Capacity
Availability, working time, leave and absences in one view. The basis of every assignment plan.
Workforce process: how do we steer capacity, skills and motivation?
People carry the value creation and tie up the largest share of cost. teamspace connects availability, skills, utilisation and compensation, so the right people with the right skills work on the right project.
The pain
Where the workforce process loses its grip
- Utilisation swings uncontrollably and only becomes visible at the end of the quarter.
- Skills sit in a few people's heads, and staffing comes down to guesswork.
- Availability lives in a leave list, separate from the contract.
- Commission models create frustration because no one can follow the calculation.
- Hours, allowances and expenses are gathered by hand for payroll.
- Attrition quietly costs a multiple of a new hire every year.
Most of this needs no new hire, just a better routine.
Three dimensions
Three levers decide productivity and retention
Competence
Skills, certifications, languages and tools. Makes staffing by competence possible, not by gut feel.
Motivation
Compensation, commissions, objectives and conversations. Connects contribution and reward in a way people can follow.
The flow
Six steps from the master record to the payroll handover
Master data, hours and compensation belong to different modules. In the workforce process they mesh, without anyone maintaining data twice.
- 1
Master data and skills
Contract, weekly working time, skills and certifications are maintained centrally in the employee record. Every plan starts here.
- 2
Availability
From contract, approved leave, sickness and special times teamspace computes the available capacity per person, current to the day.
- 3
Assignment and staffing
Capacity planning filters by skill and free capacity. The planner assigns, and conflicts become visible.
- 4
Capture and approval
Staff log time, allowances and expenses, managers approve. When someone is away, the deputy takes over.
- 5
Utilisation and analysis
Logged hours flow straight into utilisation. Over- and under-load surface across weeks, not only at the end of the quarter.
- 6
Payroll and development
Reviewed hours, allowances and commissions go bundled into payroll preparation. Objectives and conversations stay documented.
The assignment plan
Utilisation and overload sit per person in the plan.
This is the assignment plan from capacity planning: per person and week the available capacity, the planned work and the utilisation. Where more is scheduled than is available, the overload shows up as a problem, early enough to steer against it.
Assignment plan (16/02/2026 - 05/04/2026)
Staff W8W9W10W11W12W13W14 Utilisation
BB Barbara Consulting Consulting
24h00
3 days 16h00
40h00
40h00
40h00
40h00
32h00
0.00 % 0h00 / 232h00
FF Finn Finance Finance
24h00
40h00
40h00 Implementation -1h36
40h00 Implementation
40h00
3 days 40h00
8h00
35.17 % 81h36 / 232h00 -1h36
PP Pia People People
24h00
40h00
40h00
40h00
1 day
5 days
32h00
0.00 % 0h00 / 208h00
VV Viktor Sales Sales
24h00
40h00
5 days
48h00 Customer support -8h00
40h00
40h00
32h00
22.22 % 48h00 / 216h00 -8h00
VV Volker Board Board
24h00
40h00
40h00
40h00
40h00
40h00
32h00
0.00 % 0h00 / 256h00
available planned work overload leave
Availability from contract and leave, planned work netted against it. Utilisation and overload sit per person in the plan, not only in the quarterly report.
Competence
Skills become a filter, not dead records.
With ten people everyone knows each other's strengths, with a hundred they no longer do. teamspace records professional, language and social skills per person on a multi-level scale, with certifications attached in the employee record.
- Filterable in the assignment plan: who can do React and is free in week 22? The profile answers the question, you make the assignment.
- Gaps become visible: which skill is scarce, long before the engagement arrives.
- Faster cover on absence: who brings the same skill stands in a list instead of in a few people's heads.
Availability
Availability is computed from the contract.
Who can work how much and when does not sit in a leave list, it falls out of the data. teamspace subtracts approved leave, sickness, public holidays and special times from the contractual weekly working time. What remains is the available capacity.
- Approved leave lowers capacity at once: the request flips to approved, the assignment plan recomputes.
- Public holidays per region are stored, and half days count as half.
- Deputy steps in on absence: if the approver is on leave themselves, their deputy approves.
Utilisation
Spot bottlenecks and idle time early.
The most important steering figure in the services business is utilisation: billable hours in relation to available time. teamspace measures it live from the logged hours and carries planned assignments forward across the coming weeks.
- Across weeks instead of after the fact: who is about to be overloaded and where idle time arises sits in the assignment plan, not only in the quarterly analysis.
- Planned assignments and absences sit side by side, so sales or recruiting can be set in motion early.
- Thresholds you set yourself: teamspace warns on idle time and looming overload, you define the limits.
The difference
The workforce process classic and with teamspace
Feature
HR plus spreadsheets
teamspace workforce process
Recommended Availability
Leave list in a spreadsheet, separate from the contract
From contract, leave, sickness and special time, current to the day
Skills
In the CV, not searchable
Captured in structure, filterable in the assignment plan
Utilisation
Manual, often weeks old
Live from logged hours, planned ahead across weeks
Commission
Spreadsheet calculation at quarter end
Per invoice, fixed amount or share of gross margin
Payroll preparation
Export hours, complete them by hand
Hours, allowances and expenses reviewed and approved
Payroll handover
Data by email to the payroll office
Reviewed data export to the payroll office or the tax advisor
Employee record
Paper or network drive
Digital and role based, one access per role
Commission and payroll
Commission per invoice, payroll without the quarterly spreadsheet.
Compensation connects contribution and reward when it stays easy to follow. In teamspace the commission rule is stored per employee, as a fixed amount per invoice or as a share of gross margin. The amounts arise per invoice automatically and stand ready as a payout proposal.
