Meeting Cost Comparison Across Different Salary Levels

A meeting's cost is mostly the salaries of the people in the room. The same one-hour meeting can cost under $100 or well over $1,000, depending on who's invited. Here's how the numbers change with salary, using simple math you can repeat for your own team.

The formula

Hourly cost per person = annual salary ÷ 2,080 (40 hours × 52 weeks). Meeting cost = hourly cost × number of people × length in hours.

This counts salary only. Benefits, payroll taxes and office costs add more, so the real cost is higher. A common rule of thumb is to multiply salary by 1.25 to 1.4 for a fully loaded figure.

Cost of one hour by salary

• $40,000 a year: about $19 an hour
• $60,000: about $29
• $80,000: about $38
• $100,000: about $48
• $150,000: about $72
• $200,000: about $96
• $300,000: about $144

Worked examples

• Weekly leadership meeting: 6 people averaging $200,000, one hour. About $577 a meeting, or about $28,800 a year over 50 weeks.
• Daily engineering standup: 8 people averaging $150,000, 30 minutes. About $288 a day, or about $72,000 a year over 250 working days.
• Mixed project meeting: 2 people at $200,000, 4 at $100,000 and 2 at $60,000, one hour. About $442.

Salary figures here are examples to show the math, not averages for any job.

Why seniority matters most

• One senior person can cost as much as several juniors. Ask whether each senior attendee needs to be there, or could read the notes.
• Recurring meetings multiply fast. A weekly hour becomes about 50 hours a year per person. See yearly cost of recurring meetings.
• Time after the meeting counts too. Getting back into focused work takes time. See context switching costs.

Using an average salary

You rarely know everyone's exact pay, and you shouldn't need to. Use a rough average for the room. In the mixed example, the average is $115,000, and 8 people at that average give the same $442 an hour.

Calculate your own

• The meeting cost calculator works it out from attendees, average salary and length.
• Meeting Cost Calculator for Chrome runs a live cost counter during the meeting.

To share the numbers with management, see presenting meeting cost data and the cost of inviting everyone.