Many organizations rely on Workday as their HR system of record and Anaplan as a dynamic planning platform — but how do these tools complement each other?
In this two-part conversation, we speak with Bashir Bashir, Anaplan’s Director of Workforce applications, as he shares his in-depth experience with both Anaplan and Workday, his perspective on the limitations of finance-first tools like Workday Adaptive Planning, and the advantages of using Anaplan's solution to unlock more agile workforce planning.
Q: Can you tell us a little about your background and history with Anaplan and Workday?
Bashir: I have firsthand experience and insights, having worked at Anaplan, then Workday, then Anaplan again. My first interaction with Workday was conducting an audit for an HR team that had implemented the system. I didn't have intimate knowledge of Workday at the time and was impressed with the technology.
About a year later I joined Anaplan, which was a Workday partner at that time. Eventually, Workday became a direct competitor with Anaplan. Over the last seven years, my role has been to lead workforce planning solutions for some of the largest enterprises in the world. That experience has allowed me to compare, be objective, and act consultatively. What drew me back to Anaplan was seeing firsthand how their workforce planning solution consistently outpaced what other vendors, including Workday, could offer.
So, 80% of my career has been between Workday and Anaplan, learning how organizations use Workday, as well as Workday Adaptive.
Q: Tell us about the history of Workday's workforce planning technology, how it began, and where it is today?
Bashir: Workday’s first attempt at developing its own planning solution dates back to 2016. Initially, they were successful in building a basic solution, but after two years they realized just how complex it would be to create a dedicated full planning engine. As a result, they acquired Adaptive Insights in 2018.
Adaptive started as a finance-centric, spreadsheet-driven solution. Workday has tried to repurpose it to cover workforce planning. The problem is that you cannot take something that was 11 years in the making for finance and instead force workforce planning onto it. It takes time to do that.
Workday has since covered some basic aspects of workforce planning, but in talking to customers, many of them still lean heavily on spreadsheets or look for a different workforce planning tool. That’s the inevitable outcome of asking HR to plan in a finance-first tool.
There’s also still gaps in integrating Adaptive seamlessly with Workday HCM — covering the nuances that go beyond headcount positions.
Q: What does it mean to work in a finance-first tool?
Bashir: Well, when you open Adaptive you see a chart of accounts out-of-the-box and hierarchies that are cost-center based. It’s structured for a finance audience. HR struggles to fit its needs into that framework. At Anaplan, we built our Operational Workforce Planning application from the ground up so that it meets HR exactly where they are and integrates seamlessly with Workday HCM and finance. The beauty here with this is that finance can see cost centers while HR can see departments or their desired HR hierarchy. So, it’s a win-win for HR and finance.
Q: How does Anaplan’s workforce planning strategy differ from Workday’s?
Bashir: It comes down to flexibility and best practice. What got me excited to re-join Anaplan was that they went out to the market and said, “Okay, how do we think about workforce planning as a dedicated out-of-the-box application?”
HR teams don’t have the analytical bandwidth and infrastructure finance enjoys. They need speed and agility.
And so, Anaplan did something foundationally important by building an application that allows HR to move beyond static headcount expense planning and model scenarios that matter most to them — hiring freezes, reorganizations, location shifts and more — while instantly seeing both talent and financial impact.
HR teams want that flexibility, speed, and data security. Anaplan delivers all that, plus quick time to value, not a long implementation project.
Bashir Bashir
Q: Why would Anaplan's workforce planning solution appeal more to an HR user than Workday Adaptive?
Bashir: I think it starts with data. We understand how data flows from an HR system of record into Anaplan for planning purposes. This is important for the HR folks who are looking for quick information on how their plan is doing, how many positions are open, how many positions are planned, and what the future potentially looks like. It's all position based.
When you compare that to some of the other solutions out there and specifically Adaptive, you don't have this HR-first approach — rather, you have a headcount-based solution. HR is looking for dedicated applications that can grow with them and can support position planning and management, skills, and scenarios without being limited by a finance only model.
Q: What role can Anaplan play in enabling more agile workforce or talent planning decisions?
Bashir: Anaplan helps HR leaders move beyond the basic headcount stage of the maturity curve — you need to understand why roles stay unfilled. Anaplan is one of the only solutions that enables agile, scenario-based talent planning to help organizations understand this.
One example is the hiring-freeze scenario included out-of-the-box. HR can shift plans at a location, organization, or supervisory hierarchy level and instantly see the impact from those talent planning decisions. And now with embedded AI capabilities like CoPlanner and our Workforce Analyst AI Agent, HR can surface recommendations, model scenarios, and resolve planning challenges faster than ever.
It’s that speed that I referenced earlier that HR is looking for. They want that adaptability in real-time rather than reacting months later. HR gains the agility in planning by departments while finance gains visibility of budget by cost center.
Q: How can Anaplan, used alongside Workday HCM, improve a customer’s ability to align workforce plans with overall business goals and financial forecasts?
Bashir: First of all, integration ensures that HR and finance are operating from the same source of planning truth, which I think is missing today. And that's what Anaplan does really well. Workday remains as the system of record. We respect and understand that. Our job is to pull information directly from there. We don't duplicate, and we provide a clear audit trail on the data. Anaplan pulls the data for people, jobs, and positions and turns that data into actionable workforce plans that align with the financial forecast. Now, HR, finance, and the business are locked in, step by step, looking at future value activities, not going backwards and spending time on history.
From static plans to strategic agility
When business priorities change, HR leaders must evolve and realign the workforce strategies. That requires fast, connected planning — something most HR teams cannot achieve with spreadsheets or finance-first planning solutions.
In part two of our conversation, Bashir explains how Anaplan integrates with Workday and the measurable business outcomes HR and finance leaders are achieving together.In part two of our conversation, Bashir explains how Anaplan integrates with Workday and the measurable business outcomes HR and finance leaders are achieving together.
