Approved Headcount Budget
Board-approved end-of-period headcount target. The contractual reference point against which `hr.total_headcount` and `hr.open_positions` are read — drift means either hiring under plan (typically a growth concern) or over plan (typically a burn-discipline concern). Common pitfall: silent in-year adjustments — boards approve a number, the CEO informally expands or contracts to it, and the variance never gets reconciled. Best practice is to treat changes to this number as board-action items, recorded in `hr.board_actions`. — HR KPI, I'mBoard-authored (editorial tier).
I'mBoard-authored (editorial tier)
No public third-party standard anchors this KPI yet, so I'mBoard authors and maintains the definition — transparently labeled as editorial tier. See the ontology methodology for the published vs editorial tier system and the back-attribution workstream.
Rogue ID: hr.approved_headcount_budget
Type: Number
Domain: HR
Definition
Board-approved end-of-period headcount target. The contractual reference point against which hr.total_headcount and hr.open_positions are read — drift means either hiring under plan (typically a growth concern) or over plan (typically a burn-discipline concern). Common pitfall: silent in-year adjustments — boards approve a number, the CEO informally expands or contracts to it, and the variance never gets reconciled. Best practice is to treat changes to this number as board-action items, recorded in hr.board_actions.
Formula
Plain board-approved end-of-period FTE target. No derivation — set by board resolution as part of the annual or semi-annual budget. Changes require board approval and should be logged in `hr.board_actions`.Why it matters
The single number that converts strategic intent into operating constraint. Variance against this number drives the budget-vs-actual conversation that anchors most board meetings' HR section.
How to interpret
Pair with hr.total_headcount and hr.headcount_change for variance reporting. A sustained gap >10% under plan typically signals recruiting capacity issues; sustained over plan signals approval-gate slippage or contractor-conversion that bypassed the budget process (industry folk-wisdom, not citation-grade).
Related KPIs
hr.total_headcounthr.headcount_changehr.open_positionshr.hiring_planhr.board_actions
Source
I'mBoard editorial — authored and maintained by I'mBoard, first published 2026-04-01. No third-party standard is cited for this KPI; when one emerges, the definition is back-attributed and promoted to the published tier (a minor version bump). Read the ontology methodology for the published vs editorial tier system, attribution rules, and dispute process.
Stage relevance
| Company stage | Priority |
|---|---|
| Series A | Recommended |
| Series B | Core |
| Series C+ | Core |
| Public | Core |
Suggested for stages: Series A, Series B, Series C+, Public.
Default owning functions
- HR
- Finance
Machine-readable
- This KPI as JSON:
/api/ontology/hr/approved_headcount_budget.json - All HR KPIs:
/api/ontology/hr.json - Full catalog:
/api/ontology/index.json
HR KPIs
Headcount, hiring, attrition, compensation. 28 KPIs in this domain — 4 anchored to third-party standards, 24 editorial.
ARR per FTE
Annual Recurring Revenue divided by total FTE-equivalent workforce — the canonical SaaS workforce-productivity ratio anchored to the SaaS Capital Annual Survey methodology (revenue per employee benchmarks). A high-signal denominator for "are we over- or under-staffed for our revenue scale?" Common pitfall: choosing different ARR conventions (ending vs average, GAAP-reconciled vs raw) without locking in a board-level standard. Best practice is to pair this with `sales.arr` so the numerator is unambiguous and to disclose whether contractors are included in the FTE denominator. — HR KPI anchored to SaaS Capital Annual Survey 2025 (14th Annual).