Swiss cheese organisation? Time for a workforce strategy
The last two years have felt pretty turbulent for most organisations in any sector. When the economic downturn hit I was gutted to hear countless stories of leadership teams managing a falling baseline with the bluntest tool in the box - the dreaded recruitment freeze.
We’ve all been cautiously awaiting the elusive economic upturn. Through these two years of economic spluttering, we’ve seen the ongoing on-off use of recruitment freezes, mirroring our hesitation to drive the organisation forward in tough financial times.
Swiss cheese shaped organisations is what we’re left with. We have holes in random places that have arrived by accident and chance, not by design. Some parts of the organisation might have been lucky to experience turnover when recruitment was back on again, while others missed out altogether.
The gaps might be in the most harmful places; the places that matter most to your strategic delivery. It’s more likely that the holes appear in teams with a skillset that still has relatively high market demand or those areas of the business that are high-performing. Typically these are the areas of the organisation where you can least afford to lose people.
I’ve worked on a few workforce strategies in the last few months. What I’ve seen is that designing and structuring your business right now is a bigger job than usual. You’ve got some strange Swiss cheese situations, you’ve got the huge AI disruption to consider and the economic uncertainty of a recovery that is still coming in and out of view. Is it a mirage or is it real?
If our economic recovery is finally in sight, it is worth remembering that we aren’t only subject to it, to some extent we are also agents of it. Making the most of that opportunity with unpredictable gaping holes in the business is far from ideal.
If you want to be ready to participate in the next economic upswing now is the time to refresh your workforce strategy. Don’t feel bad if you don’t have one to refresh, start afresh instead. A bit of bluesky (sorry for the awful ‘90s corporate reference!) might be just what you need to get your head up and out into its most creative state again.
A good place to begin is to design your workforce for where you’re going next. Ask yourself, if the business were really succeeding, what workforce would be in place? Melt down that Swiss cheese structure and set yourselves up with the platter you’ve been dreaming of.
Hungry (for a change) anyone?