Drivetrain

Drivetrain covers financial reporting, revenue planning, budgeting, headcount planning, cash flow forecasting, financial consolidation and scenario planning as published use cases.

Headcount planning appearing as its own use case is correct rather than incidental, because for most companies it is the plan.

In a services or software business, people are the largest cost by a wide margin, frequently seventy percent or more of operating expense. Every other line is small by comparison, which means the accuracy of the whole financial plan rests almost entirely on the headcount assumptions: how many people, in which roles, starting when, at what cost including employment taxes and benefits.

Those assumptions are also the ones most likely to be wrong, because hiring slips. A role planned for January that fills in April changes the year's costs materially, and a plan that assumes hiring happens on schedule is optimistic in a predictable direction.

Modelling headcount properly means handling start dates rather than annual averages, partial-year costs, the difference between an offer accepted and a person productive, and the ramp before a salesperson generates anything.

Cash flow forecasting is the other use case that deserves separate treatment, since profit and cash diverge in ways that surprise growing companies. A business can be profitable and run out of money by growing, because it pays for people and inventory before customers pay it, and that gap widens exactly as things go well.

Pricing is not published on the captured page.