1. Workforce Planning:
An Interview with KC Bradley
Written By:
Rashed Alkhaili
Soo Choi
Vivian Nguyen
Kathleen Truong
Victoria Vertilo
Past, Present, & Future

2. INtroduction
Executive Summary
Within the last 15 years, the world has seen a rapid evolution of technology, which in turn has affected how
organizations conduct their businesses. The new technological developments affect various organizational
functions, but one in particular was slow to adapt. Human resources is known primarily as a function with very little
change and very little growth. But as of recently, human resource professionals have started to make progress
towards creating a more strategic impact on their organizations. In their efforts to “have a seat at the table”, human
resource professionals are incorporating more of the technological advancements to concretely demonstrate their
impact. We were fortunate enough to interview KC Bradley, an industry leader in Workforce Planning. The following
white paper will summarize KC’s insights on the current field of Workforce Planning, as well as where it is heading
and how we can get there.
With the rapid growth of technology, organizations are expanding beyond their traditional borders and into the global
marketplace. These trends create an uncertain and ever changing environment for organizations and only those
who can adapt appropriately will survive. One function in particular is beginning to identify how they can have a
direct impact on the strategic trajectory of their organizations. You are probably thinking, “What function could that
be? C-suite management? Finance?” Although you are not necessarily incorrect, there is an unsuspecting function
that is climbing its way into the strategic hearts of organizations, and that is the field of human resources. As the
field of HR continues to evolve into a more forward-thinking and data-driven function, HR professionals are seeking
a way to be a new strategic lever for their organizations. More specifically, talent management is beginning to
manifest itself into what is now known as “workforce planning”.
Workforce planning is a continual process used to align the needs and strategic priorities of an organization with
those of its workforce. More simply, workforce planning is intended to ensure an organization has the right people
in the right place at the right time and at the right cost to meet business needs. You may now start to question how
HR can be situated to accomplish such a feat. In order to shed some light on the new potential within HR, this white
paper will focus on insights provided to us by a Workforce Planning thought leader, KC Bradley.
KC Bradley is currently an Advisory Services Manager at PwC, where she is leading a team who will bring
talent management and workforce planning consultation to other organizations. Previously, she has held various
management level positions with ConAgra Foods. When KC first started her career 20 years ago, Workforce
Planning was not a distinguished field. She believes that it was not until the last 7 years that organizations, other
than manufacturing (e.g., airplanes and car production lines), began to think about workforce planning. Even now,
KC explains how many organizations are not currently using any sort of workforce planning. And for those who are,
it has become a big competitive advantage for them. Even though technology has grown, which makes conducting
workforce planning analyses much more manageable, only larger organizations are utilizing workforce planning
strategies.
The following section of this paper is intended to provide you with insights from KC Bradley during our informational
interview with her. She will elaborate on her background and how she came into the field of workforce planning.
She will also provide her thoughts on the future of workforce planning and how HR can be better suited to tackle
the strategic challenges of their organizations.
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3. Workforce Planning Resources
Interview with KC Bradley
Victoria: Tell us about your career journey: Did any of your previous positions have components of
workforce planning? How did you get interested in workforce planning?
KC: I have been in HR for almost 20 years. I received a B.S. in Finance and started out as a financial analyst. The
company I was working at was bought out, and HR became irrelevant, since the focus shifted from recruiting and
hiring to managing numbers. The company let go the head of HR and gave HR to finance. I was responsible for
managing the transition of headcount. Once that was done, I left to pursue a job at ConAgra Foods and worked on
implementing an HRIS system. I then began to do metrics: collecting and reporting HR data to improve business
processes. I always had a passion for project management and took on a project within the HR services area.
Following that experience, I moved into a leadership and development role to build the “softer” skills within talent
management. That role transformed into a talent management role and during this time I was getting my EMBA
degree and one of my significant papers was on workforce planning, which in 2010 was a new concept. Now I
work on HR Transformations at PwC, which involves getting other companies to improve their HR processes and
technology.
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Leading Companies in WFP
Magazines & Conferences:
• PwC – Analytics function, there is
an hour webinar around analytics
and planning every Thursday
• Talent Management Magazine
• CFO Magazine
• Center for Effective Organizations
(research by Dr. John Boudreau)
• Institute for Corporate Productivity
(Membership based)
• Various Talent Management
Conferences
My theory is that if companies
are doing workforce planning
well, you are not going to know
about it because they will keep it
as their competitive advantage.
For instance, when I worked at
ConAgra, I found a little network
of people who I can talk to about
workforce planning, but I did not
want to publicize what I was doing
because it was a big win.
Currently, GE, Pacific Gas and
Electric, Boeing, and Ford are
companies that have been doing
workforce planning for a long time
and are considered leaders in the
field.

