and direction. It offers insights into workforce availability and other essential metrics, equipping leaders to make decisions grounded in data.</p><p>Strategic alignment: Capacity planning functions as a roadmap for your organization. It synchronizes your workforce efforts with your overarching business goals, making sure all initiatives contribute to growth.</p><p>Anticipating bottlenecks: Capacity planning is your early warning system. It identifies potential bottlenecks and resource shortages, allowing you to proactively address issues before they impact your operations.</p><p>With these benefits spotlighted, workforce capacity planning takes its place as a strategic masterpiece, ensuring that your business performs in tune, even when the tempo changes.</p><p>The process of workforce capacity planning</p><p>Let's dive into the process of effective workforce capacity planning! This crucial aspect of project management ensures your team has the right resources at the right time to meet customer demands and achieve business goals.</p><p>Step 1: Data collection and analysis</p><p>To kick off the capacity planning process, start by collecting relevant data and analyzing it. This step sets the foundation for informed decisions.</p><p>· Collect historical data: Gather data on past workloads, customer demands, and the number of employees during specific time periods. This could include sales figures, customer orders, and project completion rates.</p><p>· Use key performance indicators (KPIs): Identify and track KPIs such as production rate, service delivery time, and employee productivity. These metrics</p><p>help you understand how much capacity your workforce currently has and how well it matches customer demand.</p><p>· Collaborate with business units: Engage with different business units to understand their upcoming projects and anticipated demands. This cross-functional collaboration ensures that you're considering the complete picture of future workload.</p><p>Step 2: Forecasting future workload</p><p>Now that you have your data, it's time to predict the future workload and demand for your team's resources.</p><p>· Trend analysis: Examine historical data to identify patterns and trends. This can help you predict how demand might change over time, such as increased orders during holiday seasons.</p><p>· Customer demand analysis: Analyze current and expected customer demand. This could involve market research, customer feedback, and sales projections to estimate the demand for your products or services.</p><p>· Scenario planning: Consider various scenarios that could impact your workload, such as launching a new product or entering a new market. This approach helps you prepare for different levels of demand.</p><p>Step 3: Identifying capacity requirements</p><p>With future workload predictions in mind, it's time to figure out how much capacity your team needs.</p><p>· Calculate required employee hours: Based on the forecasted workload, calculate the number of available employee hours needed. This involves estimating the time it takes to complete tasks and the number of employees required.</p><p>· Use a lag strategy: Implement a lag strategy where you have a buffer of extra capacity to handle unexpected spikes in demand. This safety net helps prevent overburdening your team during high-demand periods.</p><p>· Identify bottlenecks: Identify potential bottlenecks or constraints in your workflow. These could be specific tasks that require specialized skills or resources, affecting your overall capacity.</p><p>By following these steps and utilizing the capacity planning strategies, you'll be able to create a robust workforce capacity plan. This plan ensures that you have the right number of employees, with the necessary skills, available to meet customer demand and achieve your business objectives.</p><p>Best practices for implementing a successful workforce capacity planning strategy</p><p>let's delve into some detailed best practices for implementing a successful workforce capacity planning strategy. These practices will help you optimize resource planning and ensure your capacity plans are effective over a given period.</p><p>· Align with business goals: Start by understanding your organization's broader business objectives. Your capacity plans should directly support these goals. If you're aiming to expand into new markets, for example, your workforce capacity planning should account for the additional resources needed to achieve that expansion.</p><p>· Define key metrics: Clearly define and measure key metrics related to your capacity plans. This could include weekly capacity utilization, employee productivity, and response times. These metrics provide tangible benchmarks to evaluate the success of your planning strategy and to make necessary adjustments.</p><p>· Consider seasonality: Recognize and accommodate any seasonal fluctuations in demand. If your business experiences spikes or drops in demand during certain times of the year, ensure your capacity plans reflect this. Having the right resources in place to handle these fluctuations can prevent overstaffing or underutilization.