Knowledge Base
HR by the Numbers
The cost economics of staffing — turnover, fully-loaded employee cost, bad hires, vacancies, and fractional-vs-full-time, sourced and labelled.
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Fractional HR vs. a full-time HR hire — what's the real cost comparison?
A full-time senior HR hire in Ontario costs roughly $130k–$185k all-in in year one (base × ~1.3 loaded + cost-to-hire), while fractional HR commonly runs ~$3,000–$10,000/month in Canada; fractional is cost-favourable when the genuine need is below roughly half-time, and full-time wins at sustained high volume — structural logic is sound, specific figures are directional.
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What do recruiting agency and executive search fees actually cost?
Contingency recruiting agencies typically charge 15–25% of first-year salary; retained executive search typically runs 25–35% (often "one-third") of first-year total compensation — these are real, invoiceable hard costs and the most concrete line item in any turnover/hire calculation.
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What does a bad hire cost — and why is a bad senior hire so much worse?
Survey data puts the average reported bad-hire cost near US$15,000 (CareerBuilder, vendor) and all-in estimates run far higher for senior roles; the ubiquitous "U.S. Department of Labor: 30% of first-year earnings" claim CANNOT be traced to any primary DOL document and should be treated as recycled/apocryphal — directional throughout.
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What does an employee actually cost beyond base salary? (The fully-loaded cost)
A fully-loaded employee typically costs ~1.25–1.4× base salary; in Ontario the mandatory employer-side statutory load (CPP 5.95% + CPP2 4%, EI at 1.4× the employee rate, EHT up to 1.95%, 4% statutory vacation pay) is roughly 9–18% of salary before benefits, with the rest made up of benefits and overhead — the exact multiplier varies by employer.
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What does an unfilled vacancy cost, and how long does hiring take? (Time-to-fill & cost-of-vacancy)
Time-to-fill is reasonably benchmarked at ~36–44 days on average (SHRM, professional-body survey) with senior roles often 60–90+ days; the dollar cost of a vacant seat is largely logic-based/estimated (commonly cited at "$500/day" or "$4,000–$9,000/month" for ordinary roles) and should be treated as directional, not measured.
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What does losing an employee actually cost? (The evidence behind Newman's Rule of Three)
Rigorous peer-reviewed synthesis puts typical turnover cost at ~16–21% of annual salary for most roles, rising up to ~213% for executives/specialists; Frank's "3x (300%)" sits at or above the very top of the published range and is defensible only for senior, specialized, revenue-attached roles — label it directional.