Vacancy cost is the productivity loss your organization absorbs while a role sits open — separate from and often larger than the cost of recruiting for it. Most organizations track cost-per-hire but not cost-of-vacancy, which means they are measuring the cost of the solution while ignoring the cost of the problem. The two numbers together paint the full economic picture of hiring speed.
The Base Formula
The core vacancy cost calculation, based on Dr. John Sullivan's methodology and widely adopted in talent analytics:
Daily Vacancy Cost = (Annual Salary ÷ 220 working days) × Role Impact Multiplier
The 220-day denominator uses working days after subtracting PTO, public holidays, and meeting/training time from the theoretical 260 working days per year — reflecting actual productive output days rather than calendar-days-on-payroll.
Role impact multipliers reflect the degree to which the role directly generates or enables revenue:
- Support, administrative, operational (multiplier 1.0–1.5): Lost productivity of the empty seat. $100,000 salary = $455–$682 per day.
- Customer-facing, client delivery (multiplier 1.5–2.0): Productivity loss plus service delivery impact. $100,000 salary = $682–$909 per day.
- Revenue-generating — sales, account management (multiplier 2.0–3.0): Productivity loss plus direct revenue contribution loss. $100,000 salary = $909–$1,363 per day.
The Full 44-Day Cost
At the SHRM 2025 median of 44 days:
- $80,000 individual contributor: $80k ÷ 220 × 1.25 × 44 = ~$20,000 vacancy cost
- $100,000 customer-facing role: $100k ÷ 220 × 1.75 × 44 = ~$35,000 vacancy cost
- $150,000 sales role: $150k ÷ 220 × 2.5 × 44 = ~$75,000 vacancy cost
None of these figures include recruiting costs (another $5,000–$15,000 in CPH), onboarding and ramp-up costs (30–100% of first-year salary), or the morale and attrition impact on the team covering the vacant role.
The Compounding Cost: Team Overload and Attrition Risk
SHRM's 2024 workplace challenge research found that 36% of employees report heavier workloads due to unfilled roles — and those employees are more than three times as likely to report burnout. Burnout-driven attrition from the team covering a vacant role can trigger a cascade: one vacancy becoming two as stressed team members leave. This compounding effect is why vacancy cost calculations should include a risk-adjusted attrition multiplier for high-criticality and high-load roles.
Building the Business Case
Present vacancy cost to your CFO as a daily P&L drain, not an HR metric. Calculate your current open-req inventory, apply the daily cost formula to each open role weighted by seniority and type, and multiply by average days-open. That sum is the current organizational cost of your vacancy backlog — and the maximum you could justify investing in reducing it.
UPPER's core promise is speed: launch a role, get a ranked shortlist in hours, not days — directly addressing the pre-sourcing lag that is the most wasteful phase of the vacancy cost clock. Calculate your vacancy cost and model the ROI →