The Ultimate Coda Handbook for People & HR Teams

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The Ultimate Coda Handbook for People & HR Teams

The Ultimate Coda Handbook for People & HR Teams

V1 Archives

(V1) 3. People Operations

Lucy Yip

Amy Shaw

Build your own operating systems.

Organizing the various components of People Operations like ticketing systems, internal wiki hub, headcount planning, and managing compensation can be daunting but its implications are profound. When every aspect of your operations is thoughtfully designed and organized, your team gains a competitive edge. It all comes down to systems and processes and Coda makes it really simple to get started.

You know you’ve optimized your systems when employees stop asking you questions.

Help your employees help you! By enabling them to find information on their own — things like centralized repository of information, frequently asked questions, company policies, guidelines, and operating principles — you can free up time for both parties in an efficient way and help each other be more productive. Employees like to have responses to their questions quickly, and this is one of the ways they can do that without being dependent on an available team member. Driving behavior takes repetition and it will take your employees some time to learn to check the internal Wiki as their first instinct. As they build that muscle, you’ll find less of your time is spent answering the same questions and can be spent on more impactful, value-driven work.

We all know wikis can be helpful— if they stay updated and are easily accessible. Nothing does this as well or as beautifully as Coda. Our Wiki is always current, easy to navigate, and engages our employees by inviting questions and preserving information for future use (no more answering questions multiple times!)

And remember, nobody wants to read a stuffy doc! Make your Wiki wonderful by writing in a way that’s appealing to the reader, which means no complex jargon whenever we can help it! You can make your text be approachable, just as they would experience if they had a conversation with you on the same question.

How highlights:

Table filters by section

Search by page

Include instructions for automations?

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Template for Internal Wiki

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Making a People Operations Wiki on Coda How much can I contribute to my HSA? What’s the travel policy? When do we get paid? Where do I file this receipt for reimbursement? etc. etc. etc. coda.io⁠

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Cut out context switching and re-gain focus with a ticketing system

Between all the emails, slacks, Microsoft teams, in-person asks, and perhaps even phantom pings in your dreams(?!) employee questions are constantly surfacing. Designing a ticketing system that integrates with your company’s existing communication tools, such as slack or email, can significantly cut down the amount of context switching. You’ll find instant value in measuring time spent on requests and resolution, employee satisfaction, and will shed light on how you can run people operations even better through becoming data driven. A common worry about introducing another system is that you may become too removed from employees and have less human-touch points. The more you can help your employees understand this ultimately serves them by getting them to their answers quicker and simultaneously helps the People team build our data analytics, the easier the change will be to adopt.

There’s so many upsides to having a ticketing system and it doesn’t have to be complex to get started.

How highlights:

Slack pack

data collection

this message has been received

buttons make it easy

stay organized

don’t lose that slack convo - awkward realization you left someone on read or getting some nudges from the people 😅

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Template for Ticketing System

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Ticketing system for HR & Workplace teams Stay organized with this ticketing system integrated with Slack. coda.io⁠

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Nail compensation management the first time

We all know the importance of compensation management — it’s vital for employee motivation, job satisfaction, and productivity. It’s an overwhelming space involving many variables like salary, bonuses, equity, cap tables, and board approvals that everybody wants to get right the first time with no errors. Each of those variables are enough to make one’s head spin, yet there doesn’t seem to be a good solution amongst popular processes and tools. It’s difficult to centralize all the various spreadsheets you use to effectively track, push out communications, and hold proper space for easy collaboration between multiple stakeholders. With Coda we’ve combined those very complex elements into one centralized doc where you can run clean workflows around compensation, manage your cap table, create custom views and share relevant information to stakeholders without sharing all the nuts and bolts.

People teams have the unique position of not only strengthening and elevating the way their functional teams work but simultaneously propelling the broader company forward and this is a prime area that you can knock two birds with one stone by nailing your compensation management process with this template.

How highlights:

Transactions - every row is a transaction

using formulas

detail view

summary page

doesn’t have to be a fussy spreadsheet

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Template for Compensation Tracker

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Compensation Tracker Template coda.io⁠

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Stop painful headcount discussions with a simple system

Headcount planning is a critical area for business success, yet, many HR and client teams find this process painful. You’re handling dynamic business needs in a changing landscape and need to be able to make speedy updates for backfills or answer a manager on whether they can open a new role, but it’s hard to make an informed decision without data. And then when you have the data, it’s often out of date and takes a considerable amount of time coordinating with each stakeholder to get the relevant information back up to speed. Amongst the various department heads, executives, HR, recruiting, and finance specialists, it is unsustainable to email or call every time you want to gauge a manager’s team capacity, get leadership input, or secure Finance budget approval. It’s no wonder this process is dreaded!

By setting up a process with clarity in steps and roles, each stakeholder can give their input in the proper place at the proper time without sticking you in the middle of chasing everyone down. A well run headcount planning process will foster a healthy work environment where there’s balanced workload amongst employees, leading to less burnout, less attrition, higher engagement, better customer satisfaction, and creates a positive loop. Check out this template to enable your stakeholders to effectively collaborate and make planning easier.

How highlights:

Different page per team

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Template for Headcount Planning and Approval

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Headcount Approval and Planning Process Head count, budgeting, and capacity planning all in one doc. coda.io⁠

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Curious to see how else your People team can succeed with Coda? Check out:

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(V1) 1. People Team Hub⁠

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(V1) 2. Onboarding & Offboarding⁠

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(V1) 3. People Operations⁠

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(V1) 4. Employee Experience⁠

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(V1) 5. Performance Management⁠

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(V1) 6. Inclusion / DEI??⁠

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