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Workforce Planning

Human Resources for Health (HRH) workforce planning is the process of comparing demand and supply for HRH, usually projected for five to ten years in the future. The supply of health workers takes into account the current stock, plus additions from educational institutions and other hiring, minus the number of employees who will quit, retire, or be lost to sickness or death. The demand for health care workers is based on the health strategy of the country and the number of workers needed to provide the services.

In Egypt, Health Systems 20/20 is partnering with the Ministry of Health (MOH) to assess the current stock of health workers, as well as plan for future needs. Using the Workforce Indicators of Staffing Needs (WISN) tool developed by WHO, Health Systems 20/20 and the MOH are setting standards for service delivery times, and using these numbers, compared to the country health strategy, to describe current and future needs for healthcare workers.

Human Resources Strategy Costing

With greater understanding of the need to plan and develop the health workforce, more and more countries are developing well-thought-out HRH strategies about how to meet current and future needs for HRH. In many cases, however, ministries of health lack financial acumen necessary to accurately calculate the costs of their HRH strategies. This gap has in some cases led to the development of HRH strategies that cost more than the entire annual budget of the MOH. In Lesotho Health Systems 20/20 is assisting the MOHSW to cost its HRH and continuing education strategies. In doing so, they are guiding Ministry counterparts through the process of aligning workplans with budget realities and country priorities.

Human Resources Information Systems Support

Even skilled human resource departments within MOH’s are usually stymied by a lack of accurate and timely information about the number, location, and training of the providers they have. In Kenya a 2005 study suggested that up to 20% of the workforce may not be where payroll records indicate they are.

Health Systems 20/20 provides technical assistance to governments to implement and use the human resources information systems for planning and decision making about HRH policies. For example, in Cote d’Ivoire, Health Systems 20/20 support has been instrumental in helping the MOH scale up the HRIS to five districts. The activities are on track to be scaled up to 30 districts, representing 40% of health districts in the country.

Comprehensive Workforce Assessments

Even skilled workforce planners and policymakers frequently lack basic information about the health workforce: How many workers are there? Where are they working? What are their qualifications? How many providers are entering or leaving the workforce each year? A first step in workforce planning and policymaking is to understand the current situation of the workforce, and to understand future trends. Health Systems 20/20’s comprehensive HRH Assessment Methodology and Tools provide a thorough methodology to measure the current health workforce, as well as current inputs and workforce shrinkage. The methodology has been used in nine countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. The methodology is adaptable to both the public and private sector.