</p><p>· Scenario modeling: Utilize scenario modeling to prepare for different situations. Create multiple capacity plans based on various scenarios, such as best-case, worst-case, and most likely scenarios. This helps you proactively address potential challenges and respond effectively to changing conditions.</p><p>· Regular review and adjustments: Capacity planning is not a one-time task. Regularly review and adjust your plans based on real-time data and performance. If your weekly capacity utilization is consistently falling short, for instance, consider redistributing resources or providing additional training to employees.</p><p>Remember, effective workforce capacity planning is an ongoing process that requires careful attention to detail and flexibility to adapt to changing circumstances. By following these best practices, you can ensure that your capacity plans align with your business goals, accommodate seasonality, and are regularly fine-tuned for optimal performance.</p><p>Software solutions for capacity planning</p><p>Microsoft Excel:</p><p>A versatile tool for creating capacity planning spreadsheets. Excel allows you to input historical data, calculate required resources, and visualize trends using graphs. It's a solid option for small to medium-sized businesses looking for a familiar and customizable solution.</p><p>Workforce Management Software:</p><p>Dedicated tools like Kronos, Deputy, or Humanity offer features tailored to capacity planning. These solutions typically integrate with time-tracking and scheduling functionalities, enabling you to allocate resources efficiently and align with demand.</p><p>Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Systems:</p><p>Comprehensive platforms like SAP, Oracle, or Microsoft Dynamics provide modules for capacity planning. They offer a holistic approach, allowing you to integrate capacity planning with other business processes, such as inventory management and production scheduling.</p><p>Demand Forecasting Tools:</p><p>Tools like Forecast Pro or SAS Forecast Server focus on predicting future demand accurately. By integrating these tools with your capacity planning process, you can ensure that your resources align precisely with expected demand.</p><p>Advanced Analytics Platforms:</p><p>Tools like Tableau or Power BI help you visualize complex data sets and identify patterns. Integrating these platforms with your capacity planning process can enhance your decision-making by providing insights from your data.</p><p>Best practices for using capacity planning software</p><p>· Data accuracy: Ensure the accuracy of input data. Garbage in, garbage out—accurate capacity planning depends on reliable historical and demand data.</p><p>· Regular updates: Keep your software up-to-date to benefit from the latest features, bug fixes, and security patches.</p><p>· Integration: If you're using multiple software solutions, ensure they can integrate seamlessly. This avoids data silos and provides a comprehensive view.</p><p>· Training: Provide training to your team on how to effectively use the software. Even the most advanced tool is only as good as those using it.</p><p>· Scenario testing: Use the software to model various scenarios, like changes in demand or workforce fluctuations. This helps you prepare for different situations effectively.</p><p>Useful Read: Employee Management Software for small business - A Guide</p><p>By utilizing these software solutions and best practices, you can enhance your capacity planning process, making it more efficient, accurate, and aligned with your business goals.</p><p>4 Best Practices for Workforce Management Capacity Planning</p><p>by LISA BUTLER</p><p>Reading time: 4 Minutes</p><p>Ensuring scheduling efficiencies while carefully considering the needs of associates is a difficult balancing act even for a sophisticated Workforce Management team.  However, when executed correctly, effective workforce staffing practices can have a long-term impact on a company’s competitiveness and sustainability.</p><p>Capacity planning models are used to convert forecasts for volume, Average Handle Time (AHT), and shrinkage into the required number of full-time equivalents (FTE’s) needed to handle a contact center’s workload, allowing managers to project staffing excesses and deficits. Managers can proactively plan to ensure the right number of people are available at all times by joining existing workforce management functions— such as short-term forecasting, scheduling, and real-time management — to a well-grounded capacity planning model. The resources and continual cadence that a Workforce Management Department puts forth as an investment in building out this process, will pay off in upcoming years.</p><p>The following are best</p><p>practices for assessing and improving a company’s workforce management capacity plan:</p><p>1. Reforecast Monthly</p><p>The WFM capacity plan should be refreshed monthly to provide a realistic view of FTEs required and the timing of new hires for the upcoming year.  