ERP Contract Team Sizing Calculator
Size the contract seats on your side of an ERP project, the weeks each one runs and what they cost at KORE1 bill rates.
ERP implementation team size for a default mid-market project, two subsidiaries, four integrations, one warehouse and eight months to go-live, comes to five customer-side contract seats and about $297K to $421K at KORE1 bill rates.
Last updated: October 20, 2026
Enter subsidiaries, integrations, warehouses, modules and your go-live date, and the calculator returns the customer-side contract seats, the weeks each seat runs and a cost range at KORE1 bill rates. One contract ERP consultant at the KORE1 median of $91 an hour costs about $47,200 for three months and $94,400 for six (KORE1 Contract Rate Index 2026-Q4).
Most ERP proposals price the partner and stop there. The project manager who can say no, the analyst who knows which customer record is real and the tester who signs off don’t show up as a line, so they don’t show up in the budget either. Nobody budgets for them.
This sheet writes them down the way an ERP writes down anything it has to build, as a bill of materials. Every seat is a line with a quantity, a start week and a cost. Every seat is also either bought, a contract seat, or made, one of your own people. A parts list for people.
That’s the work of our ERP consultant staffing desk and the ERP program team staffing page behind it, inside the IT staffing services KORE1 has run since 2005.
How many contract seats does your ERP project need?
A few inputs, no sign-up. Each seat on the right is a line in a bill of materials with a start week, an end week and a price. Mark a seat as your own people and it stays on the sheet, unpriced.
A first ERP, or a replacement for one. Every seat is on the table and the build runs long.
Seats start and stop as a share of this clock. Hypercare is added after it, 4 weeks for an implementation and 2 for an upgrade.
Subsidiaries are the legal entities you consolidate. Integrations are connections to other systems. Warehouses are sites with their own receiving and counts.
Each one adds testing and training, and four or more adds seats.
Any level uses KORE1’s own ERP placements. Mid and senior use the national modeled cells.
A seat you cover yourself isn’t priced. If that person won’t be free for those weeks, switch it back.
ERP implementation team size, explained in 4 minutes
Video chapters
- 0:00 — Intro
- 0:15 — How many contract seats does your ERP project need?
- 0:53 — What the partner quote leaves out
- 1:36 — What each seat costs at KORE1 bill rates
- 2:30 — What is in each bill rate?
- 3:11 — What breaks if the customer-side team is understaffed?
Read full transcript
Your ERP partner quoted their people. Did anyone quote yours? The project manager who can say no. The analyst who knows which customer record is real. The tester who signs off. They don’t show up as a line in the proposal, so they don’t show up in your budget either. Nobody budgets for them.
KORE1 built a calculator for that gap. You enter subsidiaries, integrations, warehouses, modules and your go-live date. It returns the customer-side contract seats, the weeks each seat runs, and a cost range at KORE1 bill rates. No sign-up. The default mid-market project has 2 subsidiaries, 4 integrations, 1 warehouse, and 8 months to go-live. It comes to 5 customer-side contract seats and about $297k to $421k. Every seat is a line with a quantity, a start week and a cost. And every seat is either bought, a contract seat, or made, one of your own people. A parts list for people. Mark a seat as your own, and it stays on the sheet, unpriced.
Open the staffing page of any implementation proposal. You’ll find the partner’s people. Hours by role, a blended rate, a hypercare line if you’re lucky. Yours aren’t there. Somebody on your side still approves the design, cleans the customer master, runs acceptance testing and answers the phone during the first close. Without the hours, the project borrows them from the month-end close. And that’s the one thing you can’t borrow from. When a quote comes in light, one of these seats usually went missing. The project manager. User acceptance. Data cleanup. Hypercare, quoted as available, which leaves the first close to whoever picks up the phone. Start with the project manager. If the quote’s project manager reports to the partner, nobody on your side owns the plan. The default sheet gives you 37 weeks of one. And the tester? 18 weeks, full time.
