Capacity Planning: Headcount plan
Objective. Read the headcount plan and explain that required headcount is a computed requirement under standards/shrinkage/occupancy assumptions, and a net balance can still hide skill and interval gaps.
The headcount plan expresses required people over the planning horizon - the output of volume, standards, shrinkage and service goals set against available workforce - so the gap between required and available is visible period by period.
See it in the demo
What this screen answers
A Sales or CSM person opens this to answer 'how many people do we need, and when?' It is the payoff screen: the requirement the customer takes to finance. It shows required versus available headcount across the horizon and the resulting surplus or shortfall.
The task
Scope to the team, client or work type and the horizon, then read required versus available and the gap per period. Trace the requirement back to its drivers (volume, standards, shrinkage, service goal) so the number is explainable. Describe the view as 'required vs available over the horizon', not specific chart labels.
How to read it
Required headcount is a computed requirement under assumptions, not an approved hiring commitment. Two misreads to avoid: first, treating the number as a decision already made (it is an input to a hiring decision); second, treating a net balance as full coverage - you can be balanced overall and still short a skill at peak and long elsewhere (the app's core interpretation check). Read by skill and interval, not just the headline total.
Honest limits
The plan is only as good as its inputs - shrinkage and standards swing it heavily. It does not prove coverage by skill or interval on its own, and it is not a set of raised requisitions. Confirm the standards and shrinkage are the customer's real figures with product and the customer before the requirement is treated as defensible.
Interpretation check
Required headcount is a requirement computed from assumptions, not an approved plan - and a net FTE balance does not prove every skill and interval is covered.
In the field
KnackGlobal-style RCM at scale: the headcount plan is the defensible seat ask - sized from output standards and shrinkage with assumptions visible - rather than an intuition-based 'we need more people' that finance can refuse.
Practical task
Produce a one-period reading: state required vs available and the gap, name the two inputs that most drive it, and point to one skill or interval the net total hides.
Self-check
The quarter nets out balanced. Is staffing solved?
No. A net balance can hide a skill short at peak and long in the trough. Read coverage by skill and interval, not the headline total.
Which inputs, if wrong, most distort the required number?
Shrinkage and handling standards (and volume). They swing the requirement heavily and must be the customer's real figures, validated by the CSM, not placeholders.
Is the headcount number a hiring commitment?
No - it is a computed requirement that informs a hiring decision. Raised requisitions and ramp live in the hiring plan, and approval is a separate governance step.
Verified vs demo. Screen is live in the demo at /#/headcount; exact controls and figures are SME-validation-pending.