Building an EE Plan for the 2025–2030 Cycle
A clear walkthrough of the national five-year planning cycle, what happens if you become designated mid-cycle, and how to build a defensible Employment Equity plan.
By AutoEqui
The national five-year cycle
Employment Equity planning now follows a national five-year cycle, currently running from 2025 to 2030. Every designated employer must have a current plan aligned to this cycle.
Becoming designated mid-cycle
If you only become a designated employer partway through the cycle — say in 2026 — your plan runs from that date until the end of the current cycle (2030), not for a separate full five-year term. You then prepare a new plan for the next cycle before this one expires.
The steps to a defensible plan
- Confirm designated employer status — 50 or more employees.
- Consult and elect an EE committee with representation across occupational levels and designated groups.
- Analyse your workforce (EEA12) by occupational level, race, gender and disability.
- Identify barriers in recruitment, promotion, remuneration, training and retention.
- Set numerical targets per occupational level, aligned to the 2025 sector regulations.
- Draft objectives, timeframes and responsible persons.
- Get CEO sign-off and communicate the plan to all employees.
- Monitor, review and report through EEA2 and EEA4.
A plan is only defensible if your targets and objectives are realistic, evidence-based and reviewed regularly. AutoEqui builds this end-to-end.