Future-proof your workforce with Strategic Workforce Planning: How HR leaders can drive measurable impact in just 100 days

On 24 March 2026, Bernd Carette, Director at KPMG in Belgium, and Annelies Van der Veken, Senior Manager at KPMG in Belgium, welcomed a group of HR leaders in Zaventem for an interactive session on Strategic workforce planning (SWP). We had the pleasure of welcoming Caroline Barbieux, CHRO, and Thomas Salden, SWP program lead, from Brussels Airport Company. KPMG is working together with Brussels Airport Company to build and implement their SWP program. During the event, the speakers discussed how organizations can move beyond theory and implement a pragmatic, scalable SWP approach, starting with a 100-day pilot and building long-term impact.

The labor market is undergoing a fundamental transformation. While millions of jobs are disappearing, even more new roles are emerging (WEF). This shift is driven by major trends such as digitalization, AI, economic volatility, and evolving employee expectations. At the same time, demographic shifts are putting pressure on talent availability, while rising employee churn, off- and nearshoring strategies, and the expanding contingent workforce are reshaping how organizations access and deploy talent.

In this context, skills are becoming obsolete faster than ever, making reskilling and upskilling essential. However, to truly create impact, these efforts must be approached strategically.

This is where Strategic Workforce Planning (SWP) plays a key role. SWP enables organizations to take a structured, forward-looking approach, ensuring the right skills, talent, and workforce models are in place to deliver on long-term strategy, with close alignment between HR, business, and finance.

The most effective way to kickstart your SWP-journey is through our 100-day pilot approach. Starting small creates momentum while building the capabilities needed to scale across the organization.

A successful pilot starts with selecting the right department: one that is neither too small nor too large, undergoing change, and supported by engaged leadership.

The pilot follows four phases:

• Days 1-15: Create a single source of truth, by getting a clear view on your current total workforce capacity (internal and external);
• Days 16-55: Understand what will drive future work, by translating strategic priorities (e.g. digitalization, regulation, efficiency) into expected workload changes;
• Days 56-70: Anticipate how your workforce will evolve over time, by considering expected outflow and internal mobility; and
• Days 71-100: Turn insights into action by combining future work demands and workforce changes to identify priorities and opportunities.

This structured approach translates strategy into concrete, data-driven workforce actions. As highlighted by Thomas Salden and Caroline Barbieux from Brussels Airport Company, SWP isn’t about predicting the future perfectly, but about making better decisions by leveraging transparent data and rationale, and engaging the entire organization. 

Scaling strategic workforce planning is about more than processes; it requires a mindset shift. To move from a successful pilot to lasting impact, organizations often focus on a few key principles:

• Take a holistic view: look beyond internal capacity and consider both internal and external talent. This transversal perspective gives you a realistic view of your organization’s capabilities and potential, enabling smarter strategic decisions about the right mix of internal resources, hiring, and outsourcing, and ensuring the right skills are available where they are needed most.
• Start with strategic ambitions: let long-term business goals guide your workforce planning. When SWP is tied to business objectives, it becomes more than a planning exercise; it turns into a powerful tool for value creation, aligning talent, skills, and capacity with where the business aims to grow and compete.
• Embrace uncertainty: plan using informed assumptions rather than waiting for perfect data. SWP isn’t just about numbers or budgets, it’s about understanding the work, the skills, and the impact on the business. Accepting that the future is not fully predictable allows you to test scenarios, anticipate challenges, and take proactive, smarter, and more holistic actions. 

SWP strengthens decision-making, improves control over workforce risks, and supports targeted development and reskilling. It also positions HR as a strategic partner by bridging business ambition and workforce reality, and helping build a future-ready organization.