Set up budget pools

Budget pools are budgets that you can create to establish the amount that can be spent within the compensation review. 
You can set up an overall budget for all spending or set up several budget pool allocations for specific uses. For example, you can configure the following for your compensation review:
a cost of living budget pool that applies to all eligible employees, and
a separate merit budget pool that reviewers can use for performance-based compensation adjustments.
ChartHop also allows you to configure budget pools so that they’re applicable to specific categories of employees (for example, based on department, team, level, location) or even based on the definition of built-in and custom fields. These allow you to create individual budget allocations for each reviewer.
If your company uses fixed budgets, or a certain amount of money assigned to specific reviewers within departments, that is also supported in our budget pools.
Your reviewers and approvers see the budget pools you establish when they perform the employee compensation reviews and work within those budgets.
Setting up budgets also allows ChartHop to provide your reviewers and approvers with real-time visualizations of the financial impact of compensation changes against those budgets. Learn more.﻿
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If you choose not to set up budgets, ChartHop still displays a visualization of how much is spent within the compensation review but does not compare that against a specific budget.
  
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To establish budget pools, open an existing compensation review with a status of Not started or Paused. Select the Budget pools tab.
Set the budget allocation type
Before you create any budget pools, you should define how your budgets will be allocated. You can choose to have your budgets allocated proportionally or sequentially:
When your budgets are allocated proportionally, ChartHop allocates proportionate amounts from each applicable budget pool (when multiple budget pools apply). For example, allocating proportionally from both a Market and Merit budget pool.
When your budgets are allocated sequentially, ChartHop tries to fully allocate from the first applicable budget pool before allocating from the next one. The order in which amounts are allocated depends on the order in which you create your budget pools. For example, allocating first from a Market budget pool and then from a Merit budget pool for the remainder.
For sequential allocation to occur, the same fields and calculations must be used across different budget pools.
To set the budget allocation type:
In the Budget pools section, navigate to the Settings section. These settings apply globally to all budget pools you create.
In the Allocation Type field, select how you want your budget allocation to be made. Choose from the following:
Proportional
Sequential
Your settings are saved automatically.
Create a budget pool
You can set up multiple budget pools to allocate and track specific budgets within your organization (for example, merit increases and market adjustments).
﻿To create a new budget pool:
Select New budget pool.
Configure the budget pool settings according to the parameters you want to implement. See below for a description of all fields.
Once you are finished, select Calculate to process the calculations and display the calculated budgets for each reviewer based on the settings you entered. You can scroll horizontally to see the full view of the calculated budget.
Establish an overall budget
An overall budget tracks overall spend. Depending on your organization's compensation policies and planning, you can set up an overall budget to track the total spend in the compensation review.
﻿To establish an overall budget:
Select New budget pool.
Configure the overall budget settings according to the parameters you want to implement. See below for a description of all fields.
Once you are finished, select Calculate to process the calculations and display the calculated budgets for each reviewer based on the settings you entered. You can scroll horizontally to see the full view of the calculated budget.
Delete a budget pool
You can delete a budget pool when you'd rather start over with a new configuration. Deleting a budget pool doesn't affect any other budgets you've created.
﻿To delete a budget pool:
Select the Budget pools tab.
Expand the budget pool you want to delete.
Select Delete.
Select Confirm to delete the budget pool.
Budget settings
The following table describes the configuration fields you can apply to your budgets:
Field
Description
Example
Basics
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Budget label
The name of your budget.
Merit - US
Employees the budget pool applies to
Establishes the group or category of employees to which the budget pool applies. Reviewers and approvers can edit compensation based on availability within this budget pool.
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Select from the following dropdown options:
All eligible employees
Only specific departments
Only specific teams
Only specific levels
Only specific locations
Custom…
Only specific locations
United States
Only specific departments
Engineering
Sales
Default budget currency
Determines the default currency used in your budget pool.

This currency is used as a backup when the job currency cannot be detected and is also used when reconciling calculations involving multiple currencies.

Defaults to the org default currency. Learn more.﻿
USD ($)
Fields
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Field the budget is calculated based upon
Determines the ChartHop field (either built-in or custom) upon which the calculations are based. 
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For example, if you choose Base, then ChartHop uses the current values of that field to perform the calculations you enter in the Calculation section.

Base
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Base - annualized


Field budget is allocated from
Determines the ChartHop field (either built-in or custom) from which the budget spend is tracked.

