Welcome back. We have Zane from Workday and Justin, who I invited on stage, but he does not want to be near me, so he gave me the Heisman. But really, a great pleasure to have the team here. And Zane and I have known each other for a long time. I did not cover him when he was a CFO at United Airlines, but I did work with him at VMware and now at Workday. And so it has been great to have the history with you and watch your success. Thanks again for being here. And I guess, you know.
Of course, thank you. And thanks to everyone here. I know you're 30 feet from a lot of sun and beautiful weather, and yet we're in here in what looks like a classroom. But thanks for all of you for being here.
I'm working on getting us a window seat next year, so it should be in the interior. You guys should be in there. We'll work on that. Maybe we just start with the reaction last week. I think everyone was maybe a little surprised by the reaction. Just to get your thoughts about what happened in the quarter, kind of your view, and maybe how you think about just your thoughts and what happened.
Sure. Yeah, no, happy to get started. We were very pleased with the performance in Q1 coming off what was a strong Q4 we set up for the year. As you know, in SaaS, Q1 is an important quarter. We feel really good about where the business is and the performance in the quarter. We hit all of our guided metrics, if not exceeded the metrics that we share externally. Net-net, we feel good about where the business is, the growth in the business, both the customer base and the net new are performing well. If there's anything I think where there was some criticism is probably around us not because we outperformed. We did not increase the guide for the year, our subscription guide. We held at $8.8 billion. We feel good about that guide.
Obviously, we recognize, as we mentioned on the call, that there is an uncertain macro that a number of our customers are contending with, both existing and prospective customers. We wanted to be thoughtful around the year and the progress that we expect to make through the course of the year. Again, we actually felt good about the quarter. I think if there is anything, we saw a run-up heading into the quarter. If there was any sort of, quote, disappointment, it may have been on the cRPO number, which again was in line with our expectations and with what we believe will be a good launch pad for the rest of the quarters as we expect continued growth quarter by quarter for the remainder of the year, in particular in the back half of the year.
We highlighted sequential growth expectations on our fourth quarter call, and we were within those expectations for the second quarter as well. Net-net, we feel good. If there is anything there, I think there may have been some disappointment around us not increasing the guide necessarily. The cRPO number is obviously one that is closely watched. We have mentioned in the past where we have come in higher than expectations driven by renewal activity. cRPO is very dependent upon both existing and expected renewal activity as well as early renewal activity. It has a big duration component there. We mentioned in the quarter, our early renewal activity came in as expected. Where we have exceeded expectations in the past, it has been around this renewal activity. We mentioned the first quarter came in line with expectations. Net-net, we feel good about the quarter.
We feel good about the year, and we'll just continue to execute to make our numbers.
Q1s are always met with new quarter assignments, territories. There is always a little reshuffle. It did not sound like there was really any big reshuffle on the go-to-market team in Q1, correct?
Correct. No, that's exactly right. We feel good about the areas we're in, the business we're in. Obviously, a number of the areas we see great opportunity, like Fed and even state and local, which we recognize are areas that are more prone to some of the macro and some of the conversation out there. We feel great about where we're growing the business. With Rob coming on as part of the team, he's really taken, he's our President and leading our growth opportunities. He's got tremendous experience looking at different parts of the globe, different industries, how our product matches up with our competitive dynamics, but also where the product can grow around the world. We feel really good about where we are. No changes on the sales front.
Speaking of Rob, I mean, he's got obviously a great playbook having worked for one of your other primary competitors. So he's got a good playbook. Many have asked, where is he at? Is he through his listening tour? Is he now on the execution tour? How would you characterize kind of where he is at in his?
Yeah, so I think the listening tour lasted about a week. Now he's into executing and working with the team. I got an email from him, and he's in this morning. He's in Europe right now. He's really taken a view, a holistic view of the business. I mean, Rob, again, is a known commodity out there. He is diligent. He's very thoughtful. He works well with all of our partners and has a great presence around the globe. He's identified growth opportunities around the globe and different ways that we can think about executing at speed, going to market faster, using different types of resources to go to market around the globe, and really thinking about verticals, segments, and looking at really the entire product portfolio.
We were also very pleased to have Gerrit Kazmaier joining us from Google, who's worked previously with Rob in one of the companies that you didn't mention. He and Rob have really gone through the portfolio and really thinking about where we're developing, how are we developing, and how do we go to market. It's been great to team with them, to pair with them. They're both of them great adds to the executive team. We are excited about the energy and the view that they bring to the company. He's hitting the ground running and working hard right this minute.
