The 5 KPIs for Effectively Managing Agency Staffing

Juliette Saez-Lopez
Auteur vérifié
10 September 2025

In summary:

Thanks to these 5 KPIs:

  • Avoid the risks of overloading and underutilization with clear indicators.
  • Check to see if your teams are filling out their timesheets correctly to ensure accurate staffing tracking.
  • Make sure that the time allocated to client projects is adhered to.
  • Analyze internal tasks: Identify who is spending too much time on them, why, and the nature of these activities.

Managing staffing at an agency without KPIs is like moving forward without a compass. Allocate too many resources, and your profit margin plummets. Allocate too few, and your teams burn out or your projects fall behind schedule. Fortunately, there’s a reliable compass: staffing KPIs. With them, you can maximize profitability while retaining your talent. In this article, we’ll look at the five must-have KPIs.

The Risks of Management Without KPIs

Without clear metrics, you expose your agency to several major risks:

  • Project Overstaffing: When you assign too many resources—such as more days or more expensive personnel than necessary—you reduce your margin and undermine overall profitability.
  • Underutilization or Overwork of Employees: Overworked teams burn out quickly, while underutilized talent becomes demotivated, increasing the risk of burnout or turnover.
  • Lack of visibility: Without reliable data, it becomes difficult to anticipate your priorities or future needs, which makes planning a real headache.
  • Missed opportunities and team dissatisfaction: You may find it difficult to respond to urgent requests or manage slow periods, which can affect both your results and your teams’ motivation.

These pitfalls not only jeopardize your agency’s financial performance, but also the well-being of your employees. In contrast, management based on relevant KPIs paves the way for overall optimization. Let’s explore them in detail.


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The 5 Essential KPIs for Optimizing Your Staffing

1. Utilization Rate (or Staffing Rate)

The utilization rate measures the actual workload relative to your teams’ total available capacity. It is a crucial metric for preventing situations of overwork or underutilization that can negatively impact your agency’s overall performance.

This KPI helps identify:

  • Overworked employees.
  • Periods or projects during which talent is underutilized.
  • The differences between billable time and time spent on ancillary activities.


Why is this important?

A rate that is too high leads to overloads, while a rate that is too low results in underutilization of resources and financial losses.

How can I follow him?

  • Resource Management Software: Implement a tool to centralize and view individual and team workloads in real time.
  • Customizable dashboards: Set up key metrics to quickly identify situations of overload or underutilization.
  • Forecasting: Use predictive tools to anticipate future needs and avoid bottlenecks during peak periods or extended periods of inactivity.


Expected impact: Balanced workload management improves employee productivity, reduces the risk of burnout, and maximizes the efficient use of resources, while increasing overall profitability.

2. Unproductivity Rate

A company wastes 11.4% of its resources due to poor project management.

This KPI measures non-billable time or time spent on internal tasks. It highlights inefficiencies in time management and prioritization.

This KPI helps identify:

  • Employees who spend too much time on internal projects or low-value-added activities.
  • Process bottlenecks that slow down deliverables.
  • Time-consuming, non-billable activities such as unnecessary meetings or administrative tasks.


Why is this crucial?
Reducing unproductive time helps maximize billable time and improve profitability.

How can you track and optimize it?

  • Timesheet Analysis: Regularly review timesheets to identify non-billable activities and internal assignments that account for a disproportionate amount of time.
  • Automation: Implement tools to automate repetitive or administrative tasks, such as data entry or meeting management.
  • Optimizing Meetings: Limit the duration and number of participants in meetings, and establish clear agendas to avoid wasting time.
  • Streamlined Processes: Identify unnecessary steps in your workflows and streamline them to speed up delivery.
  • Team Feedback: Organize sessions with your employees to identify obstacles in their time management and prioritize appropriate solutions.


Expected Impact: By reducing non-billable tasks, you can focus your teams’ efforts on value-adding activities, which improves margins and increases employee satisfaction.

3. The billable objective

The billable target allows you to set a target percentage of billable time per employee and compare it to actual performance. This metric is crucial for assessing whether resource allocation remains aligned with the agency’s financial goals.

This KPI helps identify:

  • The differences between the expected billable rate and the actual rate per employee.
  • Issues that affect project profitability and increase the cost per employee.
  • Signs of an imbalance between the time spent on client-related matters and ancillary tasks.

Why is this crucial?

A realistic billable target ensures that employees remain focused on high-value-added tasks. If the actual billable rate falls short of the target, this leads to higher costs per employee and increased pressure on overall profitability.

How can I follow him?

  • Analysis of Billable Rates per Employee: Regularly track the percentage of time spent on client projects relative to total hours worked. Identify discrepancies to adjust your priorities.
  • Project Profitability Tracking: Verify that the actual time spent on client projects aligns with the planned objectives to prevent financial deviations.
  • Assessing Non-Core Tasks: Identify employees who spend too much time on non-customer-related activities and implement solutions to optimize their time.


Expected Impact:
A well-monitored billable target helps maintain project profitability, prevent an increase in operating costs, and ensure optimal allocation of resources to strategic initiatives.