For example, if you choose Base - changed, when reviewers and approvers change the contents of the the Base - changed column in the reviewer workbook, ChartHop uses the difference between the new entered amount and the previous amount (in other words, Base versus Base - changed) to figure out how much is being spent. That amount is tracked and shown within the budget allocation visualizations.
Base - changed

Base - raise amount
Calculation
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Are calculations dependent on one or more field values, like department?
Determines whether the amount is calculated based on how a specific built-in or custom field is defined (for example, department, performance).
Select Yes to establish additional considerations for the budget calculations based on specific fields. Selecting Yes displays the Which field affects the calculation? field underneath.
Select No, the calculation is the same for everyone to apply the calculations evenly across all eligible employees for the budget pool.

Select No, the calculation is based on reviewer pods to apply fixed budget amounts for reviewers in the budget pool. 
Yes
Which field affects the calculation?
Determines the built-in or custom field that affects the calculation. When you select a field, you can define how the values of this field specifically affect the budget calculations.
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Only fields with the following data types can be selected:
Number
Money
Percent
Single select
Performance rating
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Division
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Business Operations  2%
Customer Support 2%
Sales 4%
Finance 2%
Legal 2%
Marketing 3%
Product 3%
R&D 4%


Calculation
Determines the specific calculation that is processed to affect the budget.

Select from the following dropdown options:
Percent
Set amount (money)
Custom formula - Percent
Custom formula - Set amount (money)
Percent
Target value
Establish a target value for the calculation.
1.5%
$3000
Configure budget bar visualizations
You have the ability to hide budgets that don’t apply to reviewers so that reviewers only see the budgets that apply to them. The Budget bar visualizations dropdown in the Budget pools settings lets you configure how budgets display to reviewers. 
Whether or not a budget displays to a reviewer is based on whether there are eligible employees to whom the budget applies in that reviewer’s pod.
To set up budget bar visualizations:
In the Budget pools section, navigate to the Settings section. These settings apply globally to all budget pools you create.
In the Budget bar visualizations dropdown, select how you want budgets to display:
Show all - Indicates all budgets display. When a budget is not applicable for the reviewer’s eligible employees, it displays as an empty bar without any values.
Only show applicable - Indicates only applicable budgets display for the reviewer. The reviewer can see budget headers and values for the budgets that apply to the reviewer’s eligible employees. This is the default option.
Your settings are saved automatically.
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Field	Description	Example
Basics
Budget label	The name of your budget.	Merit - US
Employees the budget pool applies to	Establishes the group or category of employees to which the budget pool applies. Reviewers and approvers can edit compensation based on availability within this budget pool. Select from the following dropdown options: All eligible employees Only specific departments Only specific teams Only specific levels Only specific locations Custom…	Only specific locations United States Only specific departments Engineering Sales
Default budget currency	Determines the default currency used in your budget pool. This currency is used as a backup when the job currency cannot be detected and is also used when reconciling calculations involving multiple currencies. Defaults to the org default currency. Learn more.	USD ($)
Fields
Field the budget is calculated based upon	Determines the ChartHop field (either built-in or custom) upon which the calculations are based. For example, if you choose Base, then ChartHop uses the current values of that field to perform the calculations you enter in the Calculation section.	Base Base - annualized
Field budget is allocated from	Determines the ChartHop field (either built-in or custom) from which the budget spend is tracked. For example, if you choose Base - changed, when reviewers and approvers change the contents of the the Base - changed column in the reviewer workbook, ChartHop uses the difference between the new entered amount and the previous amount (in other words, Base versus Base - changed) to figure out how much is being spent. That amount is tracked and shown within the budget allocation visualizations.	Base - changed Base - raise amount
Calculation
Are calculations dependent on one or more field values, like department?	Determines whether the amount is calculated based on how a specific built-in or custom field is defined (for example, department, performance). Select Yes to establish additional considerations for the budget calculations based on specific fields. Selecting Yes displays the Which field affects the calculation? field underneath. Select No, the calculation is the same for everyone to apply the calculations evenly across all eligible employees for the budget pool. Select No, the calculation is based on reviewer pods to apply fixed budget amounts for reviewers in the budget pool.	Yes
Which field affects the calculation?	Determines the built-in or custom field that affects the calculation. When you select a field, you can define how the values of this field specifically affect the budget calculations. Only fields with the following data types can be selected: Number Money Percent Single select	Performance rating Division Business Operations 2% Customer Support 2% Sales 4% Finance 2% Legal 2% Marketing 3% Product 3% R&D 4%
Calculation	Determines the specific calculation that is processed to affect the budget. Select from the following dropdown options: Percent Set amount (money) Custom formula - Percent Custom formula - Set amount (money)	Percent
Target value	Establish a target value for the calculation.	1.5% $3000

Updated 15 Feb 2024

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