- Per invoice instead of at quarter end: every issued invoice generates the commission amount, and the employee sees it in their statement.
- Hours, allowances, expenses and commissions come together reviewed and approved in the employee statement.
- Data export to the payroll office: the reviewed data goes to the tax advisor or the payroll office, the payroll run itself happens there.
Steering
The KPIs that steer the workforce process
Utilisation
Billable hours divided by available hours. Across the industry the healthy range sits between 70 and 85 percent. The most important steering figure in the services business.
Revenue per employee
Total revenue divided by headcount. A measure of productivity and scalability, very different depending on the business model.
Realisation rate
Billable hours divided by hours worked. When it drops, hidden project losses appear.
Utilisation forecast
How busy are we in the coming weeks? The basis is planned assignments and known absences.
Skill coverage
Which competences do we have, which are missing? Makes gaps visible, long before the engagement.
Attrition
Share of staff leaving per year. Acts directly on knowledge, capacity and follow-on cost.
Score your maturity honestly
Four questions show where your workforce process stands.
Maturity does not show in the HR system, it shows in four questions. Anyone who answers two or more with rather no usually sits at level 1 or 2.
-
Availability
Is the available capacity per person readable from the system current to the day, or does it sit in a list?
-
Skills
Are competences captured in structure and filterable in the assignment plan, or do they live in CVs?
-
Utilisation
Is utilisation steered ahead of time, or only reported after the fact?
-
Compensation
Are commission and payroll preparation anchored in the data set, or in the quarterly spreadsheet?
Maturity
From staffing by phone call to steered utilisation
Level 0: unplanned
Capacity, leave and skills are neither documented nor planned. Staffing by phone call.
Level 1: manual
Spreadsheet lists for leave, availability and skills. Utilisation is calculated after the fact.
Level 2: structured
HR and time tracking system in use. Skills are documented, but rarely used for planning.
Level 3: assisted
Capacity planning connected with the project plan and time tracking. Utilisation is measured continuously.
Level 4: largely automated
Utilisation planned ahead across weeks, skill filter in the assignment plan, commission computation and payroll preparation digital.
Level 5: fully automated
Live steering of utilisation, skill gaps visible, compensation models and career paths integrated.
Where you stand
Where does your workforce process stand today?
In a short requirements call we place your routine on a maturity level and show the biggest concrete lever, from availability to the payroll handover.
These building blocks carry the workforce process
Six modules form the workforce process. One maintains the master data, the next plans the assignment, another prepares payroll.
Digital employee record
Documents, contracts, certifications and conversations, accessible by role.
Learn moreCapacity planning
Assignment across all projects with utilisation, skill filter and conflicts.
Learn morePayroll preparation
Hours, allowances, expenses and commissions reviewed, approved and exported.
Learn moreTime tracking
Working and project time with approval and analysis, in line with the recording obligation.
Learn moreThe target picture
People leadership with a data base.
The workforce process is the end-to-end steering of capacity, competence and motivation: from the available hour through the matching skill to compensation people can follow. A high-maturity workforce process combines soft and hard steering. Availability and skills are present in structure, utilisation is steered ahead of time, compensation is transparent and computable per invoice, payroll preparation runs digital. People experience transparency, leadership gains steerability.
The way there asks for no larger crew, but for a routine in which availability, hours and compensation come from the same data. HR administration turns into lived steering of capacity, competence and motivation.
We have been developing teamspace since 1999 in Darmstadt, hosted in an ISO 27001 certified data centre in Frankfurt am Main, and the data processing stays in the EU.
Frequently asked questions about the workforce process
What utilisation is realistic and healthy?
It depends on the industry. Consultancies often sit between 70 and 85 percent, agencies between 65 and 80 percent, engineering firms between 75 and 85 percent. Values permanently above 90 percent sound attractive but lead to overload, quality problems and attrition.
How does the utilisation forecast differ from today's utilisation?
Today's utilisation is the past, measured from logged hours. The forecast looks ahead: it carries planned assignments and known absences forward across the coming weeks. That way sales or recruiting can be started before a bottleneck or idle time arises.
Why capture skills systematically when everyone knows their strengths?
Because that is true with ten people, no longer with a hundred. Structured skills make staffing by competence possible, surface gaps and support career paths. Above all, on an absence the replacement is found faster, because the profile sits filterable in the assignment plan.
How do the workforce process and payroll integrate?
Hours, allowances, travel cost and commissions are captured, reviewed and approved in teamspace. From this comes a reviewed data export to the payroll office or the tax advisor. The payroll run itself happens in the payroll system, the data base comes from teamspace. teamspace does not contain a payroll run of its own.
How do we handle commission and bonus models?
The commission rule is stored per employee, as a fixed amount per invoice or as a share of gross margin. The amount arises per invoice automatically and stands ready as a payout proposal, the employee sees it in their statement. Bonuses tied to objectives are documented as well.
How does the workforce process help against attrition?
Indirectly, but effectively. Clear compensation, transparent utilisation, documented skills and visible development paths take away the feeling of working in a black box. On top of that, overload and chronic imbalance surface early, so counter measures are possible before a resignation.
Other processes
The workforce process is one of seven core processes. Here are the other six:
Sales process
How do we consistently win the right work?
Project delivery process
How do we deliver projects reliably and profitably?
Billing process
How do we turn work into revenue quickly?
Cost control process
How do we keep costs and liquidity under control?
Customer care process
How do we serve clients fast and by value?
Business steering
How do we run the firm on current data?
How well set up is your workforce process today?
In a 15 to 30 minute requirements call we place your workforce process on a maturity level and find the biggest lever for utilisation and retention.