Set up your organization

Overview

The organization setup guide leads you through four essentials: review the organization basics, verify the standard hours for one FTE, create the first assignable department and job code, and add a position or import existing workforce information. It also highlights team access and approval setup to review before inviting the wider team or using requests for live decisions.

Open Settings > Organization setup guide to see the organization’s four-step progress and your next available action. The guide shows all four essentials, offers only actions you have access to complete, and identifies the administrator role needed for other steps.

1. Organization profileConfirm the organization basics.
2. Annual hoursEnter the hours represented by one FTE.
3. Organization structureCreate an assignable department and a job code.
4. Initial workforce dataAdd a position or import existing information.

Access needed

Creating your organization

After signing up and confirming your email address, you can create your first organization. On the setup page:

• Choose monthly or annual billing and review the price.
• Enter your Organization name, which appears throughout FTE Tree.
• Choose your Historical baseline date for initial setup history.
• Choose your Organization time zone, which becomes the default for organization dates, reports, and new users.
• Choose the number of active approved positions your organization expects to manage.
• Agree to the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.

After you submit the form, your trial begins and the organization setup guide opens.

FTE Tree also prepares these starting settings:

• Standard position and employee fields.
• An Active position status and Active and Terminated employee statuses.
• A 1.0 FTE choice.
• Nine standard access roles. The person who created the organization receives Organization administrator access for All departments.
• One starter stage in each of the four approval workflows. The creator is the initial approver for the top department.
• A separate starter Reason group for each request type. Sensitive Justification is optional until an administrator requires it for a request type.
• Common activity history note choices.

Review these defaults and adjust them for your policies. You still need to verify annual hours per FTE and create an assignable department and job code.

Each request type initially passes through its own starter stage, so every request receives human review unless an administrator changes that workflow’s Workflow defaults. The stage order, department approvers, Reason choices, and Justification requirement can differ for new position, position replacement, position change, and position elimination requests.

Complete the essentials

Organization basics

First, review the information entered when the organization was created.

• Confirm the organization name, time zone, historical baseline date, and Organization support contact under Settings > Organization > General settings.

See Organization settings and Invite and manage users for full guidance.

Annual hours

Enter annual hours before creating Positions that use Hourly pay. The annual hours page opens with both the value and effective date ready for you to enter. For the first entry, choose the organization’s historical baseline date so the value covers the full reporting history. Enter the value your organization uses; FTE Tree does not supply or assume a standard value. You can enter up to two decimal places, and the saved value displays with two; for example, a typical 52-week, 40-hour schedule appears as 2,080.00.

• Annual hours per FTE controls annual cost calculations for hourly pay rates.
• The first entry must cover the historical baseline date. A future-only entry does not complete this setup step.
• After saving, the annual hours detail page opens. Return to the organization setup guide from Settings when you are ready for the next step.

See Compensation settings for help choosing this value.

Organization structure

Create at least one assignable department and one job code before adding a position.

FTE Tree uses Department, Employee, Job code, and Pay grade as the default labels. Your organization can configure each singular and plural label independently, so the names you see in FTE Tree may differ from this guide.

• Add assignable divisions, locations, cost centers, or teams beneath your organization name. Positions cannot be assigned directly to the organization itself.
• For each new department, confirm its name, placement in the department hierarchy, and whether positions can be assigned to it.
• Create the job codes that positions will use.
• If departments use different job codes, create the job codes first, then choose which ones can be used in each department.

See Departments and Job codes for full guidance.

Initial workforce data

Add one Position or import your existing workforce information. Every Position requires its own Base pay rate and Pay rate basis of Hourly or Annual. Configure optional Job code suggestions first when they will help users enter or review those values.