This monthly cadence allows you to identify trends quickly and consistently and proactively adjust your hiring plan to reflect current insights, while developing an operational game plan to minimize risks.</p><p>The first step is updating the previous month’s actuals to enable an analysis of current trends, actual results and forecast variances. You should compare actuals to your previous forecast, and trends to year-to-date, year over year and your annual budget, all of which can provide insights on risks and/or favorable trends you should consider in your next monthly forecast.</p><p>The following example highlights why this is important to your contact centers’ performance and financial results: You forecasted “x%” attrition and a contact rate of “y”. Both were favorable during the last few months, so you decide the trend warrants reforecasting.</p><p>· You could potentially delay hiring a class by a month or two which can result in a savings of $60-$70k per month.</p><p>· Alternatively, you could determine that instead of a new hire class of 18, you only need a class of 15, which would also result in significant savings.</p><p>A monthly reforecasting cadence allows you to “course correct” and strengthen your overall forecast, transitioning your organization to a proactive planning cycle vs. reactive adjustments. Implementing this best practice also allows organizations that utilize outsourcers to lock in a 90-day forecast with the accuracy that most suppliers require.</p><p>2. Forecast Realistically</p><p>As you develop your forecast, make sure you are projecting hiring needs based on current trends and planned initiatives. Far too often, organizations forecast with a presumed FTE objective in mind and/or forecast to a desired productivity goal, even though current trends don’t support these assumptions. You can avoid the pain of having to use additional resources to solve an understaffed situation by forecasting realistically and following up with a proactive action plan to reach desired goals, budgets, or metrics. If this best practice is not followed, you risk understaffing or overstaffing your organization for a prolonged period; it’s always less efficient to dig out of a staffing shortage as all the metrics go the wrong way in a prolonged staffing deficit.</p><p>3. Account for Attrition</p><p>In addition to proactively determining the number of people you need to hire, your capacity planning model should factor in the impact of attrition. Attrition should be tracked monthly and utilized to develop trends to enable proactive hiring of employees prior to the attrition; this ensures you have employees staffed and trained as the attrition occurs instead of reacting to the attrition afterwards and starting the recruiting / training process. Secondly, it’s important to account for new hire attrition trends. Accounting for new hire attrition is essential to ensure that the right number of new hires are fully onboarded. Far too many organizations forget this component and end up understaffed — this outcome has a direct impact on financial forecasting and planning. As you evaluate trends, you will notice a consistent pattern in the percentage of staff that completes the new hire training process. Once you establish these trends, you can ramp up your hiring goal to consider new hire attrition and to ensure you have the right number of people completing training at the right time.</p><p>4. Collaborate</p><p>The best monthly forecasts include both an upfront analysis from Workforce Management and a collaborative discussion with Operations that considers trends and operational insights. Operations leaders are critical partners in this process, so it is important to share insights with them regarding any changes in trends, action plans, or initiatives that are expected to have an impact on ongoing forecasts. From capacity planning to budgeting, Workforce Management and Finance cannot execute a monthly refresh in a vacuum — Workforce Management, Finance, and Operations must work collectively.</p><p>The value of Workforce Management lies in the process and making sure the right due diligence and analysis are carried out. Successful organizations make improvements sooner rather than later and most organizations can strengthen their results by getting into a solid cadence of conducting monthly reforecasts. Although there are many challenges to consider, staffing for success can best be accomplished with a capacity planning model that allows for proactive and accurate forecasting of staffing needs.</p><p>Fundamentals of Capacity Planning</p><p>When WFM professionals hear the word capacity planning, they automatically feel proud about their job. That is the power of Capacity Planning!!</p><p>Many analysts aspire to become a capacity planner one day, because of the challenge, fun and satisfaction the planning activity provides. It feels like control of the main resources of the entire project is in our hands which makes us feel superior about WFM and the planning.</p><p>So, what is Capacity Planning?