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Count of board-approved roles that are currently posted and unfilled (requisition open, offer not yet accepted). The leading-edge indicator for upcoming hiring capacity demand. Common pitfall: "approved" drift — roles that were verbally green-lit but never went through the approval gate get counted here, inflating the number. The board number should match the approved headcount budget; everything else belongs in narrative as "pipeline ideas." — 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.open_positions Type: Number Domain: HR

Definition

Formula

Count of requisitions where status = open AND approval = granted AND no candidate has accepted. Excludes positions filled but not yet started (those belong to `hr.new_hires` in the next period). Excludes role ideas not yet approved.

Why it matters

Quantifies the hiring debt — every open role is unrealized capacity. Combined with hr.avg_days_to_fill, it projects when capacity actually arrives. A growing open-position count while time-to-fill stretches is a recruiting-capacity yellow flag.

How to interpret

Open positions ÷ approved budget gap = recruiting load. If open positions exceed 15–20% of total headcount sustained over multiple periods, it usually signals either compensation issues, recruiter capacity issues, or unrealistic role specs (industry folk-wisdom, not citation-grade). Tie to hr.key_openings for priority-weighted context.

Calculation policy

How an AI agent should compute this KPI from messy company data. Free-text rules consumed at reasoning time — not a deterministic DSL. The most common ways to get this wrong are listed under Common miscomputations.

Inclusion rules

Count of requisitions where status = open AND approval = granted AND no candidate has yet accepted — a point-in-time snapshot of unfilled, board-approved roles as of the period-end date.
The number should tie to the approved headcount plan: every open req traces to a budgeted, approved seat.

Exclusion rules

Role ideas that were verbally green-lit but never cleared the approval gate — "approved drift" inflates the count; those belong in narrative as pipeline ideas.
Positions already filled but not yet started — the candidate accepted, so the seat is no longer open; it becomes hr.new_hires next period.
Backfills already covered by an accepted offer.

Required inputs

Requisition list at the snapshot date with status, approval state, and candidate-accepted flag.
The approved headcount plan to confirm each open req is budgeted.
Priority / criticality tags if the board reads hr.key_openings.

Data-source priority

ATS (Greenhouse / Lever / Ashby) open-requisition report.
Approved headcount budget / board resolution to validate the approval gate.

Edge cases

Offer extended but not yet accepted: still open (candidate has not accepted) — flips out of the count only on acceptance.
Evergreen / pipeline reqs kept open with no intent to hire imminently: exclude or flag separately so the hiring-debt read is honest.
A single req approved for multiple identical hires: count the number of seats, not the number of postings.

Validation checks

Open positions ÷ approved-budget gap = recruiting load; sustained above ~15–20% of total headcount signals comp, recruiter-capacity, or role-spec issues.
Open positions closed in a period should reconcile against hr.new_hires started in the following period, allowing for hr.avg_days_to_fill.

Common miscomputations

Counting unapproved "wish-list" roles as open positions — overstates hiring debt and breaks the tie to the approved plan.
Leaving filled-but-not-started seats in the open count, double-reading them once here and again as next-period hires.
Counting postings instead of approved seats when one req covers several identical hires.

hr.approved_headcount_budget
hr.avg_days_to_fill
hr.hiring_plan
hr.key_openings
hr.new_hires

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.