You won a very large airline called United. I know that was probably heavily contested. You're also the CFO of United. You must have been the primary salesperson. So there's no commission payout, right?
There is definitely no commission payout. I found that. In fact, I did not even get invited to club. No commission and no trip to club tied to that one. Interestingly enough, it was the team. It is obviously a brand we are incredibly fond of and thrilled to have them as a customer. It was one of the.
He did not fly Delta yesterday. I was on his flight with him. We were on United together.
I was on United.
He's United all in.
Exactly. I am for sure. No, it's a great team. I will tell you, obviously, I had some conversations with the team at United. It was really about our team delivering. I actually was not actively involved. Obviously, I had a few conversations at the appropriate time, but I was not actively involved. I think it just highlights the presence of the team, the fact that, yes, it was heavily contested. We are obviously thrilled to have them as a customer and very pleased with what we will be doing with them. I think it's really a testimony to, A, the team that worked on that account, but also more broadly, our go-to-market opportunity. The product itself is one that resonates across industries, including airlines.
Yeah. We did not talk about this post the call, but when you think about some of the concern around SLED, state and local, and education, when you think about the exposure to your business, I do not know if you have ever broken that out, what % that is of the business, or.
Yeah, we have not broken it out, both on the Fed side and then state and local. Tremendous opportunity for us. I mean, one of the characteristics of state and local, when we win, we typically go in with the full suite. And with the platform we have, enabling state and local communities to leverage that suite and really thinking about the future and even leveraging the AI and agentic AI themselves is terrific. Now, obviously, it is an area that, as we discussed, has some challenges ahead as a category. But within that, we've got customers that are thrilled to be customers. And we've got opportunities there that we still believe we can execute on through the course of the year. So it's small and growing, but definitely a focus for us, very exciting opportunity.
Okay. Carl's made a lot of changes. He's brought a lot of great people on. When you think about the team, is the team now kind of set where you want for the next chapter of this journey? I know there's been some changes, but is this the team now? Most of the pieces in, Rob's in. You've got.
Yeah. I mean, I couldn't be more pleased to be a part. It's not just the executive team. It's the 19,500 workmates that I have the privilege of working with. Really, anywhere you go, for those of you who know anyone who works at Workday, we have this incredibly strong culture, this incredible attitude that is around the customer and what we're doing with the customer. Obviously, Carl bringing in some new talent and people that I feel very privileged to work alongside. We're focused on executing, delivering results, growing the business. I can't imagine a more exciting time, can we, to be a part of this business with what we're able to do with the platform, all of the conversation around AI, agentic AI, what we're doing with our system of record, and how we're growing the business is exciting with all these verticals.
I know it's still early. We've got a number of growth metrics that we talk about publicly. We're executing against those, whether it's partners, international, our full suite opportunities, AI itself. We've got just a long list of initiatives and candidly a lot of work to do and to execute against. This is a great time to be in this part of the business and to see the growth and value that we're delivering to our customers, but we're also benefiting from ourselves.
On AI, do you think you'll just monetize that through the platform and embed it and just it's going to sell your platform? Or do you feel like, hey, there's all these add-ons we can layer in? There's been maybe some confusion about ultimately what you think that looks like. I know it's early still.
Yeah, no, it's a great question. Early on, we wanted to spend time with our customers and think about the philosophy of adoption and having customers feel like they can actually use the technology. Our agents and what we do with AI has such tremendous ROI to it. You really want your customers to embrace that and to recognize that as part of that sale. There are a number of different ways that we think of monetization today, whether it's in some cases it's documents or otherwise in other cases it is tied to headcount or other means. We believe there's great opportunity just in thinking about renewal rates as well as net new business and how we benefit from that. All that being said, in other cases, we have a recruiter agent that has deliverables that are tremendous for the customer.
We obviously share those benefits with them and charge for that. I think it's still early days as you think about monetization. Even with the APIs we have within Workday, within the platform, if you think about where we go and as we extend that with partners and others, there are plenty of opportunities to leverage that built on Workday applicability and to drive value and to drive monetization. We've got a thoughtful process internally, but it's really about adoption and leveraging customers and having them recognize that value that we'll ultimately share with them.