</p><p>The term is self-explanatory which says that we are going to plan the capacity. Capacity is in terms of FTE Requirement, Call Handling Capacity etc.</p><p>The word planning indicates future. Therefore “Capacity Planning” is a process of making plans of requirements for the future.</p><p>Why is it so important?</p><p>There is a famous quote which says “An hour of planning can save 10 hours of doing”. The future of business should be foreseen to prepare for all the possible causes which may affect the smooth operation of the business.</p><p>This includes the number of staffs required, what will be our call handling capacity in the future etc.</p><p>Depending upon the planning, the management will take necessary actions to solve any requirement deficit. For e.g. we may hire a batch of new agents to handle to higher call volume anticipated on third month from now.</p><p>The hiring decision taken will change the planning of many departments such as Hiring, Training etc. and hence becomes highly important.</p><p>On the other hand, the cost will increase as more people are added which will also be of Finance Department’s interest.</p><p>In short, the WFM’s execution of accurate capacity planner is very important as the major business decisions lie on it which in turn affects the decisions of other departments too and also impacts the profitability of a business. This adds a lot of weightage on the WFM department and it is viewed as most required skill by many organizations.</p><p>We hope now you can see, why WFM professionals feel proud about Capacity Planning!!</p><p>Let’s look at the steps for Capacity Planning Process below</p><p>The first step in Capacity Planning is to find out the future FTE requirements. The forecasted volume and AHT along with shrinkage, attrition and other factors are used to find out how many people are required in the future.</p><p>Post that, we will find out how many people are currently present in the process and by comparing both required Headcount and Present Headcount, the decisions will be taken whether or not to hire new people. Sometimes we may have deficit just for one week which can be managed by Over Time.</p><p>Next, we will look into the factors required to build a capacity planner along with their uses</p><p>· Forecasted Volume and AHT – This will tell us how many people are required. The requirement can be derived either by using Erlang or Linear Workload method.</p><p>· Shrinkage – This is simply the buffer component which we anticipate for the future to protect the operations against any unforeseen headcount shortage. The shrinkage can also be used to plan for any special event such as new product release, holidays etc. Shrinkage if not planned effectively may lead to over or under staffing which may cause discomfort for either customers or for the business.</p><p>· Attrition – Not all the people will stay</p><p>in the company forever, they will switch over the job for multiple reasons. A good capacity planner should take attrition into account so that he/she can identify how many people should be hired to fill the attrition positions. Many businesses may have identified attrition pattern such as Holiday seasons, College Graduation season, Months of Loyalty payment etc. This has to back filled with new agents to fill the gap</p><p>· Training Duration – As we do the capacity planning to anticipate the future hiring, it is also important to find out what would be the contribution of new agents in terms of call handling capacity. We hire agents either to fill the attrition gap or to fill the higher volume requirement. But depending on the training duration, we have to precisely inform the management when an agent should be hired and when he/she would start taking calls. Therefore, Training duration is important for the precise details of hiring timelines.</p><p>· AHT Learning Curve – Not all the agents will become proficient in handling customers from Day 1, some may take longer time to understand and some shorter. Therefore, it is very important to have an AHT Learning Curve which will be pre-decided by the operations team. This will help us understand what will be the duration for an agent to become proficient. The AHT learning curve is required since this will increase the overall AHT as new agents are hired. If the AHT increases, the requirement will increase and the call capacity will decrease. If we know exactly how much this would happen, we can plan for Over Time or shrinkage reduction etc., to meet the requirements. Basic example of AHT glidepath is 600 secs in 1st month, 500 secs in 2nd Month, 400 secs in 3rd Month and 300 secs (Target AHT) from 4th month onwards.</p><p>Capacity planner becomes good and precise only if it is worked along with operations team, training and hiring team. They may have some constraint in terms of training, hiring etc. which needs to be considered by WFM while building the planner. Basis all those, we have to look at the requirements and recommend necessary action to be taken by the operations team.</p><p>Finally, don’t forget to track the actual performance</p><p>· Create and optimise capacity planning so that our customers get support within defined service-level agreements.