Industrial Training, Documentation & Work Instructions worked example

Onboarding Capacity at 54% trainer availability for onboarding: a worked example

This worked example runs the onboarding capacity numbers for a tougher week than the baseline: 54% trainer availability for onboarding instead of the typical 75%. Calculate how many new operators your training team can onboard per period based on trainer capacity, onboarding duration, trainer availability, and successful completion rate.

The inputs for this scenario

  • Trainees per trainer per cohort: 4 trainees / cohort (held at the documented default)
  • Onboarding cohorts per period: 6 cohorts (held at the documented default)
  • Trainer availability for onboarding: 54 % (the input this scenario stresses; the baseline uses 75)
  • Successful onboarding completion rate: 90 % (held at the documented default)

Working through the calculation

  • The calculation starts from the formula this tool documents: Gross onboarding capacity = trainees per cohort x cohorts per period.
  • Effective onboarding capacity (successful completions) works out to 11.66 new hires at these inputs, and this is the headline figure for the scenario.
  • Gross onboarding slots available works out to 24 new hires at these inputs.
  • Capacity lost to trainer availability constraints works out to 11.04 new hires at these inputs.
  • Capacity lost to incomplete onboarding attempts works out to 1.3 new hires at these inputs.

How this compares with the baseline

  • Against the tool's baseline example, where trainer availability for onboarding sits at 75% and the headline result is 16.2 new hires, this scenario comes in 28% below the baseline at 11.66 new hires.
  • Use it during workforce and hiring planning to set realistic new-hire targets, or when diagnosing why an onboarding pipeline can't keep up with demand. A result at this level usually justifies acting on the stressed input before touching anything else, because every other figure in the table is downstream of it.

Results at a glance

  • Effective onboarding capacity (successful completions): 11.66 new hires (headline result)
  • Gross onboarding slots available: 24 new hires
  • Capacity lost to trainer availability constraints: 11.04 new hires
  • Capacity lost to incomplete onboarding attempts: 1.3 new hires

Run it with your numbers

  • To rerun this with your own numbers, open the live Onboarding Capacity calculator, set trainer availability for onboarding to your actual value, and adjust the remaining inputs to match your operation.

Last reviewed 2026-05-12.