Setting Your Blended Hourly Rate
The blended hourly rate is the number we multiply hours-saved by to produce a dollar value. Without it, hours-saved is still tracked, but ROI in dollars is hidden everywhere.
To set it
- Go to Settings → Organization
- Find the Reporting & ROI card
- Enter a number in the Blended hourly rate field
- Pick your currency (defaults to AUD)
- Click Save
It applies immediately to the dashboard and reports.
What number should I use?
The right answer is "fully-loaded labour cost per hour for an average member of your team". That includes:
- Salary
- Superannuation / pension
- Payroll tax / on-costs
- Health insurance, leave, training, equipment, software
- Allocated overhead (rent, utilities, management)
A common rule of thumb: fully-loaded cost ≈ 1.4 to 1.7 × salary.
Some examples that might help calibrate:
| Team profile | Reasonable hourly rate (AUD) |
|---|---|
| Australian professional services / consulting | $90–$140 |
| Tech company, mid-level engineering | $100–$160 |
| Retail / hospitality (operations) | $40–$70 |
| Senior leadership / executive | $200+ |
Pick a number you'd be comfortable defending in a board pack. If your team challenges it, you can always change it — every report recalculates.
What if my team has very different rates?
A blended rate is a single number for the whole organisation, which is usually the right level of precision for executive reporting. If you have a wildly mixed team (say half are graduate engineers and half are senior partners), pick a sensible average rather than the highest or lowest.
In a future release we'll let you set per-group hourly rates, so an Engineering group can have a different rate from Customer Support. For now, use the blended figure.
Currencies we support
AUD, USD, GBP, EUR, NZD, CAD. The currency you pick affects formatting on the dashboard and reports.
If your tool costs are in a different currency than your hourly rate, convert them so they match. The platform doesn't do FX conversion.
What if I genuinely don't know?
Two practical paths:
- Ask your CFO or Head of Finance. They almost certainly know fully-loaded labour cost — it's a standard finance number.
- Use a defensible round number. AUD $100/hr is a fine starting point for most professional services orgs. You can refine it later.
Better an estimate than nothing — an unset rate hides the entire ROI story.
Related: Understanding ROI · Setting tool costs and why it matters · Why is ROI showing "—"?