</p><p>· Create analytical and performance reports. Help support teams engage with data to improve key operations metrics.</p><p>· Proactively contribute to, create and own changes to operating models both in operations and Workforce Management teams through developing insightful analysis and helping to improve efficiency.</p><p>· Own calendar of events, including charing sessions with relevant teams for foresight overlays.</p><p>· Conduct ad hoc scenario simulations and sensitivity analysis to ensure optimal resource allocation.</p><p>· Provide accurate and easy to consume outputs for operations and recruitment.</p><p>· Regular review and detailed report for MAPE accuracies.</p><p>· Co-own quarterly OKR target-setting with your lead.</p><p>· Create basic data automations to improve efficiency of Workforce Management processes.</p><p>· The daily work of Workforce Management (WFM) teams requires the precise updating of certain indicators in order to size the necessary capacity, whether in terms of hours, human resources or required concurrency.</p><p>· In this note we will take a look at the most commonly used sizing processes, from the perspective of those who use the processes on a day-to-day basis and those who need to decide and calibrate based on the information received.</p><p>· Prior to the Capacity process</p><p>· Even after many years of experience and in leadership positions in WFM Operations, many analysts believe that the historical-based volume forecasting process is part of the capacity sizing process.</p><p>· We may describe this process in detail in the future, but we want to list three important reasons why this process is unique and isolated:</p><p>· 1) The forecast becomes only an input to be used for sizing; it is only a variable to be used in a statistical model. Its individual process can be modified without impacting the sizing process.</p><p>· 2) The forecasting process is stochastic, meaning that events change probabilistically as time passes. For example, the forecast includes seasonality change factors, product launches, general failures that modify the probability of contact entry.</p><p>· 3) In some cases, the forecasting process is not implemented by the Workforce team; only the results are received from the External Client, or from a central planning team (GRP – Global Resource Planning).</p><p>· The three most commonly used processes for determining the Required Capacity are as follows</p><p>· What is the most convenient capacity sizing process? Let’s review in detail three of the most used processes, what are the pros and cons of each of them.</p><p>· 1) Empirical Process</p><p>(or “busy boss opening the calculator app”)</p><p>· Para fines educativos le vamos a llamar “proceso”, pero lo cierto es que este cálculo es una de las “cajas negras” más sencillas y usadas en la industria para validar de forma simple un proceso más complejo. This process consists of consecutive arithmetic operations that lead us to determine the capacity required in hours or in human resources. Many leaders do not have time or do not find it within their reach to have to know in-depth details of criteria or formulas.</p><p>· In this simple case we can afford to give an example.</p><p>· Let’s say we expect to receive 20000 calls in a week and each call has an average duration of 5 minutes. We should prepare for a speaking time of 5 minutes. 5×20000 = 100000 minutes (1667 hours). Let’s say an agent works 40 hours per week, de las cuales un 70% del tiempo esperamos que esté efectivamente al teléfono. This gives a useful time per agent of 40 * 70% = 28 weekly hours. Doing the corresponding division we obtain that with 60 agents we fulfill the attention.</p><p>· Pros of the Empirical process:</p><p>· -Easy to understand.</p><p>-Aplicación rápida.</p><p>-Fast application applied depending on the type of contract.</p><p>· –It allows to detect possible errors in more complex methods.</p><p>· Cons of the Empirical process:</p><p>· –Wrong expectations. The actual outcome of specialized processes can vary greatly from this general exercise.</p><p>· –It does not take into account seasonal variations, nor variables such as absenteeism/retention.</p><p>· -The causal determinism on which these arithmetic solutions are based leaves no room for the generation of complex scenarios.</p><p>· 2) Erlang</p><p>(or “we all use it, but we don’t really know it.”)</p><p>· The process for applying the Erlang distribution is based on the theory of Danish mathematician Agner Erlang (1917) to examine the number of contacts that can be made at the same time to telephone operators changing stations.</p><p>· The formula widely known and used in the contact center world is known as Erlang C and is based on the following assumptions:</p><p>· a. The time between call arrivals is a random variable with exponential distribution of parameter according to how many calls are expected to be received in an interval. This hypothesis is highly realistic.