Land Information New Zealand (LINZ)
WORKFORCE STRATEGY CASE STUDY
Key Messages
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Engage organisational leaders early and throughout
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Have a strong future focus - be clear on the business strategy and results your Workforce
Strategy needs to support
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Use evidence and analysis as the foundation for the strategy
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Integrate workforce planning with other business planning
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Be deliberate and explicit about the workforce shifts you have to make; Be clear about the
building blocks and the right sequencing of change
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Keep implementation in mind – the real value comes from what comes next!
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Don’t try to do everything at once - concentrate on 2 or 3 priorities each year
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Any time is the right time - whenever the start point is, the key is aligning development with
where the organisation is right now.
About LINZ
LINZ is a medium sized government agency based in Christchurch, Wellington and Hamilton.
LINZ manages a range of activities that help protect New Zealanders’ property rights, make
the best of use of Crown land, and maximise the value of location-based information1 to our
economy and society.
Organisational Context
LINZ has undertaken significant change over a number of years to develop its capability to
provide better, smarter public services. Like other government agencies, LINZ is working to
optimize services in an environment of ongoing fiscal constraint.
LINZ has a clear strategic direction and business strategy, and has well developed
organisational systems to support delivery. The outcomes it strives for, and the priorities
agreed with its Minister, are those articulated in its Statement of Intent 2012-15.
LINZ’ Four Year Budget Plan and the goal of a sustainable business model shaped its
Workforce Strategy. Where LINZ needs to be as an organisation in four years time defines
what its workforce needs to look like four years ahead – its desired ‘future state’.
Location-based information (or geospatial information) tells us where things are on the earth and how they relate to each
other.
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Workforce Context
LINZ developed its first workforce strategy (called the People Strategy) in 2009. The People
Strategy was important in building the capability LINZ needed for both delivery of its core
business and to support its strategic agenda particularly an expanding geospatial leadership
role.
Since 2009 LINZ has put a lot of effort into consolidating change and building organisational
agility. Implementation of the People Strategy focused on developing leadership, technical
capabilities, and organisational culture. As a result, LINZ saw its staff engagement rise
significantly in 2011.
LINZ employs around 450 people and has a highly technical and specialised workforce. LINZ
has been actively working to rebalance an ageing workforce demographic.
LINZ Workforce Strategy
In October 2011 LINZ was one of a number of government agencies asked by the State
Services Commission (SSC) to submit a Workforce Strategy in support of Four Year Budget
Plans. This was the first stage of a Cabinet mandated initiative to ensure that government
agencies have an integrated medium-term organisational development and workforce plan
supporting achievement of Government priorities.
Foundations
LINZ approached development of the Workforce Strategy as a natural extension of its
existing People Strategy. The tight timeline meant that a deliberate and managed approach
was required. Key foundations for the project included:
• Strong executive leadership: LINZ senior leadership team gave priority to and supported
the workforce strategy. Senior leaders were engaged at key decision points throughout;
• A diverse project team: Drawn from across business teams and including strategic
planning, human resources, operations and communications to ensure that the relevant
organisational perspectives were involved; and,
• A formal project management structure: A well laid out project process and storyboard
that structured the project team’s work (Attachment 1).
Analysis
Systematic enquiry and analysis provided a base for development of the workforce strategy
using the SSC workforce framework to guide the process:
• Workforce data & metrics: Using LINZ’ well established internal reporting system, the
Workforce Strategy provided an opportunity for a stock-take. The process of analysis
confirmed and deepened LINZ understanding of ‘current state’ related to its workforce;
• Environmental scan: An environment scan provided intelligence focussing on workforce
opportunities and challenges informed by what was already known about LINZ’
workforce and progress as an organisation;
• Technical Capability Project: Before the Workforce Strategy project, LINZ had initiated a
survey to give a better picture of the technical capability of its workforce. LINZ used the
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survey to answer questions emerging from the workforce analysis that showed that it
also needed information at a more granular level around workforce capacity and costs;
and,
• Development Workshops: LINZ executive and business group leaders were involved in
two workshops focussing on development of the organisational culture and change
aspects of the workforce strategy.
The Build
The Workforce Strategy emerged from the analysis via an iterative process of testing and
refining. Key to ensuring the strategy would support LINZ’ business direction were:
• Developing content into the storyboard as the analysis progressed;
• Engaging with LINZ planning and finance teams to test findings from the analysis and
workforce planning assumptions; and,
• Communicating regularly on progress and findings with the senior leadership team;
When senior leaders signed off on the Workforce Strategy, it was based on a document
they strongly owned and were already familiar with.
What we learned
Applying an external framework to the development of the Workforce Strategy was a useful
experience. The analysis helped to confirm many of LINZ’ business planning assumptions.
What worked well:
• LINZ’ deliberate positioning of the workforce strategy as an organisational priority was
key to drafting a successful strategy;
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The Senior Leadership Team took leadership of the Workforce Strategy early, gave it
priority throughout, and provided clear consistent messaging to the organisation;
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Clearly locating the Workforce Strategy project in LINZ and anchoring to what was
already in place and /or being developed;
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Taking a joined up approach across corporate and operational functions to build the
strategy. This was a jointly owned project that was well connected with the operational
environment; and,
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Building on its existing survey of technical capability to include a focus on people
capacity and workforce costs. This interview based survey enabled grassroots
conversations on our capacity challenges and giving more insight into the capability
shifts it needs. An added benefit was the value of these conversations in making
workforce strategy real and relevant to LINZ operational managers.
Lessons for next time:
• An earlier start on the analysis would allow more time for drilling down to a deeper
level of understanding sooner, reducing some of the time pressures in the final stages
of iterating the strategy; and,
•
Spread workload of the project team and start penning earlier when analysis was still
being done.
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Value to LINZ
A key value of the workforce strategy project for LINZ has been in again looking
systematically across its business. The Workforce Strategy has provided more clarity on
workforce capacity and costs which are critical to LINZ business strategy going forward.
LINZ’ Workforce Strategy is now the central reference point for workforce matters. Insights
from the Workforce Strategy have informed other organisational strategies. The Strategy
has enabled LINZ to further develop its workforce reporting to provide more meaningful
measures of organisational performance.
Further Contacts
For further information on the development of the LINZ’ Workforce Strategy, contact Erica
Nicholls, Acting Manager Human Resources ([email protected]) or Jane Hopkirk, Team
Manager, Human Resources ([email protected]).
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ATTACHMENT 1
Workforce Strategy Development Process
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Workforce Strategy Storyboard
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Analysis of
available
information
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Workforce data –
current & future in
number and value
Information
Skeleton
Gap in
information –
what do we
need to
develop?
4 year budget
guidelines
Develop
information
Translate
information into
workforce
planning
parameters
Gap Analysis
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Workforce
Strategy
Implementation
Plan
Strategy
considerations
and analysis
Implementation
considerations
& planning
4 year budget plan
Strategy implementation
stage
Monitoring & Evaluation
Workforce Planning stage
Pre-workforce planning stage
Strategy building stage