One of the big questions we got is you went through one of the biggest reductions in force recently. That is always painful to go through. You were very clear, we're going to hire everyone back, if not more. In severance as well, in this kind of weird environment, you're seeing this in state and local and, d o you tap the air brakes on that? Are you just plowing forward and staying committed to that rehiring plan?
Yeah, I think that's a nice setup. Just to be clear, obviously, we did have a reduction in force earlier. As you pointed out, those are never easy as a company to go through. It was roughly 7.5% of our workforce. At the time, we mentioned our intention is to invest back in the business and ultimately have the same amount of people working. Now, part of that is I do not want this taken out of context because it is about being thoughtful with growth and how we think about where those hires would come from and where they would ultimately go within the organization. We're not to a tight time frame or timeline on how we hire back. We're a growing company.
We have great aspirations on the AI front as well as becoming continuously more efficient and effective at everything we do, whether it's on product development, go-to-market, and every aspect of the business. Clearly not to be taken out of context. We will be hiring back. We wanted to make sure everyone understood that this is not us reducing. This is us, in fact, growing but different ways in different geographies and focused on specific areas. We're very thoughtful in every hire we make in understanding what are the opportunities for that hire. Do we need that type of role in that position years from now? How do we think about AI? How do we think about where we are around the globe? There's a lot more that goes into it.
I don't want to make it sound like, oh, we're just going to hire for the sake of hiring. That's the complete opposite. We're very diligent about bringing people into the company, ensuring that they're driving incredible ROI and growth for the business.
We know you're hiring because one of my friends just got hired. She's very excited, so.
She’s no doubt a great individual and a good talent, so.
Europe's been very high on your radar to improve the cadence. Obviously, you have a very large competitor that's sitting there in Germany that has held center court for a long time. Talk through what's happening there, what you're seeing, the signs of success. Last quarter, I think you highlighted some pretty big accounts even in Germany that you called out. What is happening in that Europe opportunity set?
Yeah, I mean, we still feel great about Europe. Now, I say that if you recall, a year ago, we talked about being more challenged in general in EMEA. Over the last number of quarters, we've seen good success, including in Q1. As I mentioned, Rob is there right now. We will have a board meeting in London next week. We are focused on that part of the world and that geography. We've seen great success. We continue to develop our go-to-market as well as our product set around that area. We are very pleased with the team we have there and the growth opportunities. We are mindful of the fact there are competitors there, plural. We feel great about what we can do against them in certain cases and how we can partner with others. We've got great partners in Europe as well.
How we're executing there is important to us. It's a focus area for us. We're 25% international. Our expectation is to continue to grow that percentage. Europe's one of the key areas that we'll be doing that.
Just back to capital allocation. You've been very open that you'd love to do more M&A, but you're not going to just do M&A for the sake of M&A. You've also increased the buyback. I would assume, I mean, it's been frustrating. Stock hasn't really done anything. How are you thinking about this balance with the stock that's come off? Maybe it's been overexaggerated. You guys take advantage of that. How do you think about that?
Yeah. Obviously, we announced last week a new authorization for $1 billion. Buybacks will continue to be a part of our capital allocation strategy. Look, first and foremost, we'll invest in the business where we believe it's the right thing to do. We remain focused on that and focused on executing. We've got a number of key growth drivers in the business. With Carl at the helm, we're focused every day on how we're progressing against those, what are we achieving. There's a sense of energy across the company because we do believe there's a great opportunity here on growth and where we're taking the business. In addition to that, as you pointed out, we remain very active as it relates to acquisitions with HiredScore and Evisort being two acquisitions that we're thrilled with coming in last year.
It's a high bar on the acquisition side. We want to make sure there's great cultural fit, there's great technical fit, and it can truly augment and accelerate our portfolio. There are companies out there that we believe will fit into that. Again, it's a high bar. We're not going to acquire companies just for the sake of growth. We'll be very thoughtful around that. In addition to that, as you mentioned, we also have buybacks. We've now increased the cadence of the authorization as well as of the buybacks. That's one of the levers that we have as we think about capital allocation. First and foremost, though, we're focused on executing and hitting our growth targets.
You love all your product children equally. If you had one that is standing out right now inside the portfolio, who would you point to just as the current standout in the classroom?
No, I mean, that's a hard one because I truly think it's the power of the portfolio and more to come on the agentic side, as you mentioned, with the product set. The way we're thinking about AI is having it deeply integrated into the portfolio and driving business performance. And the success and value that customers are getting are really how I look at it and how I think about what we're delivering and what we're driving. Recruiter Agent just being an example of a product that's easy to demonstrate the ROI behind.
