Free tool · for founders, team leads & HR
Quarterly Headcount Planner
The fastest way to sketch one quarter of hiring before you commit to it. List the roles you mean to hire, the month each one starts, and what you plan to pay, and this free headcount plan template turns it into the cost of the quarter and the average cost per hire. Each hire is priced at salary times the common 1.3x loaded-cost rule of thumb, plus the one-time spend it takes to recruit and seat them, and carried through month 12 of the plan — the twelfth month counting from the quarter's first month, which the planner names for you. Eight hire rows, five of them already filled in with a fictional example. It is a sketch, not a computed employer-cost build-up: the one-page guide that comes with it explains exactly where that rule of thumb goes wrong, which is worth knowing before anyone signs off on the number.
Take it with you — free, no signup
Direct download. No email, no account — just the files.
What it does
- Turns a list of planned hires into the hiring budget for the quarter — salary at the 1.3x loaded-cost rule of thumb, counting each hire only from the month they actually start.
- Shows what each hire costs from their start month through month 12 of the plan — not twelve months from that hire's own start date — including the one-time spend it takes to recruit and seat them.
- Totals the quarter: hires costed, headcount added, the quarter's cost, the full-year run-rate you are left with, and the average quarter cost per hire.
- Holds eight hires, five of them pre-loaded with an illustrative fictional example so you can see it working, then typed over with your own.
- Assumes the 1.3x multiplier rather than computing one — and says so on the tab, in a plain block on what this free planner does not do.
- Includes a one-page guide on why a single loaded-cost multiplier is only a rule of thumb, and the four questions to ask before you trust any loaded-cost figure.
- Opens in Excel, Google Sheets, and LibreOffice — no macros, no signup, nothing saved anywhere but your own file.
Related reading
Own it, don't rent it
Want the whole hiring budget costed properly, not just a quarter sketched?
This free planner sketches a quarter using the 1.3x rule of thumb. The full Headcount / Hiring-Plan & Budget Workbook stops guessing: it prices every hire from your own itemized employer rates with real wage-base caps, so the loaded multiplier comes out different for each one instead of being assumed; phases eighteen months of cash from each actual start date, prorated by days, with one-time spend landing only in the start month; names the first month the plan goes over budget; and adds scenarios with months of runway, payback against the value a hire creates, and the backfill reserve your plan quietly assumes away. Nine connected tabs and four guides, in one owned spreadsheet.
A one-time purchase you keep and re-run every planning cycle — the structured workbook between a blank spreadsheet and headcount-planning software commonly billed per employee, per month.
A planning tool, not payroll software, and not tax, HR, employment, or legal advice. The example company, roles, and salaries are fictional and the figures are illustrative. Employer tax rates and wage bases change annually and vary by state and by employer — verify them before you commit a budget. Free to use; please don't resell or redistribute.