Six people numbers the owner of automation and robotics companies should see every month

The owner of a controls integrator receives a tidy monthly HR report. It shows headcount, joiners, leavers and one attrition figure for the company. It also missed every warning of the past year. Two commissioning engineers carried most of the road. One SCADA engineer was the sole support for four water utilities. The robot team idled for six weeks while the panel shop worked Sundays. Nothing on the report hinted at any of it.

In project work, useful people numbers come from timesheet codes, lodging bills, the call-out log and the skill grid. Payroll headcount barely helps. Six figures, on one sheet, give an owner warning while a fix is still cheap.

For each team, total the hours coded to customer jobs and the hours coded to bench work. Set both against hours available. Show three months as a short trend, with the next quarter's order book alongside. Watch for one team drowning while another idles. Watch, too, for a trough approaching with an empty bench backlog. Our piece on feast-and-famine loading in integrators covers the remedies.

From travel vouchers and guest-house invoices, list site weeks per engineer over the trailing quarter. Show only the top five names. When identical names head the list month after month, the firm is grinding down its most obliging people. Lodges beside industrial estates, overnight buses and weekend cutovers all hide inside this one figure. It tends to climb a quarter or two before those people hand in notice.

From the call-out log, count after-hours breakdown calls taken by each engineer, and whether rest followed. Pumping stations, bottling halls and continuous process plants generate most of them, usually through a tripped drive, a frozen HMI or a lost telemetry link. A rota that exists on paper but leaves one engineer answering nearly every alarm is a resignation in slow motion. SCADA firms facing this can borrow the rota rules in their shift and leave guidance.

Count installed systems, live customers and platforms that only one engineer can support unaided. The skill grid and service register supply the data. Name each customer and the engineer holding the key. A count that rises after a big order win is expected. A count that never falls means pairing and handover are not happening. This is the figure most likely to turn one resignation into a lost maintenance contract.

List the month's leavers by team, with service length, the reason on the resignation mail and the reason that surfaced in conversation. Flag anyone leaving inside their first year. A single company rate flattens these differences, a point our explainer on what an attrition percentage conceals makes in detail. Three straight months of departures from the site crew is a pattern, not misfortune.

For the hardest roles, such as robot programmers or vision application engineers, show how long each vacancy has been open. Add offers extended, accepted and declined, and why each refusing candidate said no. Refusals over money point at ranges. Refusals over travel point at the road. Beside this, show trainee solo sign-offs from mentors' sheets and grid rows that gained a second engineer working alone. Those are the leading signs that lone-key exposure will shrink.

Booked, bench and available hours by team for three months, with next quarter's order book beside them.
Suitcase count: top five engineers by site weeks this quarter.
Midnight call-outs: top five engineers by after-hours calls, and whether rest followed.
Lone-key exposure: count, with customers and key holders named.
Exits: team, service length, stated cause, true cause, first-year flag (no names).
Scarce seats: role, days open, offers extended, accepted, declined and why.
Trainee solo sign-offs and grid rows gaining a second solo engineer.
Three decisions for the coming month, each pinned to one person and a due week.

1. 1

   Fix the sources

   Job and bench codes on timesheets, a single travel register, one call-out log, the skill grid and an offer register. Without them, every figure is a guess.

2. 2

   Name one compiler

   Often an HR executive or the office manager, working to a set date, say the fifth working day.

3. 3

   Hold it to one sheet

   Anything the owner cannot absorb in ten minutes soon goes unread.

4. 4

   Walk through it with the technical heads

   Half an hour that closes with three decisions, each pinned to one person and a due week.

5. 5

   Open with last month's decisions

   Every review starts by asking what became of the previous three.

Founders outside this trade may prefer our general list of reports a growing firm's founder needs. Firms planning headcount across design, build and service can tie this sheet to the manpower planning notes for mixed design-build-service firms. GullyHR's analytics and reporting work sets up the sources and the sheet with you. The patterns behind each figure are described on our integrator HR hub.