Thanks to proactive resource planning and more accurate estimates of time spent on each project, the agency has not only improved its profitability tracking but also saved 5 hours per week. This significant improvement was made possible by using Furious.

Caroline Vignand, Associate Director, POP FOR YOU (Humanskills Group)​

4. Percentage of time spent on sold projects

This KPI measures the proportion of time your teams spend on billable projects, relative to the total number of hours worked.

This KPI helps identify:

  • The differences between the estimated time and the actual time spent on client projects.
  • Time wasted on non-priority or ineffective activities.
  • Underutilized resources on projects where their skills could be put to better use.


Why is this crucial?

This KPI helps ensure that the time employees invest generates maximum value for the agency.

How can I follow him?

  • Comparison of Forecasts and Actual Results: Implement resource management software to automatically compare the time estimated for each project with the time actually spent. These variances should be analyzed regularly to identify inefficiencies or adjust practices.
  • Detailed dashboards: Set up metrics to track:
    • The ratio of billed hours to hours worked.
    • Variance analysis by project or by team to identify less profitable assignments.
  • Qualitative Analysis: Conduct project reviews to identify why certain projects are taking longer than expected (unforeseen difficulties, underestimated planning, misallocated skills).
  • Priority Optimization: Identify non-priority tasks that are taking away from the time available for billable work, and implement solutions to reduce or outsource these activities.
  • Employee Feedback: Consult with teams to understand any obstacles they may face in managing their time, and adjust your processes to reduce waste.


Expected Impact:

Better management of this KPI will allow you to increase the productive time allocated to client projects, improve the profitability of each assignment, and maximize the use of your employees’ skills.


5. Absence Rate

The absenteeism rate measures the impact of absences (vacation, sick leave, turnover) on the agency’s overall productivity. This KPI should not be limited solely to occasional absences, but should also take into account the effects of employees leaving and joining the company, which can affect the continuity of projects.

This KPI helps identify:

  • Recurring absences that disrupt schedules.
  • Critical periods when staff turnover or leave affect the continuity of projects.
  • The need for additional flexibility to deal with unforeseen circumstances.
  • Transition phases related to employees leaving and new employees joining, which can cause disruptions in projects.


Why is this crucial?
Accurate tracking of absences and transitions helps prevent disruptions to projects, anticipate peaks in activity, and reduce the workload on the remaining teams. Poor management of these phases can delay projects and affect customer satisfaction.

How can you track and optimize it?

  • Real-time tracking: Use a centralized system to track staff absences and movements. This gives you a comprehensive overview of scheduled time off, unexpected absences, and transition periods.
  • Dynamic Dashboards: Set up metrics to track:
    • The absenteeism rate per shift or per period.
    • Critical absences (on key projects or at critical times).
    • Transition periods (notice periods, onboarding) to anticipate the impact on projects.
  • Structured Transition Plan: Anticipate departures and onboarding with clear handover processes. Implement solutions such as mentoring, project documentation, or accelerated training for new hires.
  • Contingency resources: Plan for flexible solutions, such as backup staff or a pool of freelancers, to ensure project continuity.
  • Regular Communication: Keep your teams informed of upcoming departures and arrivals so you can better organize task assignments and ensure smooth transitions.


Expected Impact: By integrating absence management and transition planning, you minimize disruptions to your projects, ensure production continuity, and reduce the workload on your teams. This helps strengthen your organization’s resilience in the face of staff turnover.

How to Incorporate These KPIs into Your Daily Practices

Involve your teams in the process

Effective KPI tracking starts with the proper adoption of tools and practices. Teams that understand the importance of KPIs are more committed to tracking and meeting them.

Practical tip: Schedule regular meetings to share performance metrics and explain how the data influences your decisions. Collective buy-in strengthens team dynamics.

Centralize your data for a comprehensive view

Working with KPIs scattered across multiple files or tools is like putting together a puzzle with missing pieces. Effective centralization allows you to view the status of your resources in real time.

How do I do that?

Use a single platform to collect, analyze, and share your data in real time. Set up customizable dashboards that are accessible to all managers.

Impact: You gain greater visibility and can make informed decisions quickly.

Automate the tracking of metrics

Manually tracking KPIs is time-consuming and prone to errors. Automation allows you to devote your time to strategic tasks.

How do I do that?

  • Set up automatic alerts to detect critical deviations in real time.
  • Use a tool to automate reporting and obtain accurate data.


Impact: You save time and improve the reliability of your analyses.

(With Furious, dashboards update automatically based on the data entered by your teams. You even receive alerts to help you anticipate overloads or imbalances.)

Make the Switch to Predictive Analytics

Effective management doesn’t stop at the present—it looks toward the future. With forecasting tools, you can anticipate future needs and allocate your resources more effectively.

How do I do that?

  • Implement forecasting tools to anticipate fluctuations in business activity.
  • Analyze historical trends to adjust your strategies.


Impact: You reduce unforeseen issues and optimize your schedules.

Regularly evaluate your practices

KPIs aren’t set in stone. Your agency’s needs change, and your metrics must adapt to remain relevant.

