• Recruitments: The main purpose of HR planning is to recruit or acquire the best talent for the company.  It determines human resource needs, assesses the available HR inventory level and finally recruits the personnel needed to perform the job. The goal of HR is to ensure that the industry’s best talent is matched with the job role and also culturally fit in with the organization. On several occasions not every criteria can be satisfied due to industry demands, time constraints and urgency to fill in a position at a job. This is another major implication for the need to plan, analyze and maintain a talent pool or base from where candidates can readily be matched to the roles in demand.

• Resource utilization: Just to have the best employees isn’t enough, it is also necessary to utilize their full potential. Human resource planning should consider the organization’s needs and utilize the manpower effectively to achieve its objectives. Not only does this type of allocation help build the organization but also gives employees the opportunity to grow in their role creating a highly engaged and satisfied workforce.

• Predicting the future needs: Human resource planning ensures that the right people are in place at the right time to run an organization. It is the work of the HR department to predict the future vacancies and to segregate the best employees for those departments and vacant places. HR planning allows time to match a company’s strategy and successfully scout talent for these positions.

• Coping with uncertainty: This is associated with reducing the impact of uncertainty which are brought by sudden changes in processes and procedures of human resource management in the organization or the company. There can be emergencies that arrive instantly in the company. To tackle them, HR department has to plan contingent strategies to mitigate challenges such as disruptive innovation, competition in the market or increased costs/taxes which will require a different approach to hiring new talent or managing roles of existing employees.

A. Environmental challenges are basically that external forces that are not present within the firm; instead they effect the organization externally. They are largely beyond management’s control but influence the performance of the company or the organization. For example: The government changes the labour laws, working environment, pay and wage laws which becomes a challenge for the HR department to deal with. There are various economic forces which influence the well being of the organization. Some of the relevant forces are: Suppliers, competitors, economic growth, and industrial labour. 

Predicting the future accurately isn’t possible but assessing the current situation of the labour market, assessment of the company goals and strategically creating plans to achieve those goals become critical for HR and contribute to the future of the company.