Every rate in the sheet is a cell of the KORE1 Contract Rate Index 2026-Q4. Some cells are observed, from KORE1 contract placements. Others are modeled from BLS wage data. Each one is labeled, and nothing is blended. One contract ERP consultant at the KORE1 median of $91 an hour costs about $47,200 for 3 months, and $94,400 for 6. That’s 40 hours a week. The cell is 15 KORE1 placements, billed at $73 to $123. Level moves the number too. The modeled mid-level ERP consultant has a median of $84, and senior comes in at $106. Project managers and business analysts both sit at a $116 median. Data analysts are at $115, software engineers at $105, and help desk at $49. Those cells are primarily Southern California, so your metro will move them.
A bill rate isn’t what the contractor earns. Take round numbers, not KORE1’s. A contractor paid $100 an hour costs $124 loaded, once you add 24% for employer payroll taxes, required insurance, and California paid sick leave. So $100 in pay, plus $24 of burden, is $124 loaded. A bill rate around $150 to $160 covers that, plus recruiting, account management, and margin. Round numbers for illustration, not a KORE1 rate. Quoted markups hide the difference. A percentage on pay looks smaller than the same percentage on loaded cost, and burden often gets left out of the quote entirely. So ask which one the number sits on.
Testing, data cleanup and decisions slip first. Those are the seats a partner can’t fill for you. And every week they slip either moves go-live, or moves the defects into production. Squeeze testing from 18 weeks to 6 and the date holds. The testing doesn’t. Duplicates survive the load and turn up in the first invoice run. An integration goes live that nobody tested end to end. Who finds out first, you or your customer? And scope grows, because the one person who can say no is also running a department. A seat doesn’t have to be a contractor. It has to be somebody with the hours. If you do buy one, KORE1’s median offer-to-start is 3 days, and the median contract assignment runs 116 days. Contract-to-hire conversion is 37.5%, so a seat you buy to cover a build can become the person who stays. Send the partner proposal and your go-live date to the ERP program team desk at KORE1.com. A KORE1 recruiter will mark which seats to buy and which to cover yourselves.
Inputs and the assumptions behind your ERP implementation team size
A team you can’t take apart is a team you can’t argue with. Here is every rule the sheet applies. No black boxes. Change one in your head and you’ll know which way the total moves.
| Seat | New implementation | Upgrade or re-platform |
|---|---|---|
| Project manager | One seat from 5% of the way to go-live to the end of hypercare. 20 hours a week, 30 on a large program, 40 on a huge one. | One seat from the first week to the end of hypercare, 20 hours a week. |
| ERP functional lead | One seat from 10% of the way to go-live to the end of hypercare, 30 hours a week or 40 on a large program. One more seat at four or more modules, at six or more subsidiaries and on a huge program. | One seat from 5% of the way to go-live to the end of hypercare, 30 hours a week. A second seat at ten or more integrations. |
| Business analyst | Only at four or more modules or four or more subsidiaries. One seat for every four modules counting core finance, from 5% to 70% of the way to go-live, 40 hours a week. | Only at three or more modules. One seat, 20 hours a week, from 5% to 50% of the way to go-live. |
| Data migration analyst | Only with two or more subsidiaries, one seat and a second at six or more. Starts earlier as subsidiaries grow, ends one week past go-live. 20, 30 or 40 hours a week by subsidiary count. | Only with four or more subsidiaries. One seat, 20 hours a week, from 30% to 80% of the way to go-live. |
| Integration engineer | One seat for every six integrations, from 25% of the way to go-live to two weeks after. 20, 30 or 40 hours a week by integration count. | One seat for every eight integrations, from 20% of the way to go-live to a week after. 20 hours a week, 30 above six integrations. |
| QA and UAT tester | One seat from 55% of the way to go-live to two weeks after, 40 hours a week, when you have two or more modules, a warehouse or a second subsidiary. A second seat at four or more modules or three or more warehouses. | One seat from 45% of the way to go-live to a week after, 40 hours a week, because an upgrade is mostly regression testing. A second at four or more modules or three or more warehouses. |
| Go-live support | One seat plus one for every two warehouses, from two weeks before go-live to the end of hypercare, 40 hours a week. Marked as your own people by default. | One seat plus one for every three warehouses, from a week before go-live to the end of hypercare. Marked as your own people by default. |
Large means six or more subsidiaries, ten or more integrations or four or more modules. Huge means ten or more subsidiaries or twenty or more integrations. Weeks are shares of the time to go-live, plus the hypercare weeks after it. These are KORE1 model assumptions, not market data, which is why they’re printed.
