Human resource
planning is vital function in organizations which is performed to make certain
that they have the appropriate and the right kind of people at proper place and
at the right time. It assists managers to reduce ambiguity and equip them to
adjust with technological, social, authoritarian and environmental change.
Effective human resource planning is a process of analysing an organization’s
human resource needs under changing conditions and developing the activities
necessary to gratify these needs (Biswajeet 2010). The basic intent of human
resource planning is to make best use of the Human Resources and make certain
their ongoing development, to secure the Production Capacity required to support
Organizational objectives, to coordinate human resources activities with the
organizational objectives and to enhance the organization’s productivity.
If Human resource team
do this process effectively, it can lead to huge success of companies. Fajana
(2002) stated that Human resource planning is the systematic and continual
process of analysing organization’s human resource needs under mutating
conditions and developing personnel policies appropriate for long-term
effectiveness of the organization. It is an essential part of business planning
and budgeting procedures since, human resource costs and forecasts both
influence and are affected by longer term corporate plans. Quoting Mondy et
(1996) explained planning as a systematic analysis of human resource needs in
order to ensure that correct number of employees with the necessary skills are
available when they are required. Planning involves the forecasting of human
resource requirements in organizations and developing appropriate actions such
as recruitment, training and career development based on identified needs.
Planning is performed within the goals and general policy framework of the firm
or organization. It is also impacted by public policies, transformations in
technology and availability of manpower. Human resource planning will be
triumphant to the extent that it accurately coordinates each of specified
elements and it is basically organizing proper resources to business needs in
the longer term or short term goal of company.
In order to make effective
human resource planning in the long term, there are procedures to be followed
by an organization which guarantees that it has the right number and kind of
people at the right place and time to accomplish its objectives. Employers need
to observe the attraction and retention of employees as a part of the
employment relationship based on a mutual understanding of expectations as well
as make effort to foresee how a potential employee might behave in future and
make a contribution to the organization’s needs (Newill and Shackleton, 2000).
Forecasting of future manpower requirement is the most significant part of
manpower planning. It is performed on the basis of production and sales
budgets, work load analysis, work force analysis, estimated absenteeism and
turnover.
Figure:
Human resource Planning Process 
The future manpower
requirements should be forecasted quantitatively and qualitatively. There are
several factors which must be considered before forecasting. Employment Trend
is major factor in forecasting manpower. The manpower planning committee must
compare and analyse the trend of last five year to forecast manpower
requirements. Productivity also impact manpower requirements. Major features in
productivity are better utilization of existing manpower, improvement in
technology and matching of skills with job requirement. In human resource
planning, absenteeism is a situation when a person could not attend the office
when he is scheduled to work. While estimating demand for manpower the
prevailing rate of absenteeism in the organisation should be considered.
Expansion and growth plans of the organisation should be vigilantly analysed to
judge their impact on manpower requirement in future. After forecasting about
suitable candidates required, the next stage is to plan, how the organisation
can obtain these people. Programmers and strategies must be developed for
recruitment, selection, training, internal transfers, promotions and appraisal
so that the future manpower requirement are fulfilled. Management experts
emphasizes that development plans must be designed to ensure a continuing
supply of trained people to take over jobs as they fall vacant either by
promotion or recruitment or through training. In this way, shortages can be
avoided in the long run. A major issue in manpower forecasting is accuracy of
forecasts. If the forecast are not precise, planning will not be accurate.
Inaccuracy increases when departmental forecasts are just prepared without
critical review. There is another issue of identity crisis. Many human resource
managers do not understand the whole manpower planning process. This creates an
identity crisis. Other problem in manpower forecasting is resistance from
Employees. Employees and trade unions resist manpower planning. They believe
that this planning increases their overall workload and regulates them through
productivity bargaining. They also feel that it would lead to unemployment.
Usefulness of the planning depends upon the dependability of the information
system. In majority of Indian industries, human resource information system has
not well developed. In the absence of reliable data, it is possible to do
effective planning. Many professionals stated that Manpower planning is an
expensive and time consuming process. Employers may resist manpower planning
because it will increase the cost of manpower.
Another planning
process is succession planning in which senior executives review their top
executives and lower level officers to determine several backups for each
senior position. Succession planning is the methodical process of defining
future management requirements and identifying candidates who best meet those
requirements. Succession planning involves using the supply of labour within
the organization for future employment needs. With succession planning, the
skills and abilities of existing employees are assessed to perceive which
future positions they may take within the organization when other employees
leave their positions. Organization needs to create pool of candidates with
high leadership potential.
Succession planning
provides specific relation to business and strategic planning. A formal
succession plan also offers a framework that allows companies to institute
mentorship and training programs. Such programs offer future business leaders
the opportunity to learn about and ideally emulate the traits and habits that
leads to business success. The objective of succession planning is to promote
individuals within the organization and thus makes use of internal selection.
Succession planning is typically useful to the organization in its human
resource planning, and when done properly, can be beneficial to organizational
performance. Though there are many benefits of succession planning, theorists
observed possible problems associated with the use of succession planning such
as the crowned prince syndrome, the talent drain, and difficulties associated
with managing large amounts of human resources information. To implement
succession planning model, it is necessary to determine resource needs for
implementation, identify barriers to implementation, update or develop job
descriptions, Prepare organization for change, Establish communication plan,
Connect with stakeholders and get their buy in, Identify and establish peer and
leadership champions of change, If needed, implement strategies on pilot basis,
Link succession strategies with HR, Recognition, Workforce planning, Assessment
strategies, Recruitment strategies, Train staff as necessary.
Figure:
Succession planning model 
Failure of HR Planning:
According to deep
analysis of HR Planning, it is said that poor HR planning and lack of it in the
Organization may increase cost and there will be financial deficit. It may
result in filling post of needed people. This increases costs and impedes
effective work performance because employees are requested to work needless
overtime and may not put more effort due to exhaustion. Employees are put on a
disadvantage because their live programmes are disrupted and they are not given
the chance to plan for their career development. When there is staff scarcity,
the organization should not just appoint discriminately, because of the costs
implications of the other options, such as training and transferring of staff
have to be considered.
To summarize, Human
resource planning meet the objectives of manpower requirement. It assists to
organize the recruited resources for the productive activities. Basically,
human resource planning intended to gather information, making objectives, and
making decisions to enable the organization achieve its objectives. Human
resource planning provides information about how many people will be needed,
what skills, knowledge and competencies will they require, will existing human
resource meet the identified needs, is further training and development needed
and is recruitment necessary. The human resource planning is vital process to
link business strategy and its operation. It identifies the skill requirements
for various levels of jobs.
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