I candidly think it's the portfolio and the data set that we have and the ability for customers to leverage that data set with AI, both with the agentic opportunities we'll present to them, but also using Extend and Extend Pro, which allows them, whether it's themselves or through partners, to leverage what we have on that data set and with those processes and develop their own AI. That's what I think is so compelling. The full suite wins that we've talked about as well, where we deliver both HCM and FINS to customers. In certain verticals, our full suite wins are a huge percent of our total wins. That enables companies to leverage both when you think about their human capital as well as their financials.
Very exciting when you think about where AI is going, in particular on the agentic side and how these agents are going to be working with individuals and with part employee base in driving change. I mean, we haven't, if you look back at how HR and financials have been managed over the years, this is an opportunity to truly transform that. We'll be doing that from the platform layer and not just some layer on top.
A lot of the partners will say Extend's their killer app. I think did you give stats out about Extend Pro growth recently?
We did not. We talked about it as part of our AI sort of compilation. We have got a few AI targets and areas where we are public. We talked about being 2x what it was just a quarter ago. That obviously includes some of the other SKUs as well. To your point, Extend Pro in the marketplace itself, we have over 1,000 partners that work with us both from deployment to go-to-market and then obviously with AI and the platform. We are very excited about that and working with our partners so that they can leverage it and continue to have this ecosystem of partners thrive.
OK, that's great. We get a lot of questions too about what does the mid-market mean to Workday?
Yeah, it's a great opportunity for us. We're very excited. As many of you know, we're over 65% of the Fortune 500. The mid-market is an opportunity for us both on simply growth and growth around the globe, but also allowing customers. As we continue to think about packaging and pricing and deployment times and just AI, it's just an opportunity for us to leverage all the strengths of the platform, but at a different scale and size so that mid-market companies can ultimately grow and become large enterprises themselves, obviously facilitated by our technology that can scale tremendously for them. We've been heavily focused on the product side and how we think about pricing and packaging and that product so that it is desirable for mid-market. It can be deployed faster than ever before and can leverage AI for our mid-market customers.
It is an area of interest for us. I mentioned full suite earlier. It is also an area where we do very well with full suite. The medium enterprise want one package that they can leverage.
Financials always gets a lot of questions. You're winning some really big financial deals. Some are coming to live. Some aren't live. I know Salesforce has been talking about trying to get live. When do you think all this concern about can it scale go away? Are we at that point where, hey, you can address any Fortune 500 now with financials? Or is there still a couple of mile markers you need to give proof to those customers?
Yeah, no, I mean, look, we've got some great customers in production today and working with it today. To your point, Salesforce will be live very soon. In fact, I just did a video for them because I'll be in Europe next week. They're going to be live very soon. We're excited about partnering with customers of all sizes. I believe the product scales. That's never an issue. It's more around the opportunities with large enterprise and the types of business. Obviously, financials itself aligns with certain businesses at that size and scale very nicely. We continue to develop the product. It's one that has grown nicely over the years. It's an area that we are focused on along with full suite. I mentioned that we're selling the package together, which is obviously a great way for us to sell as well.
If anything, we're focused on full suite as well as financials. I think the scaling question has gone away.
Most underappreciated part of the story that you breathe and see every day that we can't see. What would you say? Yeah, how would you characterize?
I was waiting for you to finish, but.
Yeah, open-ended question. What are we missing? What do you see that we can't see?
No, look, I mean, behind the scenes, the execution and the passion of the customer base as well as the employee base. I know we've talked about all of these growth areas and where we are in sort of early innings in some of them, whether it's international growth, the AI opportunity. When you see the commitment of our what we call workmates, which are 19,500 workmates in delivering the product and what it does for customers. When you're in our CXC and you have a conversation with a customer about helping them solve whatever issue they have. We have a wide variety of customers around the globe in different verticals and different sectors dealing with different things. What we're able to deliver for them is something I get very excited about.
You just have to be in one of those customer meetings to recognize there's tremendous value that we can add. That is sort of the behind-the-scenes part of what we're driving, how customers are benefiting, and ultimately what we'll be executing against. That is what ultimately delivers value, we believe.
Great. Zane, we're out of time. Thanks again for being here.
This presentation has now finished. Please check back shortly for the archive.
