What are the critical issues that a company must consider when trying to match its staffing to its strategy?

Matching Staff to Strategy

Staffing means the activities of the organization that leads to the development of employee structure within the organization. Staffing is usually the responsibility of the human resource departments of the firm. This process usually involves the following steps:

• Planning
• Recruitment
• Selection
• Appraisal
• Retention

(Fernandez, 2011)

The issues that any company should consider when trying to match its staffing to its strategies are the following:

• Quantity

The quantity of the staff in an organization will depend on upon the strategies of the organization. A manufacturing work focusing on a growth strategy would focus on increasing the number of labors. Similarly, an organization would have to decide how many personnel it would need in the different functional department of the company in order for it to continue working smoothly.   

• Quality

The quality of the staff in terms of knowledge and experience would also depend on upon the strategy that the company is planning on pursuing. If the company is going to expand its business into new markets, it would need managers that have knowledge of the market or prior experience in effectively applying such a strategy. (Raghuram, 2006)

• Behavior

Companies also have to pay attention to the behavior of the employees while forming the staffing policy. One of the most important behavioral aspects is risk taking nature. A company that has a strategy of maintaining stability in the market is more likely to hire staff that has low risk-taking style and cautious nature.

• Staffing practice

The hiring can be internal and external, the firms that are working on new ideas would have strict confidentiality requirements and would more likely to internally recruit. Similarly, a firm that has low-quality manufacturing strategy will not particularly focus on internal recruitment and would hire from outside sources. (VIDAL, 2009)

In short the companies have to keep their strategies in mind while making the staffing decision and policy framework.