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1) What is a “loaded hourly rate”?
A loaded rate includes salary plus employer costs: benefits, payroll taxes, equipment, software licenses,
office/coworking, and sometimes management overhead. If you only know annual salary, a quick shortcut is:
salary ÷ 2,000 hours ≈ base hourly rate, then multiply by 1.15–1.40 to load it.
Example: $120,000 ÷ 2,000 ≈ $60/hr. Loaded at 1.3 → $78/hr.
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2) What overhead multiplier should I use?
If you already typed a loaded hourly rate (like a billable consulting rate), set overhead near 1.00–1.10.
If you typed a simple salary‑based hourly rate, common overhead ranges are 1.15–1.60 depending on benefits,
tooling, and how “fully loaded” you want to be. Contractors with minimal overhead might use 1.05–1.15,
while organizations with significant overhead may use 1.35–1.75.
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3) Why include prep time “per attendee”?
Prep is often the hidden iceberg. Reading context, pulling metrics, writing updates, or building a quick deck
can easily exceed the meeting itself. Using “per attendee” keeps the estimate realistic: a meeting with 10 people
tends to generate more prep than a 1:1, because everyone wants to show up informed (or at least safe).
If your meetings require only the host to prep, set prep minutes to the host’s prep per meeting and
temporarily set “attendees” to 1 to model host‑only prep — or just reduce prep minutes drastically.
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4) What is “context switch penalty”?
When you stop deep work, attend a meeting, and then resume, you often pay a switching tax:
reloading your mental state, finding your place, re‑opening tabs, re‑running tests, and so on.
The penalty varies by role and meeting placement. A meeting in the middle of a focus block hurts more than one
at the start of the day. Many teams feel 10–25% is a fair “average” for knowledge work. If your org batches
meetings into blocks, you can lower the penalty.
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5) Does this overestimate for “easy” meetings?
It can. That’s why you can set prep to 0 and context penalty to 0 if your meeting truly has no hidden cost.
The point isn’t perfection — it’s to make the trade‑off visible. Even a “light” recurring meeting can become
expensive purely through frequency.
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6) Example: A weekly 30‑minute team meeting
Suppose 6 people meet for 30 minutes. Hourly rate is $90/hr (loaded). Overhead is 1.10.
Prep is 10 minutes per attendee and context penalty is 15%.
Participant labor = (0.5 hr × 6 × $90) = $270.
Prep labor = (10/60 hr × 6 × $90) = $90.
Context cost = $270 × 0.15 = $40.50.
Total per meeting = ($270 + $90 + $40.50) × 1.10 ≈ $440.55.
If it happens 3×/week for 48 working weeks, yearly cost ≈ $440.55 × 3 × 48 ≈ $63,439.
That’s a real budget line — even before considering opportunity cost.
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7) Example: What do you save by cutting 10 minutes?
Reducing duration from 30 to 20 minutes cuts meeting hours by one‑third.
If the meeting happens frequently, the savings compound.
This tool shows “savings if you cut 5/10/15 minutes” automatically so you can run quick scenarios:
shorten, right‑size, or replace with async.
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8) How do I use this as a consultant or freelancer?
Use it in proposals and retrospectives to justify a meeting cadence.
If a client wants multiple weekly calls, you can show the implied cost and offer an alternative:
one decision‑meeting + async updates. It also helps you price “project management” time honestly,
because meetings are part of delivery cost.
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9) Is “meeting cost” the same as “waste”?
No. Some meetings are high‑leverage and pay for themselves many times over.
That’s why the effectiveness slider exists: it helps you separate cost (which is real)
from waste (which is the portion of cost not turning into outcomes).
A high‑cost meeting can still be worth it if it prevents mistakes, aligns strategy, or closes deals.
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10) Can this help reduce burnout?
Indirectly, yes. Over‑meeting often creates a squeeze where real work must happen before or after hours.
Cutting meeting load can restore focus blocks and reduce “always on” fatigue. Use the yearly number as a
forcing function: if the spend is high, it’s worth redesigning how decisions and updates happen.
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11) What’s the fastest way to lower meeting cost?
In order: (1) remove meetings with no decisions or owners, (2) reduce attendees, (3) shorten duration,
(4) move status updates async, (5) batch meetings together to reduce context switching.
The calculator makes it obvious which lever saves most for your situation.
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12) Privacy: where does my data go?
Nowhere. This page runs entirely in your browser. Your numbers are not sent to a server.
If you click “Save,” it stores snapshots locally on your device (like a bookmark), and you can clear them anytime.