Budgeting and forecasting
Workforce planning and management
Headcount planning and management

How Docker streamlines headcount management with TeamOhana

60 hrs
saved monthly
6-figure
savings in unapproved headcount costs
Overview
Imagine dreading Fridays. The weekend is just around the corner, yet it’s the worst day of your week. This used to be the case for Aaron Solomon, Sr. Financial Analyst at Docker. He dreaded his Fridays because it was “headcount reconciliation” day – a process that took roughly five hours and completely buried him in a massive, complex spreadsheet. The process took him at least five hours, sometimes more during the planning and replan cycles. It was inefficient for sure, but it was how things were done at growing companies like Docker. Aaron’s manager, Finance Director Joe Becic, even handled this work before Aaron was hired. Since headcount is 70-80% of their operating budget, they wanted to keep a close eye on the forecast. It was simply a necessary evil in order to hit organizational growth goals.
Challenges
No single source of truth for headcount
Messy, inefficient people planning processes
Disjointed communication, disparate systems of record
Missing hiring timelines, which impacts business goals and opportunities
01
The challenge
02
Our solution
03
Key workflows
04
Impact and results

This can’t be the only way to track headcount and headcount spend

For Docker, and many other growing companies, the only way to get a complete picture of headcount that included the dozens of roles they were hiring for was to lump all of the data into one, big, complicated spreadsheet. 

Of course, he also needed to keep it updated. That meant a huge amount of collaboration to understand all of the critical information about existing headcount in-seat, pending starts, future terminations, and approved roles yet to be hired. 

The problem was that Docker didn’t have a system that could gather and sync all this headcount data. It required input from multiple sources, including both systems and people, which made it inefficient and time-consuming.

“My Fridays basically consisted of multiple hours downloading data from our ATS and reconciling that back to a download export from our HRIS. Then, I had to reconcile that to make sure that the number of new employees (both hired and pending starts) all had start dates, compensation, and other data that matched what my finance record had. It was a really manual process on a weekly basis reconciling numbers across recruiting, hiring managers, finance, and others,” Aaron said.

If anything were to change throughout the hiring process, hiring managers and recruiters would leave comments in the master spreadsheet. If Aaron did not notice a new comment, the change would not be implemented across the different sources of truth. 

“On top of this, we’re living in a constantly changing business environment. We're constantly evaluating where we should be investing in the next quarter, the next year, the next two to three years. Just keeping all of these moving parts in a source of truth while also maximizing collaboration is a significant challenge,” explains Joe.

What Docker needed was a single source of truth for its workforce, including both current and future headcount. In addition, they needed advanced workflows to be able to handle complex employee changes, like backfills and internal transfers, which made forecasting extra tough and prone to error.

Most importantly, they needed a system that was collaborative and user-friendly, unlike many of the tools in the existing Finance and HR tech stack. It needed to be built and solve challenges for all key stakeholders in the headcount process - Finance, Talent, HR, and hiring managers.

Our solution

A headcount source of truth that solves cross-functional alignment problems

To centralize their people planning, data, and processes, Docker implemented TeamOhana’s headcount management platform.

With TeamOhana, Docker’s Finance, Talent, and People teams can now plan, hire, manage, and report from a single source of truth for headcount data. They no longer need to spend time exporting and manually updating data across multiple systems and spreadsheets.

“Not only is TeamOhana the source of truth for headcount and hiring plans, it's really helped us scale a prescriptive, collaborative process with the business.” -Joe Becic

Docker usage: By the numbers

For the Finance team, the headcount reconciliation process went from “almost impossible” to “automated and accurate” – without hours of time dedicated to it. They use the Hiring Tracker and Budgets & Forecasts modules to see how the hiring plan is progressing and their real-time budget vs. actuals. Aaron has what he needs without time-consuming reconciliation work. In other words, he got his Fridays back.

The Talent team has a dedicated module for recruiting called the Recruiting Workboard, where they can see only approved roles that are assigned to them. This way, they're not opening roles that aren't fully approved. The head of global talent, Bre Paredes, is able to see all approved roles and do capacity planning with greater confidence and accuracy.

Hiring managers use TeamOhana to plan their org, see their approved headcount, and request changes to their headcount plan. When they are ready to hire, they can easily notify the recruiter within the tool, and that kicks off the hiring process from a central location, as opposed to sending Slacks or commenting on a spreadsheet.

Now it’s all done in one place and it’s easy to track.

“I used to have to write formulas to make the entire spreadsheet ‘work.’ And literally change individual cells from ‘Not Open’ to ‘Open.’ Now I spend five minutes a week reviewing the hiring tracker and inserting the data into my rolling forecast,” says Aaron.

Key workflows

Approval desk

Before TeamOhana, approval processes were not well defined. Plus, they were scattered across multiple channels like Slack and email. Now, Docker leverages TeamOhana’s powerful process orchestration to streamline complex cross-functional approvals. All budget-impacting changes, like new requests and changes to existing headcount, are approved by the right people in the right order.

Headcount reconciliation

Aaron used to spend five hours in a spreadsheet every Friday reconciling data. Now, he simply logs in to TeamOhana and reviews the updates. TeamOhana syncs and reconciles the HRIS and ATS data automatically into a format that the Finance and Talent teams can use to do their jobs more efficiently and make better decisions.

Internal Transfers

Internal transfers were one of the biggest pain points in the headcount process. Aaron shares why in this post about the internal transfer process. With TeamOhana, internal transfers and backfills are as easy as a few clicks and can be done in under five minutes.

“The internal transfer feature is one of the biggest contributors to operational efficiency and effective budgeting at Docker.” –Aaron

Terminations

Future terminations used to be a challenge because they were tracked and documented in disjointed channels, since the HRIS system could not account for terminations on a future date. But TeamOhana can, including tracking backfills for those who are leaving the company. Now, Docker’s team simply enters the termination date and TeamOhana writes the data to the HRIS at the appropriate time, so Finance gets their forecast correct and HR runs a smooth offboarding process.

One-click job openings in ATS

Thanks to TeamOhana’s integration with Ashby ATS, recruiters are able to see all approved roles assigned to them and open the job directly into the ATS without any duplicative work. All job details, description, and compensation are automatically transferred over. As hiring progresses, TeamOhana pulls in updates so that hiring managers and Finance folks have complete visibility.

“TeamOhana is the source of truth for capacity planning, and it’s how we determine the number of recruiters needed and who should handle which teams based on the annual headcount plan.” –Bre Paredes, Head of Global Talent

Impact & results

Docker has grown headcount over 100% – smarter, and more efficiently 

“We use TeamOhana to get a single source of truth for headcount planning. It has helped us optimize resource allocation recommendations for the business.” –Scott Baumgartner, CFO

Eliminated spreadsheets – completely

  • Single source of truth for all current and future headcount data
  • 100% compliance in budget-impacting changes going through TeamOhana Approval Desk

Saved time and reduced miscommunication

  • 50% increase in productivity 
  • Standardized ready-to-hire and forecast process

Trustworthy data

  • Fully automated budget and forecast for finance and budget owners
  • Real-time hiring plan status for budget owners
  • Real-time visibility into hiring plan budget vs actual variance 

Joe Becic says it best. 

“TeamOhana has cut down on the time it takes to run a collaborative hiring process. It’s allowed us to be more accurate on our forecast, and to have greater trust in the information. And it’s reduced the cognitive load of our hiring managers and leaders, so they can go execute product and sales plans without worrying about how they’re doing against the hiring plan.”
60 hrs
saved monthly
6-figure
savings in unapproved headcount costs

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