What is Shrinkage?

When it comes to hiring, we sometimes overlook the essential elements to build a thriving, joyful, and well-informed workforce. This means granting them some well-deserved breaks (I know, right?), providing training, and keeping them in the loop. Staffing calculations are undoubtedly influenced by workload, but what about the other crucial factors at play? Have you noticed that you're always just a step away from meeting your hiring needs? Well, fret not! This nifty calculator should lend you a hand in that predicament.

Shrinkage calculates the amount of time employees spend on activities that are paid but not their primary function. For example, paid employee training is a great example of staff shrinkage. So are breaks and team meetings. Lunch, as it is unpaid, is not included as part of shrinkage (also called staff shrinkage).
The questions on your right will help you define your staff shrinkage. You can run ideal scenarios for how you'd like to see time spent within your team. At one point, normal shrinkage was anywhere from 15-30%, but the world is your oyster!


Also, this is just a calculator. The information you enter here is NOT saved or stored.


Click here to watch a short explainer video on Shrinkage

Answer these questions, and we'll calculate shrinkage for you.

How many people do you need?

If you think you need more help because of a lot of customer questions, this calculation can help. You can figure out how many extra people your business needs. First, estimate how much work needs to be done on by channel. Keep in mind this estimate assumes each person works only one channel. If your team does more than one channel at once, you may need to increase the staff shrinkage number. Calculate the shrinkage number if you haven't already and enter it here if needed (even zero, thought not recommended).

What's the best you can do?

If you're not sure how much more work you can take on, this calculation can help. You can figure out how many contacts can be handled with your existing staff. First, estimate how much work needs to be done on by channel. Keep in mind this estimate assumes each person works only one channel. If your team does more than one channel at once, you may need to increase the staff shrinkage number. Calculate the shrinkage number if you haven't already and enter it here if needed (even zero, thought not recommended).


Get started now...

Use a shrinkage plan to understand why you're almost always understaffed. Staff Shrinkage measures how much time employees spend on things that are not their main job. This can lower how much work customer-facing work they get done.


Use this calculator to get an estimate of how many people you need to do the work based on how much work there is and how long it should take. We use the number you give us, but you can change it if needed.

Use this calculator to figure out how much work our group can do. The number of people in the group and how long it takes to finish the work help us decide this. We look at what you told us about the amount of work, but you can change it if you want.