4. Soo: What challenges have you experienced while working in Talent Management or Workforce
Planning?
KC: Overall, the process of workforce planning is difficult because it is a completely new capability and companies
need to figure out how it fits within their strategic business plans. In addition, people working in HR do not
normally know how to think or how to do workforce planning. There have also been technological challenges with
consolidation of vendors and realizing the workforce planning capability, since a lot of people have not received
training on how to think or do workforce planning. The biggest challenge for me was getting people to broaden their
thinking about workforce planning. HR has grown from a personnel department to be more of a resource for the
business, and now into a function that provides insights to the business. Workforce planning is the next lever to be
pulled to get HR that seat at the C-suite table.
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Kathleen: Could you describe a typical process carrying out a workforce planning project?
KC: Details vary widely based on what technology you have. At a high level, one of the first workforce planning
exercises that I did - still to this day - was one of the most impactful, which was an assessment in one of our plant
locations. We found that the best and most viable pipeline for the plant managers was a team lead. The team lead
is someone who is on the production line managing hourly workers who are creating our products.
We did a detailed review of 60 plant managers and tracked all the way back to the team leads. Pouring through
historical documents, we looked at where these leads were hired from, how long it took them to go from a team
lead to being a plant manager, how they were performing, their tenure, and how their pay changed over that career
path. The big question was how to take all of this data, make the best case plan out of it, and create a toolkit to say
this is the gold standard for what development, training, and engagement should look like for a team lead that takes
them from entry-level salary position into the highest position at a plant location. It took months to collect all the
data, and to go through the analysis of what had happened in the past and to make our predictions for what that
meant for future promotions and future movement.
When we got back to the business leaders, many of our findings were significantly different to what they thought
about managing this type of population. For example, in compensation, they were paying their team leads
up through plant manager positions very differently at way higher or lower salaries across different parts of the
company. That was definitely a detriment to other parts of the business when people find out that you can make
money by making the switch to another position. So leveling that out and making it a fair playing field for everyone
was really important to the business leaders.
Looking back, it took a lot of resources. We collected all that data and had to go to the head of recruiting,
compensation, and talent management. Everybody had a different piece of the data before an integrated system
was established. Smaller companies are still at the point where the data is not coded or brought together, so they
cannot easily go through these processes.

5. Soo: How do you persuade people who do not see the value in what you do?
KC: There are two theories on this. First, there is the theory of “I need to convince you that my idea is the best
idea.” Another tactic is to find people who believe in what you are doing. These people see how the pieces fit
together, and they are happy to have someone volunteer to put the pieces together. In my career, I have been
fortunate to choose people who are already excited about workforce planning and this has allowed me to begin my
projects faster.
Rashed: What are some important skills or talents one needs to be successful in this field?
KC: Workforce planning takes the effort of a team of people with different sets of skills and capabilities. In reality,
I do not think workforce planning can ever be done by one person because it takes a lot of work. The important
thing is being able to integrate thinking in terms of dollars and headcounts as well as thinking in terms of skills and
capabilities. Most of the time, people with different skill sets are brought in to mix these capabilities together. For
instance, financial analysts are brought in to get to the numbers. On the other hand, HR generalists understand
how to keep the employees motivated and happy. The skills and talents these types of roles bring are essential for
workforce planning to be done well from start to finish. The analytical capabilities are important in looking at data
and forecasting numbers. To understand what these numbers mean, it is important to have the skills to translate the
numbers in terms of a person.
Professional & Personal Successes
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I consider my workforce planning projects a success if I have furthered the profession in some
way. For instance, was I able to make more people want to do this tomorrow than they did today?
In terms of my overall career, I am a self-proclaimed “change junkie” because I don’t like doing
the same things everyday. I constantly evaluate if I’m happy with what I’m doing and if I’m making
a difference. And finally, in my personal life, I am always setting goals for myself and constantly
attempting to achieve my goals. My goals encompass not only family and work, but education
as well. It’s important to find a way to stay up-to-date with the field and the industry and I’m
continually trying to find ways to further my knowledge.
Vivian: What are some mistakes people commonly make when starting in WFP?
KC: Some mistakes people make is trying to force-feed the concept of workforce planning to others or trying to
make others do something that they do not understand or are not ready to do. Furthermore, not educating the
company’s HR workforce or not giving them an opportunity to learn something different from what they have done in
the past. People need to be aware that it is going to take time for individuals to understand workforce planning and
that different industries are at different places in terms of this function.

