Staffing Plan. KRA and KPA

Creating a business staffing plan involves several key steps to ensure that your organization has the right people with the right skills in the right positions at the right time. It helps you achieve your goals by aligning your workforce with your strategic objectives.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

A staffing plan is a “map” that outlines the staffing requirements of your organization. A staffing plan is not necessarily what your organization looks like right now, but what it could look like if all the critical functions
were being attended to.

Here’s a breakdown of the steps involved in creating a business staffing plan:

Identify Business Goals:

• Start by understanding your company’s overall goals and strategic direction. This could be found in your strategic business plan.
• What are your short-term and long-term objectives?
• Are there any upcoming projects or initiatives that will require additional staffing?

Analyze Current Workforce:

• Take stock of your current employees — their skills, experience, strengths, and weaknesses.
• Are there any skill gaps that need to be addressed?
• Consider employee turnover rates and upcoming retirements.

Forecast Future Staffing Needs:

• Based on your business goals, anticipate what kind of talent you’ll need in the future.
• Will there be a growth in workload?
• Are there new technologies or processes being implemented that require specific skillsets?

Conduct a Gap Analysis:

• Compare your current workforce with your projected needs.
• Are there any gaps in skills, experience, or manpower?

Develop Staffing Strategies:

• Formulate a plan to address the identified gaps.
• This could involve internal strategies like training and development programs, or external strategies like recruitment and hiring.
• Consider factors like budget constraints and the feasibility of finding the talent you need.

Additional Tips:

• Be flexible: The business landscape can change rapidly, so make sure your staffing plan is adaptable.
• Consider employee morale: A good staffing plan takes into account employee career goals and growth opportunities.
• Track and monitor: Regularly assess the effectiveness of your staffing plan and make adjustments as needed.

By following these steps, you can create a comprehensive staffing plan that aligns with your business objectives and ensures that you have the right people in place to drive success.

Here’s an example of a staffing plan for a hypothetical company:

Company Name: XYZ Tech Solutions

Assessment of Current Workforce:

• Total employees: 50
• Roles include software engineers, project managers, sales representatives, customer support specialists, and administrative staff.
• Skills assessment reveals a shortage of specialized AI/ML engineers and cybersecurity experts.
• Turnover rate: 10% annually.

Future Needs and Objectives:

• Objective: Expand market share by 20% in the next fiscal year.
• Launch new AI-driven product line.
• Enhance cybersecurity measures to meet growing client demands.

Job Analysis and Role Definition:

• Define new roles: AI/ML Engineer, Cybersecurity Specialist.
• Refine existing roles: Software Engineer (with AI/ML focus), Project Manager (with cybersecurity oversight).

Gap Analysis:

• Identify skills gaps in AI/ML expertise and cybersecurity knowledge.
• Develop training programs for existing staff to acquire necessary skills.
• Plan for hiring additional staff to fill specialized roles.

Recruitment and Hiring Strategy:

• Utilize online job boards, industry-specific forums, and professional networking sites to attract AI/ML and cybersecurity talent.
• Partner with universities and technical colleges to recruit recent graduates with relevant skills.
• Offer competitive salaries, benefits, and career advancement opportunities.

Onboarding and Training:

• Develop onboarding materials tailored to new hires in AI/ML and cybersecurity roles.
• Provide ongoing training and development opportunities for all staff to stay updated on industry trends and best practices.

Retention and Engagement:

• Conduct regular performance reviews and provide feedback to employees.
• Offer incentives such as bonuses, stock options, and flexible work arrangements to retain top talent.
• Foster a culture of innovation and collaboration to keep employees engaged and motivated.

Flexibility and Adaptability:

• Maintain a flexible staffing model to scale up or down as needed based on project demands and market conditions.
• Consider outsourcing non-core functions or utilizing freelancers for short-term projects.

Monitoring and Evaluation:

• Track key metrics such as time-to-fill vacancies, turnover rates, and employee satisfaction scores.
• Review staffing plan quarterly and make adjustments as necessary based on performance data and business needs.

By following this staffing plan, XYZ Tech Solutions can ensure that they have the right mix of talent to support their growth objectives and stay competitive in the market.

So in the previous, we saw the importance of business staffing plan, how we have to plan the recruitments, how we should, get the people on board.

Now, we’ll move to the next process of defining the job roles, defining the responsibilities, defining the roles of any employee in the company.

Key Result Areas

Key Result Areas (KRAs) are broad categories that represent the critical areas of focus for an individual, team, or organization to achieve its goals. They translate high-level objectives into specific, measurable targets.

Here’s a breakdown of KRAs:

• Focus Areas: KRAs define the key aspects of performance that matter most. They act like buckets that hold specific achievements or results.
• Measurable: KRAs should be quantifiable. Ideally, they use metrics to track progress and determine success.
• Alignment: KRAs should be aligned with the overall strategy and objectives of the organization. They ensure everyone’s efforts contribute to the bigger picture.

Here are some examples of KRAs:

• Sales: Increase sales revenue by 15% in the next quarter.
• Customer Satisfaction: Improve customer satisfaction score by 10% within a year.
• Product Development: Launch two new product features by the end of Q3.
• Marketing: Generate 1000 qualified leads per month through social media campaigns.

KRAs are often used in conjunction with Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) which are the specific metrics used to measure progress towards achieving a KRA.

Key Performance Areas

Key Performance Areas (KPAs) complement Key Result Areas (KRAs) in the goal-setting process. Here’s how KPAs differ from KRAs:

• Scope: KPAs are broader. They represent essential aspects of a business or role where high performance is crucial for overall success. These could be areas like sales, marketing, customer service, or product development.
• Measurable (indirectly): KPAs themselves aren’t directly measurable, but they encompass measurable KRAs. Think of them as categories that hold specific results (KRAs).
• Guiding Focus: KPAs act as a roadmap, highlighting the general areas an employee, team, or organization should focus on to achieve their objectives.

Here’s an analogy: Imagine a company’s goal is to increase customer satisfaction (KRA). The KPA could be “Customer Service Excellence.” This KPA would then encompass specific, measurable results (KPIs) like reducing customer wait times or improving customer satisfaction scores.

Here are some examples of KPAs:

• Sales: Driving revenue growth.
• Marketing: Brand awareness and lead generation.
• Human Resources: Employee engagement and retention.
• Product Development: Innovation and product quality.

By outlining KPAs, you define the critical areas for success, and then use KRAs to set specific, measurable goals (with KPIs) within those areas. This two-pronged approach ensures efforts are aligned and directed towards achieving the overall objectives.

Within organizations, each position is outlined in a “Job Description (JD),” detailing all the responsibilities associated with the role. These responsibilities typically fall into two distinct categories:

Category A — Comprising functions and activities deemed essential or critical for the role. These duties constitute the Key Result Areas (KRAs) of the job.

Category B — Encompassing functions and activities related to the role but not considered indispensable. These tasks contribute to the overall performance of the team, department, or organization and form the Key Performance Areas (KPAs) for the job.

Example :

Role — Product Manager

Goal — Ensuring delivery of quality product within schedule.

Key Result Area

1. Customer Satisfaction.
2. Product Management.
3. Operational Cost Control.
4. Quality Check.
5. Record keeping.

Key Performance Areas

1. Maintaining good working condition in plant.
2. Optimum Resource Utilization.
3. Process Improvement.
4. Safety and Prevention planning and control.
5. Working within the company’s SLA(Service Level Agreement), GRC(Governance, Risk Management and Compliance) policies

If you liked the article, you can support the author by clapping below 👏🏻 Thanks for reading!

Oleh Dubetcky|Linkedin