</p><p>· b. The duration of a call is also a random variable with an exponential distribution whose parameter is adjusted to respect the TMO. This second hypothesis is not realistic in practice.</p><p>· c. The caller waits indefinitely in queue until his call is answered. There are no dropouts; another hypothesis that is not realistic.</p><p>· A later formula known as Erlang A (1946) -although developed by the Swede Conny Palm-, allows the expected number of dropouts to be calculated by adding to the Erlang C assumptions a patience that is also modeled with an exponential variable. This formula undoubtedly helps to complement Erlang C, but it does not solve the problem since it does not provide a service level forecast by itself.</p><p>· It is common to receive only an Excel with a macro module ready to use and mechanical instructions on how to apply the Erlang code. And in the case of robust WFM systems, the code comes ready to be part of the sizing</p><p>process based on segmented historical information.</p><p>· Erlang Pros:</p><p>· – It is a process familiar to all BPO operations today.</p><p>– Customized versions are used to generate calculations on other channels.</p><p>· – In addition to indicating the required agents, it allows the forecasting of other indicators such as Service Level and Average Response Time.</p><p>· Cons of Erlang:</p><p>· – The call duration assumption does not match reality.</p><p>· – If the process receives more parameters than necessary, it can create overestimates in its result that are not always interpreted correctly. The vast majority of teams take the result without checking if it contains an unneeded level of over-fitting.</p><p>· – El modelo Erlang no contempla abandonos. Para esta aplicación de la fórmula se parte del supuesto de que todas las llamadas esperan de forma indefinida hasta que son atendidas.</p><p>· – Although it is a common practice nowadays, Erlang’s applied formula is designed for a single service. It does not contemplate that current agents are trained in various lines of business and are dynamically moved throughout the day to meet coverage needs.Multichannel allocation or overflow per line of business cannot be sized. This is one of the main reasons for oversizing in multichannel operations when projecting Erlang-based resources.</p><p>· – The original formula assumes a finite number of incoming contacts only. Transfers made from other lines of service, direct calls to an extension, additional calls made by contacts who hang up and call back are not taken into account in the base Erlang. To compensate for these occurrences, many teams adjust with incremental values according to holidays, offer or product launch days and intervals with historical spikes.</p><p>· 3) Custom Simulation</p><p>(or “yes, we can do that and more, based on mathematics.”)</p><p>· Taking into account the benefits of the current computational capacity, we start from a simplification of the mathematical simulation process. Simulate at an accelerated pace every call of the day with all its attributes:</p><p>· – who takes the call</p><p>– if it meets the service level</p><p>– whether or not to abandon</p><p>– how long does it take</p><p>– if the agent takes another contact immediately or if he goes on break</p><p>· A robust statistical model allows us in a matter of minutes to perform different simulations for a whole day or weeks.. And based on trends, it allows defining the most accurate projection according to the historical information and criteria used to feed the model.</p><p>· Pros de la Simulación Personalizada:</p><p>· – Real criteria such as waiting time or dropouts are applied.</p><p>– The algorithm generates calls and assigns them to available agents.</p><p>– Simulates a full day in milliseconds allowing all relevant indicators to be displayed.</p><p>· – It allows repeating the day many times, to give more realistic results of scenarios that could arise (it gives an idea of what is known in statistics as variance) instead of just giving the average result.</p><p>· – Ability to simulate agents with multiskill.</p><p>· Cons of Custom Simulation:</p><p>· – High computational capacity required. We are talking about dedicated servers and a large amount of information processed to create each of the simulations.</p><p>· –A structured interface is required to be able to process input data and calibrate specific details such as multiskill agent processing, changes in absenteeism trends and auxiliary usage such as holidays or anomalies, agent profiles, etc. Without this facility, managing the statistical model requires a dedicated person.</p><p>· -Being able to implement this solution from scratch requires an advanced level of exact sciences and WFM expertise that is difficult to achieve.</p><p>· Beyond the chosen process, there is one critical role: that of the Workforce Management team.</p><p>· Considering the benefits and pitfalls of each of the sizing processes, the factor that will actually make the difference between the success and failure of these planning cycles is the level of freedom allowed for WFM teams to calibrate the results.