Cost of employee turnover in Germany

Five cost blocks per departure

The cost of a departure falls into five blocks: recruiting (ads, headhunters, selection), onboarding (formal training, mentoring), productivity gap (several months of reduced output), knowledge loss (informal networks, domain knowledge) and transition cost (overburdened colleagues, temporary cover).

The documented magnitudes

Gallup puts the cost of replacing an employee at one-half to two times their annual salary. For Germany, the Gallup Engagement Index 2024 gives 1.5 times one year of salary and associated cost. The Center for American Progress review of 30 case studies reports a median of 21 % of annual salary with a range from 5.8 to 213 %. The three figures come from different studies with different scopes and cannot be converted into one another. None of these sources publishes a cost series broken down by seniority level.

Link to mental load: a correlation, not a measured effect

Burden patterns from the GB Psych, above all high emotional demands, low control and weak leadership, go together with a higher intent to leave. In 2025 Gallup measured 3 % active job seekers among employees with high emotional commitment and 39 % among those with none. These are repeated cross-sectional surveys with newly drawn samples each time, not panel studies: they show an association, not the effect of an intervention.