Welcome back. We have Zane from Workday and Justin, who I invited on stage, but he does not want to be near me. He gave me the Heisman. Really, a great pleasure to have the team here. Zane and I have known each other for a long time. I did not cover him when he was the CFO at United Airlines, but I did work with him at VMware and now at Workday. It has been great to have the history with you and watch your success. Thanks again for being here. I guess.
Of course, thank you. And thanks to everyone here. I know you're 30 feet from a lot of sun and beautiful weather. And yet we're in here in what looks like a classroom. But thanks for all of you for being here.
I'm working on getting this window seats next year. It should be in the interior. You guys should be in there. We'll work on that. Maybe we just start with the reaction last week. I think everyone was maybe a little surprised by the reaction. Just to get your thoughts about what happened in the quarter, kind of your view, and maybe how you think about just your thoughts and what happened.
Sure. Yeah, no, happy to get started. We were very pleased with the performance in Q1 coming off what was a strong Q4 we set up for the year. As you know, in SaaS, Q1 is an important quarter. We feel really good about where the business is and the performance in the quarter. We hit all of our guided metrics, if not exceeded the metrics that we share externally. Net net, we feel good about where the business is, the growth in the business, both the customer base and the net new are performing well. If there is anything I think where there was some criticism, it is probably around us not because we outperformed. We did not increase the guide for the year. Our subscription guide we held at $8.8 billion. We feel good about that guide.
Obviously, we recognize, as we mentioned on the call, that there is an uncertain macro that a number of our customers are contending with, both existing and prospective customers. We wanted to be thoughtful around the year and the progress that we expect to make through the course of the year. Again, we actually felt good about the quarter. I think if there is anything, we saw a run-up heading into the quarter. If there was any sort of, quote, disappointment, it may have been on the cRPO number, which again was in line with our expectations and with what we believe will be a good launch pad for the rest of the quarters as we expect continued growth quarter by quarter for the remainder of the year, in particular in the back half of the year. We highlighted sequential growth expectations on our fourth quarter call.
We were within those expectations for the second quarter as well. Net net, we feel good. If there's anything there, I think there may have been some disappointment around us not increasing the guide necessarily. The cRPO number is obviously one that's closely watched. We've mentioned in the past where we've come in higher than expectations driven by renewal activity. cRPO is very dependent upon both existing and expected renewal activity as well as early renewal activity. It's got a big duration component there. We mentioned in the quarter, our early renewal activity came in as expected. Where we've exceeded expectations in the past, it's been around this renewal activity. We mentioned the first quarter came in line with expectations. Net net, we feel good about the quarter. We feel good about the year.
We will just continue to execute to make our numbers.
Q1s are always met with new quarter assignments, territories. There's always a little reshuffle. It didn't sound like there was really any big reshuffle on the go-to-market team in Q1.
Correct. No, that's exactly right. We feel good about the areas we're in, the business we're in. Obviously, a number of the areas we see great opportunity, like Fed and even state and local, which we recognize are areas that are more prone to some of the macro and some of the conversation out there. We feel great about where we're growing the business. With Rob coming on as part of the team, he's really taken our President and leading our growth opportunities. He's got tremendous experience looking at different parts of the globe, different industries, how our product matches up with our competitive dynamics, but also where the product can grow around the world. We feel really good about where we are. No changes on the sales front.
Speaking of Rob, I mean, he's got obviously a great playbook having worked for one of your other primary competitors. So he's got a good playbook. Many have asked, where is he at? Is he through his listening tour? Is he now on the execution tour? How would you characterize kind of where he is at in his?
Yeah. I think the listening tour lasted about a week. Now he's into executing and working with the team. I got an email from him. He's in this morning. He's in Europe right now. He's really taken a view, a holistic view of the business. I mean, Rob, again, is a known commodity out there. He is diligent. He's very thoughtful. He works well with all of our partners and has a great presence around the globe. He's identified growth opportunities around the globe and different ways that we can think about executing at speed, going to market faster, using different types of resources to go to market around the globe, and really thinking about verticals, segments, and looking at really the entire product portfolio.
We were also very pleased to have Gerrit Kazmaier joining us from Google, who's worked previously with Rob in one of the companies that you didn't mention. He and Rob have really gone through the portfolio and really thinking about where are we developing, how are we developing, and how do we go to market. It's been great to team with them, to pair with them. Both of them are great adds to the executive team. We're excited about the energy and the view that they bring to the company. He's hitting the ground running and working hard right this minute.
