Put a Number on the Cost of Losing a Key Employee

To estimate how much losing a key employee would cost your business, add four things together. Count the revenue and margin that person drives, the cost of replacing them, the harder-to-measure losses, and the bills that keep coming during the gap. Use your own figures, and treat the result as a working range, not a prediction.

Why a death estimate is different from a turnover estimate

A death estimate is not the same as a turnover estimate. Most turnover calculators model someone who resigns. A resignation usually comes with notice, time for a handoff, and a chance to plan.

A death offers none of that. The work stops at once. Clients, vendors, and decisions may be affected the same day.

The purpose of this estimate is to size your business’s exposure. It helps you decide whether key person life insurance fits your situation. It does not predict what will happen. Key person coverage is meant to compensate a business for financial losses caused by a key employee’s death or disability, according to the Insurance Information Institute’s guide to life insurance for key employees. That guide also defines who counts as a key employee. Start there to decide whose loss to estimate.

Start with the employee’s measurable contribution to revenue and margin

The first step is the revenue the employee directly produces or is essential to producing. That might be accounts they manage, projects they lead, or a product line only they can deliver.

Next, estimate the gross margin on that revenue. Gross margin is the money left after the direct costs of making the sale.

Then decide how fast that revenue would slow or stop. Here is an illustrative worksheet with hypothetical numbers. These figures are not a typical result.

Separate the revenue the employee causes from revenue you would keep anyway. A client who stays because of your company’s name is not a loss tied to that one person. Count only the revenue that would actually leave.

Add direct replacement costs: recruiting, onboarding, and ramp-up time

Direct costs are the bills you pay to fill the role. List recruiting fees or advertising, interview hours, onboarding, training, and any signing or relocation payments.

Then add ramp-up time. Ramp-up is the months before a new hire reaches the departed employee’s output. Multiply the monthly output gap by those months.

Replacement pay may differ from the employee’s old pay. Model that difference for each year of the gap. Use your own past hiring records where you have them. Mark any figure that is an assumption rather than a record.

Count the indirect costs: relationships, knowledge, and delayed work

Indirect costs are real, but they are harder to measure. Knowledge often sits in one person. Processes may be undocumented, and a vendor or client may trust only one relationship.

A death can also delay projects, cause missed bids, and slow decisions. You may need overtime or outside help to cover the gap.

Put a value on these items with a reasoned method. One approach is hours of lost productivity times the loaded cost of the staff involved. Treat these numbers as estimates, not certain losses.

List indirect costs on their own line. That way you can see which numbers rest on records and which rest on judgment.

Check the obligations that continue while the business rebuilds

Fixed costs keep running after a death. Payroll for remaining staff, rent, debt payments, and insurance premiums do not pause.

Add these costs for the number of months you expect the rebuild to take. Then read your loan agreements and contracts. Some lenders tie loan terms to key personnel. In that case, coverage can become part of the financing.

Review any buy-sell agreement for an owner or key employee, too. Its funding and valuation terms can change how much the business must cover. Those terms belong in the estimate.

Is 20% employee turnover high? Use your own history first

No single percentage settles whether turnover is high. Benchmarks differ by industry, role, and region.

Start with your own numbers. Divide departures over a stated period by average headcount, then multiply by 100. For example, 3 departures from an average of 25 staff over one year is 12 percent. That example is hypothetical.

Turnover counts departures, not deaths. It tells you how often to plan replacements. It does not replace a key person estimate, which looks at the loss of one person. Avoid borrowing a benchmark from another company unless it is named, dated, and sourced.

Is it cheaper to retain a key employee or replace one?

Retention and replacement answer different questions. Retention efforts lower the chance of a voluntary departure. Replacement cost measures what follows a departure.

Neither one removes the risk of a death. The death estimate is a separate calculation, and retention spending does not reduce it.

You can weigh retention spending and coverage against the same estimated exposure. That comparison shows where each dollar does the most good. No option is always cheaper. The answer depends on your numbers and on the person involved.

Turning the estimate into a coverage review

Your estimate is a starting point for one decision: whether key person life insurance fits your business. Policy limits and exclusions apply, so read them closely before you decide.

The transfer-for-value rule in the same subsection can change that result. Interest on the proceeds is taxable, according to the IRS. Whether proceeds are taxable depends on the facts, so we review that with you.

Florida’s insurable-interest statute, Fla. Stat. § 627.404, lets a business insure a key employee when that person consents in writing before the policy is bought.

Nischay Rawal is the licensed insurance agent responsible for this page. When we discuss insurance products, he acts as a licensed insurance agent. Insurance is offered by the licensed agent, separately from the accounting practice. Any commission is disclosed in writing before an engagement. Our fee terms for the coverage review are also disclosed in writing before any engagement.

Frequently asked questions