Attrition rate: how to calculate it and plan your hiring

Attrition rate is the share of employees who leave an organization over a set period, shown as a percentage of total headcount.

For a recruiter, it's an early signal of the backfills, or replacement hires, you'll be asked to make next quarter. If you read it before the hiring manager or client does, you can start sourcing while everyone else is still writing job descriptions.

What is attrition rate?

Attrition rate measures how many people leave a company, team, or role over a period, compared with how many work there. An employee attrition rate often counts every departure, including people who quit, people who are let go, and people who retire. Some teams track each type on its own, since each one points to a different cause.

Many HR teams use attrition and turnover as if they mean the same thing. Others use turnover only for roles the company refills, and attrition for roles it leaves empty. Ask which definition the hiring manager or client uses before you compare their numbers with anyone else's.

The type breakdown changes what you do next. A voluntary spike on one team often points to a pay gap or a manager problem. Expect more exits from that same team before you even see the next open role.

An involuntary spike, such as a round of layoffs, often means the business is cutting a function, not growing it. New searches in that area may pause instead of multiply. Retirement-driven attrition gives you the longest runway, since people often give notice months ahead. That's enough time to build a shortlist before the role even opens.

How to calculate attrition rate

Divide the number of people who left during the period by the total number of employees, then multiply by 100. SHRM's attrition formula uses that math, and its example of 20 departures out of 1,000 employees gives a 2% rate.

Pick one period and stick with it every time you run the number. Monthly figures swing a lot on small teams, so quarterly or yearly views are easier to read. Use the same headcount each time too, such as the average across the period or the count on its first day.

What counts as a healthy rate

There's no single healthy number, since what's normal changes from one industry to the next. SHRM's attrition guidance still sets a useful line, saying companies should aim for a rate below 10%.

Treat that line as a starting point, not a verdict on any one team. Compare each team against its own past quarters and against similar roles at the same company. A night-shift nursing unit and a corporate finance team will rarely look alike, and that's fine.

For a recruiter, the direction matters more than the level. A rate that climbs for two quarters in a row tells you backfills are coming, even if it still sits under the benchmark.

What a rising attrition rate means for your workload

A rising rate means more backfill openings, and they land on top of the new roles you're already working. SHRM's 2025 benchmarking survey of U.S. recruiting executives found a median of 20 requisitions per recruiter per year. The same survey found recruiters at large and extra-large organizations handled 50 and 60 requisitions each.

Each backfill also takes time to close, so extra openings add empty seats as well as work. SHRM's 2025 survey put median time-to-fill at about a month and a half for both executive and nonexecutive roles. Time-to-fill is the stretch from opening a role to filling it.

Check the gap before openings pile up

Run the math on the team that worries you most, then compare it with how long that role takes to fill. Say a client's support team has 40 people and 6 left last quarter. If the trend holds, you can expect about six more backfills next quarter, and they'll arrive while your other searches are still open.

If you wait for those roles to open and each one takes the median time-to-fill, the seats sit empty for most of the quarter. Keep a pipeline ready for that role now, and you can send profiles the same week a role opens.

The same math works on an agency desk. If three clients show a rising rate in the same kind of role, you can build one candidate pool and place from it several times.

How to build a pipeline before roles open

Pick the roles with the highest attrition and start sourcing for them before anyone asks. These four steps keep that work small enough to fit next to your current searches.

• Get the data: In-house recruiters can ask HR for the rate by team each quarter. Agency recruiters can ask clients for it at the intake call, the first meeting where you scope a role.
• Rank the roles: Focus on jobs where people leave often and searches run long, whether those are night-shift nurses, store managers, or backend engineers.
• Keep a warm bench: Hold a short list of qualified people who've said they're open to a move, and check in with them every few weeks.
• Share the forecast: Show the hiring manager or client how many backfills the trend points to, so they can approve openings sooner.

Revisit the list each quarter, since the roles that lose people can shift after a pay change, a new manager, or a reorg. A hiring plan that already accounts for backfills makes this forecast easier to sell in.

Start with one team before your next intake call

Pick one team or client with a rising rate and run the numbers this week. Compare this quarter with the last two, and list the roles that drove the change.

Then bring that list and a rough backfill count to your next call with the hiring manager or client. You'll walk in with a plan for next quarter instead of a stack of surprise openings.