Hiring feels like growth. It is also a fixed monthly bet: wages, burden, truck, tools, insurance, and training time while utilization ramps. The right question is not "Am I busy?" It is "Will this hire's billable work leave more owner profit after all new costs?"
List the full cost of employee one
- Wage + payroll taxes, workers' comp, benefits, PTO (burdened rate)
- Second truck or shared vehicle cost, fuel, maintenance
- Tools, phone, uniforms, software seat
- Your time training and reworking early jobs
- Extra marketing if you need volume to keep them busy
Model utilization, not hope
Assume a ramp: month one at 40–50% billable, month three at 70%+, not 100% from day one. For each month, estimate jobs they will run and cost a typical ticket in the calculator at their burdened rate. Sum contribution across tickets, subtract incremental fixed costs. If the hire only frees you for more unpaid admin, that is not profit — unless you price your own time into sales and estimating that convert.
Owner role after the hire
The math works when your freed hours go to higher-leverage work: quoting installs, closing memberships, tightening dispatch, or taking higher-margin jobs yourself. If you stay on every truck and the employee sits underutilized, revenue rises and cash gets tighter.
Go / no-go checklist
- Consistent overflow demand for 60+ days (not one busy week)
- Documented job costs so you know which work to assign them
- Cash buffer for 90 days of payroll and truck
- Clear plan for your non-wrench hours
Model a hire's typical job
Cost tickets at the new burdened rate in the free calculator before you make the offer.