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    • Action plan

    Predicting what skill sets your business needs to develop for the future

    Low effort

    Medium impact

    What skill sets will future proof your business? What new roles can create opportunities for you to grow? New roles need to be introduced as your business develops, but taking a structured approach to understanding what you’ll need in the future can make that process easier and much more effective.

    • We’ve designed our action plans to be completed in the order of steps laid out and explained why each step is important
    • Customising your action plan lets you set your own completion dates, assign tasks to others and get notifications
    • Helpful tools are provided for certain steps while a tracking metric at the end will help you determine the long-term success of your effort
    • A downloadable PDF version of each action plan is available if you’d like to compete it offline
    What's involved? Ways to use this action plan Measuring impact
    1

    Work through your financial planning to understand how the business will scale and what’s needed to make that happen

    Impact: medium

    Why will this help?

    Hiring plans should be grounded in the needs of your business. Your ambitions highlight what new support roles may be needed and any specialist skill sets that will be required.

    Preparing your business to scale

    Looking to scale up your business and take it to the next level? Follow these tips to assess if you’re ready.
    2

    Find out what support your team has and ask them where new skill sets could create an opportunity

    Impact: high

    Why will this help?

    Employees know what tasks are being completed at a lower standard because the business doesn’t have specialist expertise. A small requirement that can be outsourced or done to an adequate standard now could be a new role for the future.

    How to get employees involved in decision making

    Involving employees in decision making can give leaders valuable insights and lead to new ideas. Our checklist will help you get started.
    3

    Examine your management structure and think about what it will need to look like as the company grows

    Impact: medium

    Why will this help?

    Layers of management and specific skills need to be added as a business grows, including key roles like HR managers and finance directors. Looking forward to the next step-change in your growth will highlight what gaps you need to fill.

    Finding skills gaps in your leadership team

    Completing a skills gap exercise, like the one in our template, will rate your leadership team’s ability to perform against key competencies.
    4

    Look at market trends that could create an opportunity for the business

    Impact: medium

    Why will this help?

    One way to explore opportunities is to hire a specialist and get them to do the footwork for you. This carries some risk if you’re yet to develop a fully fledged offering, but that can be managed by hiring with a trial, and it will kickstart your R&D.

    5

    Develop job descriptions for the skills you think you will need in the future and decide whether you can upskill employees or will need to recruit

    Impact: high

    Why will this help?

    Now you’ve done the footwork, you can create job descriptions that fill the needs you’ve identified. That will solidify your thinking and allow you to get feedback from team members.

    What can I do with this Action Plan?

    Start this Action Plan

    Add some extra information to this plan and we’ll help you get it done.

    • We’ve designed our action plans to be completed in the order of steps laid out and explained why each step is important
    • Customising your action plan lets you set your own completion dates, assign tasks to others and get notifications
    • Helpful tools are provided for certain steps while a tracking metric at the end will help you determine the long-term success of your effort
    • A downloadable PDF version of each action plan is available if you’d like to compete it offline

    Download and print

    Get a printable template for this Action Plan, fill it in with some target dates, and share it with your team. Pin it on the wall where everyone can see it.

    Get the printable Action Plan

    Learning Groups

    We also run Learning Groups on these topics where you can join other leaders tackling the same challenges.

    Find a Learning Group

    How will I know if my action plan is working?

    Reactive versus proactive hiring

    The number of hires you make that are linked to the company's long-term strategy

    Why this metric?

    Making a higher share of proactive hiring decisions will set your company up for the future and put you on track to develop the skills you need.

    How do I start tracking?

    Look at your hires over the last six or 12 months and what share were made to meet immediate demand versus those that target skill sets you need to develop.