Time Approval & Payroll
Hours, rates, and payroll were three disconnected manual steps in the same chain. Each one introduced delay, inconsistency, or a blind spot in the numbers leadership relied on. This connects them.
The Gap I Found
Three manual steps.
One chain. Zero connections.
Hours were logged informally, billing rates were applied manually, and payroll was never reflected in the cash forecast. Three separate gaps in the same chain — from hours worked to the true cost of running the team. Each one was a manual step that introduced delay, inconsistency, or blind spots in the numbers leadership relied on.
The approval process had no structure: entries were not locked, so they could be changed after the fact. Rate application happened once per billing cycle — someone looked up the rate card, did the multiplication, and hoped they had not missed an entry or applied the wrong rate. Payroll was calculated separately and never posted to the cash forecast, which meant leadership was always looking at a financial picture that excluded the team's cost.
Each gap was invisible on its own. Together, they meant the business could not answer a basic question with confidence: how much does this project actually cost us, and what does that do to our cash position this month?
Why It Happens
Time, rates, and payroll
lived in separate systems.
Time, rates, and payroll lived in separate systems with no triggers connecting them. Each calculation step — approval, rate application, payroll posting — was a human handoff, which meant each one could be delayed, skipped, or done inconsistently.
The Time and Billing DB held hours. The People DB held rates. The Financial DB held cash flow. None of them spoke to each other automatically. The connections between them existed entirely as manual steps in someone's head — and manual steps get skipped exactly when the team is busiest, which is when accurate numbers matter most.
What I Designed
A complete chain from hours logged
to cash impact — three connected stages.
The fix is not one automation — it is a connected sequence. Stage 1 structures the approval: hours log against projects, the system monitors budget in real time, and only manager-approved entries are locked and move forward. Stage 2 fires automatically on approval: billing rate and cost rate are pulled from People DB, billable amount and labor cost are calculated and written back to the entry — zero manual calculation. Stage 3 closes the cash loop: on payroll approval, the total payroll figure posts to Financial DB as a cash outflow and the 90-day forecast in the Report Dashboard updates live.
Stage 1
Approval Loop
Stage 2
Rate Application
Stage 3
Payroll to Cash
Systems Involved
What Changed
Rate applied on every entry.
Cash forecast finally complete.
0
Manual rate calculations
Rate is applied automatically the moment an entry is approved — pulled from People DB, calculated, written back. No spreadsheet lookup, no mental math, no variance between entries or billing cycles.
90%
Budget alert threshold
Project managers are alerted before the budget is gone, not after the invoice is built. The alert gives time to have a scope conversation while there is still scope to discuss.
100%
Entries rated before invoicing
Every approved hour goes into Invoice and Billing with billable_amount already calculated. The finance team reviews a billing queue — they do not produce it.
→
Payroll in cash forecast
On payroll approval, the outflow posts automatically to Financial DB and the 90-day forecast refreshes. Leadership no longer looks at a cash position that excludes the team's cost.
The clearest change is in what the finance team and leadership actually see. Before, billing rate was applied once per invoice cycle by someone doing manual math — and the cash forecast never included the team's cost because payroll lived in a separate calculation. Now rate is applied on every approved entry with zero variance, budget alerts give project managers time to act before scope becomes a problem, and payroll posts automatically on approval so the cash forecast is always complete.
The team did not lose control — they gained visibility. Every decision that used to depend on memory or a spreadsheet now depends on a live system that updates the moment work is approved.
How It Connects
The workflow that makes every
downstream number accurate.
Time Approval and Payroll is the source of clean data for three other workflows. It feeds Invoice and Billing with pre-calculated, locked entries — no recalculation needed downstream. It connects to Project Management's scope change stage through budget alerts. And it completes the Report Dashboard's cash forecast by posting payroll as an outflow the moment it is approved. Every number in the system that depends on what something actually cost runs through this workflow first.