• Review position numbering, headcount rules, FTE choices, funding values, and external position IDs under Settings > Positions.
• If you are starting small, select Workforce, then Positions, add one position, and enter its required Base pay rate and Pay rate basis. When the selected job code has a pay suggestion available on that date, compare its amount and hourly or annual basis with the values you enter. Confirm the department, job code, FTE, funding, and reporting relationship at the same time.
• If you already have many records, select Import workforce data in the organization setup guide, download the appropriate template, and provide Base pay rate and Pay rate basis for every Position create row.
• Add Employees and assignments when you need assigned staffing and Assigned cost information. Assigned cost uses active assignment FTE with the Position’s effective Base pay rate and basis; Employee records do not define a standard pay amount.

See Position settings, Position numbers and external IDs, FTE options, Positions, and Batch imports and exports for full guidance.

Prepare your team and approvals

These reviews do not change the four essential setup steps. Complete them before a wider rollout so administration and approvals do not depend on one person.

Users and access

Review the standard access roles before creating custom roles. Invite at least one additional administrator, confirm that they can sign in, and make sure two active administrators can manage both access and security. This gives your organization another person who can help if one administrator is unavailable.

Give everyone only the access needed for their responsibilities. Limit each person’s access to the appropriate departments, and keep sensitive pay access separate when responsibilities differ. Invite one user first and confirm what they can see and do before inviting a larger group. See Roles and permissions and Invite and manage users.

Approval workflows

Review the four starter approval workflows before submitting position requests.

• Your organization starts with one approval stage in each request-type workflow and a top-level department approver assignment for the administrator who created the organization.
• Rename each starter stage and add only the additional stages your policy needs.
• Assign at least two active approvers for every required stage in each department that can hold positions. Multiple approvers provide coverage, but only one eligible approver decides each stage; after one acts, the others no longer need action. A person who submits a request cannot approve that same request.
• Start with approvers at the top department when the same people can review requests throughout the organization. Add department-specific approvers only where the people should differ.
• Review each workflow’s Workflow defaults, choose meaningful Reasons, and decide whether sensitive Justification is required. For Position change, also review the stages assigned to position fields.
• Add reusable requester files to the workflows that need them, confirm each file’s audience, then submit a sample request as someone who will use the process and confirm that the expected people can review it.

See Approval workflows and requests and Set up requester files for full guidance.

Configure other settings when needed

After the essentials and team-readiness reviews are complete, continue with the settings that match your organization’s policies and information.

Security and sign-in

Before inviting a large group, decide whether to limit invitation and organization-email domains and whether people must use your company’s sign-in method. Most users are not required to use multi-factor authentication (MFA) for everyday access, but administrators need a recent MFA check for sensitive changes. Test invitations and company sign-in with a small group before wider use. See Configure company sign-in and Sign in and use MFA.

Job codes, compensation, and adjustments

Create job codes before positions that depend on them. Set annual hours per FTE for hourly calculations, add optional job code pay suggestions and pay grades, and create adjustments for benefits, differentials, premiums, or other planned costs. When you use a pay range, FTE Tree converts values between hourly and annual amounts as needed. Every position then stores its own required Base pay rate and Pay rate basis. See Job codes, Compensation settings, and Position adjustments.

Fields and controlled choices

Review standard fields before adding custom fields. Choose clear labels and the right type of entry, and provide a list of choices when users should select from approved values. For a dated field, use the date the value begins or the historical baseline date when it should apply to all earlier reports. See Field settings and custom fields.

Activity notes and notifications

Review the starter reason and note choices, then decide which actions require a reason or note, how comment email should be delivered, and which organization-wide notification defaults should apply. Users can then choose from the personal notification options your organization allows. See Activity history and Collaboration, messages, and notifications.

Reports and billing

Open Reports and confirm position totals, costs, funding allocations, approval activity, and access results with a small sample. Under Settings > Billing, confirm the plan includes enough active positions and that the right people can manage billing. See Reports and Billing and subscriptions.

Review before wider use

Use a small set of sample records to confirm the complete experience.

Return to Settings > Organization setup guide whenever you need to review progress or open another setup area. An Organization administrator can dismiss the Setup guide shortcut from the top navigation for everyone and restore it later from this page; this does not change setup progress. Share Getting started: new user guide with people joining the organization.