Leadership and Life Essentials: The Cost of a Bad Hire - It's More Than Just the Salary

you've probably heard the number that it costs to replace someone.

I've heard everything from 50 to 150% of a person's salary, depending on their level in the organization.

But when you actually factor in everything that goes into replacing someone, the real impact is much larger than just recruitment and lost productivity costs.

There's the obvious monetary cost of recruiting, advertising, the time it takes to get someone onboarded.

But a lot of the time and attention actually isn't readily considered.

The hours you and your manager spend interviewing instead of doing work that grows and operates the business.

The weeks of onboarding that are wasted because the person wasn't ever going to work out.

The lost productivity while everyone waits to see if this is going to turn around.

On top of that, there's the impact to clients that's often forgotten.

Delivery is slower and turnover can impact relationships.

Reflect on what actually needs to happen when you need to hire someone new.

Someone has to write the job posting and sort through the resumes.

Someone sits in on every interview, which means they're not spending time with clients or doing the other work that needs to get done.

And in many interviews, there's multiple interviewers.

So multiply that time by two or three.

Once there's an offer, there's training and onboarding.

There's equipment and system access to set up.

A manager checking in more consistently to see how things are going.

All of that is an investment made on the assumption that the person's going to work out, stick around and perform.

When they don't, none of that time and energy comes back.

You've spent it and you're about to spend it again on the next one.