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Headcountnoun

The number of people employed, counted on an agreed basis.

Headcount counts people rather than cost. The basis matters: whether contractors, part-timers and unfilled roles are included changes the figure, so the definition has to be stated before the number means anything.

Full-time equivalent is the companion measure, converting part-time staff into whole-person units. Headcount answers how many people there are; FTE answers how much capacity they represent.

How it is calculated

FTE = Total contracted hours ÷ Standard full-time hours

Two half-time staff are two headcount but one FTE.

Also called

  • FTE
  • full-time equivalent

See it in AWRA OpsHub

Employee Management

Related terms

Employee Lifecycle

The stages of an employment relationship from hiring to exit.

Payroll

The process of calculating and paying employee remuneration and deductions.

Timesheet

A record of hours worked, allocated to days, tasks or projects.

Cost Centre

A department or unit that costs are collected against for accountability.

More in People & Payroll

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Headcount is not just a definition here

People & Payroll runs on this vocabulary every day in AWRA OpsHub — 16 of our 259 glossary terms describe things the platform actually does.

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