OptForceTM
Strategic Workforce Optimization
OptTek Systems, Inc. is developing a software product designed to support strategic workforce optimization. The product fills the gap in existing software to help organizations identify optimal portfolios of policies and programs, making it possible to achieve desired workforce composition. The software is structured to take account of organizational objectives such as financial goals, productivity goals, diversity goals, and retention goals. The software is designed to add an important strategic functionality to current HR applications. This will be achieved by integrating data over the employment life cycle from recruiting to retirement. Analyses provided by the software will span a variety of human resource processes, including hiring, employee review, compensation and benefits, compliance, and professional development.
To effectively manage personnel costs and satisfy strategic requirements, organizations must be able to forecast and evaluate the impact of human resource policies and programs on their workforce and organizational objectives. They must be able to manage the risks and uncertainty of external shifts in the economy, their changing customers’ needs, competition, and the variability in the technical and non-technical skills of the labor pool. Questions gaining prominence in executive planning now include:
- How to tie workforce planning to long-range revenue targets and forecasts
- How to determine the resources a business unit will need based on how much revenue it generates
- How to deal with an aging workforce, more competition for limited talent, and increasing pressure to manage costs and customer expectations
- How to allocate employee benefit and compensation options as health care costs increase and personnel requirements change (as a result of shifting workforce demographics, new government regulations, and increasing international competition)
- How to identify key positions and competencies required in a variety of geographic locations both today and in the future
- How to achieve results without sacrificing quality, productivity, or costs
- How to reach diversity goals within budget and time constraints
Beginning in January, 2007 under a Phase I Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) grant from the National Science Foundation, OptTek developed a “pilot system” to demonstrate the feasibility of the technology in supporting an organization’s ability to plan and manage workforce diversity. In April 2008, OptTek was awarded a Phase II SBIR and we began work on the software to develop an expanded prototype version to encompass workforce optimization and diversity planning. The software simulates and optimizes policies and programs to obtain workforce readiness and diversity goals for an organization’s workforce, taking account of how these policies and programs affect the retention and recruitment of individuals with different attributes. It demonstrates the ability to optimize the selection of policies and programs for recruiting and retaining individuals. Constraints handled by the software include budgets and relationships between programs. Based on the recruitment and retention outcomes for each period simulated, the software determines the optimal policies and programs to maximize readiness and diversity for a specified budget.
OptTek is currently accepting requests from organizations to prototype the software. If you are currently developing workforce plans or contemplate doing so in the near future, please contact OptTek to find out how to participate.
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