</p><p>· For example, real-time analysts can easily account for anomalies in results</p><p>(human factors, emergencies related to connectivity or software, among others). But many times do not have a structured way of documenting this knowledge generated on the front lines and being able to include it effectively in the new planning cycles.</p><p>· The sizing process should include parallel business intelligence processes, to capitalize on process errors, human errors and anomalies external to the process. And then replicate that learning to the rest of our teams. Just like the well-known “if it’s not measured, it’s no good”, we have the opportunity to apply the following on a daily basis: “Today’s computing power, such as Artificial Intelligence, will not replace analysts and creators, it will only make our work more human.”</p><p>· The more we share knowledge and train our teams, opening the door to forums where these processes are questioned, validated and improved; the more we support our talent within WFM, the better results these processes and others related to BPO cycles will have. At the end of the day, it is a business of people for people.</p><p>· Introduction to Capacity Planning</p><p>· Objectives & Strategy</p><p>· Collect inputs and assumptions</p><p>· Contractual Inputs</p><p>· Operational Inputs</p><p>· Calculate Capacity projection</p><p>· Capacity calculations</p><p>· Planning vs Scheduling projections.</p><p>· Verify Staffing Plan</p><p>· Staffing Plan accuracy</p><p>· Staffing mitigation plans</p><p>· Discussion with stakeholders</p><p>· Target audience</p><p>· Discussion checklist</p><p>· Stakeholder Sign off</p><p>· Publish staffing Plan</p><p>· Manage Change</p><p>Dfsf</p><p>· • Responsável pela composição e consolidação do Capacity Planning das Operações da Teleperformance Brasil;</p><p>• Participação em reuniões junto a diretorias de áreas como T&D, R&S, Financeiro, Projetos, entre outras.</p><p>• Composição da base de “Bill to Pay” da Empresa, com projeções a médio e Longo Prazo;</p><p>• Suporte e atualização dos dados de Position Account da Empresa (visão Brasil), cruzando dados de FP, Capacity Planning e Forecast;</p><p>• Criação de ferramentas com foco em decisões e estratégias de negócios para apoio operacional, junto a setores de BI & MIS;</p><p>• Governança da migração do Sistema de WorkForce Corporativo (Nice TotalView Cloud), interagindo em conjunto com unidades offshore da Empresa e Fornecedora;</p><p>• Auditor dos processos do B.E.S.T. WFM Teleperformance (sistema de padrões que asseguram qualidade, desempenho e gestão pro ativa dos programas e produtos da empresa);</p><p>• Criação de documentos (guidelines) baseados nos manuais de processos dos escritórios centrais da empresa;</p><p>• Execução de treinamentos junto a equipes de WFM, bem como calibrações e ações de melhoria continua em processos;</p><p>Continuous improvement: Lead initiatives to enhance forecast accuracy and overall workforce planning processes, ensuring we stay ahead of emerging trends, challenges and opportunities</p><p>· Accurate Forecasting: Develop and maintain workforce forecasts using historical data, trend analysis and predictive modelling</p><p>· Cross-Functional Collaboration: Collaborate with various teams to align workforce strategies with business objectives</p><p>· Proactive Optimisation: Identify trends, challenges, and opportunities to optimize staffing levels and minimise labour costs</p><p>· Insightful Reporting: Create and communicate timely reports on forecast accuracy, performance metrics, and key trends</p><p>· Effective Scheduling: Work closely with the scheduling team to translate forecasts into effective schedules that meet service level requirements</p><p>Responsável pelo ciclo mensal e de curto prazo:</p><p>No processo S&OP:</p><p>Responsável por todas as categorias de Massivo, sendo (Tissue e Personal Care):</p><p>• Elaborar o baseline para abertura da colaboração, levando em consideração a sazonalidade / campanhas MKT e ou Coml / alteração de preço / ações de trade.</p><p>• Captação e análise da demanda, cuidando da acuracidade do forecast;</p><p>• Elaborar material e apresentar os KPI's nas reuniões do ciclo S&OP;</p><p>• Acompanhar as ações de MKT, Pricing e Comercial;</p><p>• Realizar</p><p>o desdobramento da meta alinhado as estratégias da CIA e premissas de abastecimento / produção;</p><p>• Garantir o atendimento das famílias e acompanhar o ciclo de vida dos produtos desde o lançamento / maturidade e descontinuação com o apoio do time de MKT;</p><p>Nas reuniões de S&OE:</p><p>• Acompanhar diariamente e evolução de vendas vs disponibilidade dos produtos, para minimizar stockout, assegurando estoque para a previsão de vendas.</p><p>• Analisar os planos de produção (mix / volume e disponibilidade) e solicitar revisões sempre que necessário;</p><p>• Atualizar os KPI’s da área através de Dashboards e relatórios padrões, bem como garantir análise de causa raiz e planos de ações adequados;</p><p>• Key User do software de planejamento de demanda SAP IBP.</p><p>image2.jpeg</p><p>image3.jpeg</p><p>image4.png</p><p>image5.png</p><p>image6.png</p><p>image1.jpeg</p>