Our tip : After each project, hold a debriefing to analyze what worked (and what didn’t) and adjust your methodologies. This will help you maintain an agile and effective management approach.

Turn Your KPIs into a Strategic Tool

Tracking these KPIs empowers your agency to effectively manage its staffing while maximizing its profitability.

With Furious, you can view these KPIs in real time. Thanks to clear dashboards and automatic alerts, you can turn your data into informed decisions. The result: greater visibility, less stress, and an agency that stays on track for growth.

Don’t let KPIs be just numbers—turn them into strategic drivers of your success.

Book your free demo now and discover how to manage your agency with confidence and efficiency.


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Youmay be asking yourself

these questions.

01 How do you choose the right frequency for tracking these KPIs (daily, weekly, monthly)?

The frequency depends on the nature of the agency, its size, its production pace, and the volatility of its projects. For example, in a very dynamic agency or one that manages many short-term projects, weekly monitoring of metrics such as the utilization rate can be useful. On the other hand, more strategic KPIs (profitability, margin, turnover) can be tracked monthly or quarterly to identify trends. The key is to be consistent and to be able to react quickly enough if a deviation is detected.

This is a common situation. KPIs are interdependent: for example, a high utilization rate (good) may go hand in hand with a high burnout rate or a decline in quality if teams are overloaded (bad). In this case, you need to dig deeper: understand the causes, adjust resources or processes, and rebalance the workload. The goal isn’t to optimize a single metric in isolation, but to achieve a balance so that the overall system remains healthy.

According to the agency, we could consider adding KPIs such as:

  • Cost of skills (actual cost of internal and external resources allocated to a project)

  • Lead/prospect conversion rate if the agency handles a lot of pre-sales work

  • Customer satisfaction (or Net Promoter Score) to assess perceptions of the service provided

  • Turnover or retention rates for internal employees (and external employees, if applicable)

  • Average billing cycle / payment terms, if this has a significant impact on cash flow.

Some best practices:

  • Use tracking tools (project management software, ERP, time-tracking systems) that centralize data.

  • Ensure that all members record their work hours and tasks regularly and accurately.

  • Clearly define what is “billable” versus “non-billable,” what constitutes “productive time,” and so on, in a consistent manner across the agency.

  • Check historical data for anomalies or data entry errors.

  • Automate data reporting (alerts, dashboards) as much as possible to minimize data loss or corruption.

Here is one possible approach:

  • Diagnose: Identify exactly which indicator(s) are causing problems, and when (assignments, teams, clients, type of task).

  • Involve the relevant parties—project managers, human resources, and operational staff—to understand the causes.

  • Test corrective actions: rebalance workloads, reallocate certain non-productive tasks, adjust the schedule, provide training, hire, and delegate.

  • Set up secondary metrics and alerts to monitor the impact of changes.

  • Review regularly (for example, after a month or a quarter) to see if the measures are effective or if other measures should be tested.

The frequency depends on the nature of the agency, its size, its production pace, and the level of volatility in its projects. For example, in a very dynamic agency or one that manages many short-term projects, weekly monitoring of metrics such as the utilization rate can be useful. On the other hand, more strategic KPIs (profitability, margin, turnover) can be tracked monthly or quarterly to identify trends. The key is to be consistent and to be able to react quickly enough if a deviation is detected.

This is a common situation. KPIs are interdependent: for example, a high utilization rate (good) may go hand in hand with a high burnout rate or a decline in quality if teams are overloaded (bad). In this case, you need to dig deeper: understand the causes, adjust resources or processes, and rebalance the workload. The goal isn’t to optimize a single metric in isolation, but to achieve a balance so that the overall system remains healthy.

According to the agency, we could consider adding KPIs such as:

  • Cost of skills (actual cost of internal and external resources allocated to a project)

  • Lead/prospect conversion rate if the agency handles a lot of pre-sales

  • Customer satisfaction (or Net Promoter Score) to assess perceptions of the service provided

  • Turnover or retention rates for internal employees (and external employees, if applicable)

  • Average billing cycle / payment terms, if this has a significant impact on cash flow.

Some best practices:

  • Use tracking tools (project management software, ERP, time-tracking software) that centralize data.

  • Ensure that all members record their work hours and tasks regularly and accurately.

  • Clearly define what is “billable” versus “non-billable,” what constitutes “productive time,” and so on, in a consistent manner across the agency.

  • Check historical data for anomalies or data entry errors.

  • Automate data reporting (alerts, dashboards) as much as possible to minimize data loss or corruption.

Here is one possible approach:

  • Diagnose: Identify exactly which indicator(s) are causing problems, and when (assignments, teams, clients, type of task).

  • Involve the relevant parties—project managers, human resources, and operational staff—to understand the causes.

  • Test corrective actions: rebalance workloads, reallocate certain non-productive tasks, adjust the schedule, provide training, hire, and delegate.

  • Set up secondary metrics and alerts to monitor the impact of changes.

  • Review regularly (for example, after a month or a quarter) to see if the measures are effective or if other ones should be tried.