WorkAI Automations3 min read
Workforce planning that updates itself
A headcount plan that is never more than thirty days old, and a board view nobody has to rebuild.
Built by our founder in the Chief People Officer seat of a private-equity-backed software company, for its own people function. Built in 30 to 45 days, inside the company’s own systems.
The problem
The headcount plan lived in a spreadsheet that was rebuilt before every board meeting. It disagreed with finance, and it could not answer a question like what happens if hiring slows next quarter without someone giving up a weekend.
The people function spent the days before each board pack reconciling numbers instead of reading them.
What we built
A workforce model in the company's own spreadsheet, connected to a monthly export from the HR system and the finance close file.
A scheduled refresh that recalculates headcount by function, spans and layers, attrition, cost per employee and revenue per employee, and compares each to benchmark.
Three scenarios, base, lean and growth, kept side by side, and a one-page board view sent on a schedule.
A short written narrative for the chief executive each month, drafted by AI from the numbers and read by a person before it goes anywhere, explaining what moved and why.
How it works
On the first business day after close, the roster and the finance actuals arrive in the model. Names are replaced by identifiers before anything leaves the HR system.
The model recalculates, the scenarios update, and a draft narrative is written.
The HR lead or finance owner reads the narrative, edits it, and approves it. Only then does the one-page view go to the chief executive and the board pack.
Every run leaves a log of what it did, so a diligence team can see how the numbers were made.
The result
The board sees the same headcount number finance sees, every month, without a reconciliation meeting.
A question about slowing or accelerating hiring is answered from the scenario tables in minutes rather than over a weekend.
The hours that went into building the plan go into deciding what to do about it.