6. 5
Vivian: Based on your experience, what is some advice that you can give to someone who is
interested in starting in this field?
KC: When you are looking for a company, try to get into companies where workforce planning is already
established. I would look for companies that have analytics or talent management. At the same time, you have
to be creative in what you are looking for when you are looking for job postings, because workforce planning
is not confined within HR. Workforce planning can sit anywhere, it can sit in finance or compensation or talent
management. Even when you get to these postings, you have to make sure to look at how much workforce
planning that company actually does. For instance, if you see a company with a dedicated analytics group, I would
take a second look at them because there are a lot of companies that say the buzzword but do not actually do
workforce planning because they do not know what it really is. Also, do not just think about the corporate side of
it. There are a lot of different routes when you are considering a career in workforce planning. Your options are not
confined to working for a company. You can also be on the software side or on the consulting side providing tools
and teaching them how to do workforce planning. For instance, a company called Visier is building a workforce
planning tool. They provide amazing technology.
Workforce Planning Leadership
Rashed: What was the structure of your Workforce Planning team at ConAgra?
KC: At my previous employer, ConAgra, which is a manufacturing organization, workforce planning sat firmly within
HR not because it was the right place for it to be, but because the HR group understood it and saw value in it.
For workforce planning to work correctly, however, it requires partnership between finance and HR and with each
business leader it is supporting.
Soo: If you had all the resources to build an ideal WFP team, what would it look like?
KC: I believe that one of the values workforce planning is going to bring to an organization is breaking down silos,
not just within HR but also across the business. In order for workforce planning to work, it is important to have
someone who can get resources from finance, someone who can get resources from HR, and a business leader.
Having a business leader stepping in is crucial because finance and HR professionals are not going to have an
understanding of strategy like a business leader has, such as where the company is going, what the demand
forecast is, and what skills and capabilities are needed to achieve the 3-5 year strategy. As far as skills and
capabilities go, a combination among those three functional areas is important and anyone on this ideal team has
to have a good grasp of all three areas. For instance, HR professionals in this case must be willing to understand
finance and the impact their efforts have on the business.
At the core, leadership competencies in workforce planning are not any different from those in other
fields. Yet “leading edge bravery” is important as it helps to get an organization to change. Managers
need to be open-minded, have a growth mindset--because the field is constantly changing--and be
willing and able to have people underneath them who are smarter than they are.

7. 6
Kathleen: What part of your work do you find most rewarding?
KC: I find my work most rewarding when I do something differently and push the envelope. Specifically, I like the
technology and process improvement side of my work and tying solutions to business outcomes in a non-traditional
HR way. Because I was trained as a financial analyst, I thought differently from every HR person when I began doing
HR work.
Victoria: How does Workforce Planning stand alone from Talent Management?
KC: Currently workforce planning stands alone because it is difficult to do both together, but in the future these
two functions should not stand alone. I see it terms of supply and demand analysis: knowing what you have and
what you need and identifying that gap. Workforce planning is geared towards numbers. The gap is where talent
management comes in. Once the company has identified the number of people they need, when they need them,
and the skills they are looking for, talent management looks at people currently in the workforce who can provide
those skills. That is the bridge between workforce planning and talent management taking it from a number or dollar
amount and tying it back to the people and skills within the organization.
Soo: In what ways do you see the field expanding or growing? Challenges in the future?
KC: It is a growing field, especially in terms of software and technology. It is only a matter of time before it is picked
up and learned by all organizations. Eventually, it will become as common in organizations as accounting and
would no longer provide companies with a competitive advantage. The ubiquity of workforce planning will be due
to the people who are going through the education for this and bringing it to organizations. Business leaders are
beginning to realize that the time and effort put towards workforce planning is worth it. For workforce planning to
work correctly, it requires a partnership between finance and HR and each of the business leaders.
Kathleen: Is there something we didn’t ask you yet that we should ask you about?
KC: Keep the lens wide. Workforce planning is not narrow; it is not a small scope view. There are parts, where
you have to put your head down and think finitely about the datasets you have. But a person who will succeed in
workforce planning should not just have “laser-point” thinking as this is only seeing one piece of the whole puzzle.
Instead, a successful person will have the ability to step back and see the whole picture of the organization’s
strategy while understanding all the pieces that make up this puzzle. This skill will benefit anyone in any industry or
role.
A Special Thank you
Our team would like to give a big thank you to KC Bradley for sharing her time and her professional
insights about workforce planning with us. We would also like to extend our appreciation to Professor
Mike Manning for providing us with this opportunity and making this white paper possible.