Who can use this: Tech admin
Available on: Any Gong plan
Gong uses a single company hierarchy for all features: conversation intelligence, deal boards, dashboards, and forecast boards. When your company structure changes, such as when a rep moves teams, a manager leaves, or a management role is unfilled, the hierarchy needs to stay accurate so your data rolls up correctly across all of these features.
For steps on how to make these changes in Gong, see Manage Gong when your company structure changes.
How Gong uses your company hierarchy
Gong pulls your company hierarchy from your provisioning source: an identity provider (IdP) such as Okta, Rippling, or OneLogin, your CRM such as Salesforce, or a combination of both. This hierarchy determines visibility and rollups across the entire platform, including who sees whose calls, how pipeline rolls up in deal boards, and how forecasts aggregate by team.
Because the hierarchy drives data across all of Gong, changes to your company structure can affect reporting accuracy across multiple features if they are not handled deliberately.
Common scenarios
The following situations are the most common cases where company structure changes require action in Gong.
A rep changes teams
When a rep moves to a new team, their open deals and historical data move with them by default. If the original team needs to retain that pipeline for the current period, the deals must be reassigned before or at the point of the move. Without action, the original team loses visibility into pipeline that should remain on their books.
A management role is vacant or unfilled
If a manager leaves and the role is not immediately backfilled, or if a management role exists in the hierarchy but has no one in it, the reps under that node roll up incorrectly. For example, if an AMER GM position is vacant, all the reps under it may roll up directly to the VP instead of staying grouped under the AMER region. This affects targets, forecasts, and pipeline visibility for everyone above that node.
A rep leaves the company
When a rep leaves mid-quarter, their open deals need to remain attributed to a position in the hierarchy so that pipeline and forecast data stays intact for the team. Removing the rep without reassigning their deals causes data to disappear from the board.
Virtual team members
A virtual team member is a regular Gong user account that you create to represent a position in your hierarchy rather than a real person. Gong does not distinguish between virtual and real user accounts, the term is a convention used to describe accounts created specifically to hold a place in the hierarchy. You assign deals, targets, and forecast submissions to the virtual team member so that data stays attributed to the correct team even when no human is in that role.
Virtual team members cannot log in to Gong. A real user with the appropriate permissions manages the virtual team member account and can submit forecasts on its behalf.
Note:
You can create a virtual team member in Gong regardless of your provisioning source. However, if your company provisions through an IdP such as Okta, Rippling, or OneLogin, moving reps to report to a virtual team member requires Gong team assistance.
Provisioning methods
The provisioning method your company uses determines what options are available when your structure changes.
Method | Supports virtual team members | Best for |
|---|---|---|
IdP only (Okta, Rippling, OneLogin, Entra ID) | Generally no | Companies with straightforward hierarchies and no complex hierarchy needs |
CRM only (Salesforce) | Yes | Companies that want all users, including virtual team members, defined and managed in Salesforce |
CRM + manual | Yes | Companies that want to minimize non-human accounts in Salesforce: real users sync via CRM, placeholder manager nodes are created manually in Gong, and placeholder reps are created in CRM for deal ownership |
Forecast board visibility
As you create and retire virtual team members over time, your forecast board can accumulate a large number of entries. Gong provides three visibility settings to keep boards manageable while preserving historical data.
Active: Always shown. Use for current forecasters, revenue owners, and virtual team members currently holding open pipeline.
Inactive: Shown only when data exists in the selected period. Use for historical users who are no longer managing revenue.
Hidden: Never shown. Use for irrelevant users or duplicate records.
Frequently asked questions
Does this affect features other than forecast?
Yes. Because Gong uses a single hierarchy for the whole platform, structure changes affect conversation intelligence, deal boards, and dashboards as well as forecast boards.
Can I use virtual team members if I provision through an IdP?
Yes, with some limitations. You can create a virtual team member manually in Gong regardless of your provisioning source. However, moving reps to report to the virtual team member requires Gong team assistance if those reps are managed through an IdP such as Okta, Rippling, or OneLogin. Contact your Gong account team to coordinate the reassignment.
Does a virtual team member need a Gong Forecast seat?
It depends on your plan. If your company is on Gong's current pricing and packaging, a virtual team member must have a Forecast seat for a real user to submit a forecast on their behalf. This requirement does not apply to legacy Gong plans. Check your plan type in Admin center > Team members.
Can I keep historical deals rolled up to the original team when a rep moves?
Yes. You can assign the rep's open deals to a virtual team member under the original manager before or at the point of the move. The deals stay rolled up to the original team while the rep's new deals roll up to their new team.