You won a very large airline called United. I know that was probably heavily contested. You're also the CFO of United. You must have been the primary salesperson. So there's no commission payout, right?
There is definitely no commission payout. I found that. In fact, I did not even get invited to club. No commission and no trip to club tied to that one. Interestingly enough, it was the team. It is obviously a brand we are incredibly fond of and thrilled to have them as a customer. It was one of the.
He did not fly Delta yesterday. I was on his flight with him. We were on United together.
I was on United.
He's United all in.
Exactly. I am for sure. No, it's a great team. I will tell you, obviously, I had some conversations with the team at United. It was really about our team delivering. I actually was not actively involved. Obviously, I had a few conversations at the appropriate time, but I was not actively involved. I think it just highlights the presence of the team, the fact that, yes, it was heavily contested. We are obviously thrilled to have them as a customer and very pleased with what we will be doing with them. I think it's really a testimony to, A, the team that worked on that account, but also more broadly, our go-to-market opportunity. The product itself is one that resonates across industries, including airlines.
Yeah. We didn't talk about this post the call, but when you think about some of the concern around SLED and state and local and education, when you think about the exposure to your business, I don't know if you've ever broken that out, what % that is of the business, or.
Yeah, we have not broken it out, both on the Fed side and then state and local. Tremendous opportunity for us. I mean, one of the characteristics of state and local, when we win, we typically go in with the full suite. With the platform we have, enabling state and local communities to leverage that suite and really thinking about the future and even leveraging the AI and agentic AI themselves is terrific. Now, obviously, it is an area that, as we discussed, has some challenges ahead as a category. Within that, we've got customers that are thrilled to be customers. We've got opportunities there that we still believe we can execute on through the course of the year. It is small and growing, but definitely a focus for us, very exciting opportunity.
OK. Carl's made a lot of changes. He's brought a lot of great people on. When you think about the team, is the team now kind of set where you want for the next chapter of this journey? I know there's been some changes. Is this the team now? Most of the pieces in, Rob's in. You've got.
Yeah. I mean, I couldn't be more pleased to be a part. It is not just the executive team. It is the 19,500 workmates that I have the privilege of working with. Really, anywhere you go, for those of you who know anyone who works at Workday, we have this incredibly strong culture, this incredible attitude that is around the customer and what we are doing with the customer. Obviously, Carl bringing in some new talent and people that I feel very privileged to work alongside. We are focused on executing, delivering results, growing the business. I cannot imagine a more exciting time, honestly, to be a part of this business with what we are able to do with the platform, all of the conversation around AI, agentic AI, what we are doing with our system of record, and how we are growing the business is exciting with all these verticals.
I know it's still early. We've got a number of growth metrics that we talk about publicly. We're executing against those, whether it's partners, international, our full suite opportunities, AI itself. We've got just a long list of initiatives and, candidly, a lot of work to do and to execute against. This is a great time to be in this part of the business and to see the growth and value that we're delivering to our customers, but we're also benefiting from ourselves.
On AI, do you think you'll just monetize that through the platform and embed it? It's going to sell your platform? Or do you feel like, hey, there's all these add-ons we can layer in? There's been maybe some confusion about ultimately what you think that looks like. I know it's early.
Yeah, no, it's a great question. Early on, we wanted to spend time with our customers and think about the philosophy of adoption and having customers feel like they can actually use the technology. Our agents and what we do with AI has such tremendous ROI to it. You really want your customers to embrace that and to recognize that as part of that sale. There are a number of different ways that we think of monetization today, whether it's in some cases, it's documents or otherwise. In other cases, it is tied to headcount or other means. We believe there's great opportunity just in thinking about renewal rates as well as net new business and how we benefit from that. All that being said, in other cases, we have a recruiter agent that has deliverables that are tremendous for the customer.
We obviously share those benefits with them and charge for that. I think it's still early days as you think about monetization. Even with the APIs we have within Workday, within the platform, if you think about where we go and as we extend that with partners and others, there are plenty of opportunities to leverage that built on Workday applicability and to drive value and to drive monetization. We've got a thoughtful process internally. It's really about adoption and leveraging customers and having them recognize that value that we'll ultimately share with them.
One of the big questions we got is you went through one of the biggest reductions in force recently. That is always painful to go through. You were very clear, we're going to hire everyone back, if not more. In severance as well, in this kind of weird environment, you're seeing this in state and local and, d o you tap the air brakes on that? Are you just plowing forward and staying committed to that rehiring plan?
Yeah, I think that's a nice setup. Just to be clear, obviously, we did have a reduction in force earlier. As you pointed out, those are never easy as a company to go through. It was roughly 7.5% of our workforce. At the time, we mentioned our intention is to invest back in the business and ultimately have the same amount of people working. Now, part of that is I do not want this taken out of context because it is about being thoughtful with growth and how we think about where those hires would come from and where they would ultimately go within the organization. We're not to a tight time frame or timeline on how we hire back. We're a growing company.
We have great aspirations on the AI front as well as becoming continuously more efficient and effective at everything we do, whether it's on product development, go-to-market, and every aspect of the business. Clearly not to be taken out of context. We will be hiring back. We wanted to make sure everyone understood that this is not us reducing. This is us, in fact, growing but different ways in different geographies and focused on specific areas. We are very thoughtful in every hire we make in understanding what are the opportunities for that hire. Do we need that type of role in that position years from now? How do we think about AI? How do we think about where we are around the globe? There is a lot more that goes into it.
I don't want to make it sound like, oh, we're just going to hire for the sake of hiring. That's the complete opposite. We're very diligent about bringing people into the company, ensuring that they're driving incredible ROI and growth for the business.
We know you're hiring because one of my friends just got hired. And she's very excited, so.
She’s no doubt a great individual and a good talent, so.
Europe's been very high on your radar to improve the cadence. Obviously, you have a very large competitor that's sitting there in Germany that has held center court for a long time. Talk through what's happening there, what you're seeing, the signs of success. Last quarter, I think you highlighted some pretty big accounts even in Germany that you called out. What’s happening in that Europe opportunity set?
Yeah. I mean, we still feel great about Europe. Now, I say that if you recall, a year ago, we talked about being more challenged in general in EMEA. Over the last number of quarters, we've seen good success, including in Q1. As I mentioned, Rob is there right now. We'll have a board meeting in London next week. We are focused on that part of the world and that geography. We've seen great success. We continue to develop our go-to-market as well as our product set around that area. We are very pleased with the team we have there and the growth opportunities. We are mindful of the fact there are competitors there, plural. We feel great about what we can do against them in certain cases and how we can partner with others. We've got great partners in Europe as well.
How we're executing there is important to us. It is a focus area for us. We're 25% international. Our expectation is to continue to grow that percentage. Europe's one of the key areas that we'll be doing that.
Just back to capital allocation. You've been very open that you'd love to do more M&A, but you're not going to just do M&A for the sake of M&A. You've also increased the buyback. I would assume, I mean, it's been frustrating. Stock hasn't really done anything. How are you thinking about this balance with the stock that's come off? Maybe it's been overexaggerated. You guys take advantage of that. How do you think about that?
Yeah. Obviously, we announced last week a new authorization for $1 billion. Buybacks will continue to be a part of our capital allocation strategy. Look, first and foremost, we'll invest in the business where we believe it's the right thing to do. We remain focused on that and focused on executing. We've got a number of key growth drivers in the business. With Carl at the helm, we're focused every day on how we're progressing against those, what are we achieving. There's a sense of energy across the company because we do believe there's a great opportunity here on growth and where we're taking the business. In addition to that, as you pointed out, we remain very active as it relates to acquisitions with HiredScore and Evisort being two acquisitions that we're thrilled with coming in last year.
It's a high bar on the acquisition side. We want to make sure there's great cultural fit, there's great technical fit, and it can truly augment and accelerate our portfolio. There are companies out there that we believe will fit into that. Again, it's a high bar. We're not going to acquire companies just for the sake of growth. We'll be very thoughtful around that. In addition to that, as you mentioned, we also have buybacks. We've now increased the cadence of the authorization as well as of the buybacks. That's one of the levers that we have as we think about capital allocation. First and foremost, though, we're focused on executing and hitting our growth targets.
You love all your product children equally. If you had one that is standing out right now inside the portfolio, who would you point to just as the current standout in the classroom?
No. I mean, that's a hard one because I truly think it's the power of the portfolio and more to come on the agentic side, as you mentioned, with the product set. The way we're thinking about AI is having it deeply integrated into the portfolio and driving business performance. The success and value that customers are getting are really how I look at it and how I think about what we're delivering and what we're driving. Recruiter Agent just being an example of a product.