Cheaper by exclusion
“A materially cheaper proposal is usually cheaper by exclusion rather than by efficiency.”
Colin Boothe, CIO at Foretopia, in a 2026 ERP integration proposal
Same rule for team size. When a quote comes in light, one of these seats usually went missing.
- The project manager. If the quote’s PM reports to the partner, nobody on your side owns the plan, and the default sheet gives you 37 weeks of one.
- User acceptance. A line called “UAT support” often means the partner helps and your people test, and at the default the tester runs 18 weeks full time.
- Data cleanup. Loading records gets priced. Deciding which of two customers is the real one doesn’t.
- Hypercare. Quoted as “available”, which leaves the first close to whoever picks up the phone.
What each seat costs at KORE1 bill rates
Every rate in the sheet is a cell of the KORE1 Contract Rate Index 2026-Q4, effective October 16, 2026. Observed cells come from KORE1 W2 contract placements started 2023 to 2026, with at least five in each cell. Modeled cells start from BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. Nothing here is blended.
| Seat and index cell | Bill, p25 to p75 | Median | 3 months | 6 months |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ERP consultant, all levelsObserved, multi-state, n=15 | $73 to $123 | $91 | $47,200 | $94,400 |
| Business analystObserved, primarily Southern California, n=10 | $90 to $120 | $116 | $60,400 | $120,900 |
| Business systems analystObserved, primarily Southern California, n=6 | $99 to $103 | $99 | $51,500 | $103,000 |
| Project managerObserved, primarily Southern California, n=21 | $105 to $124 | $116 | $60,400 | $120,900 |
| Data analystObserved, primarily Southern California, n=11 | $69 to $116 | $115 | $59,800 | $119,600 |
| Software engineerObserved, primarily Southern California, n=16 | $91 to $120 | $105 | $54,600 | $109,200 |
| Help deskObserved, primarily Southern California, n=39 | $41 to $55 | $49 | $25,500 | $51,000 |
| QA tester, mid levelModeled, national | $73 to $94 | $83 | $43,000 | $86,000 |
| ERP consultant, mid levelModeled, national | $75 to $95 | $84 | $43,700 | $87,300 |
| ERP consultant, seniorModeled, national | $95 to $115 | $106 | $55,300 | $110,600 |
Hourly figures are bill rates, what you pay, never what a contractor earns. Three and six months are 40 hours a week at the median. The observed cells are multi-state for ERP and primarily Southern California for the rest, so your metro will move them. Method and exclusions are on the contract rate methodology page.
What is in each bill rate?
Not what the contractor earns. Take round numbers, not KORE1’s. A contractor paid $100 an hour costs $124 loaded once you add 24% for employer payroll taxes, required insurance and California paid sick leave.
- Pay
- $100
- Burden at 24%
- + $24
- Loaded cost
- $124
- Bill rate
- about $150 to $160
Round numbers for illustration, not a KORE1 rate.
Simple math. The payroll tax rates sit in IRS Publication 15.
A bill rate near $150 to $160 covers that loaded cost plus recruiting, account management and margin.
Quoted markups hide the difference. A percentage on pay looks smaller than the same percentage on loaded cost, and burden often gets left out of the quote entirely, so ask which one the number sits on. Our page on the contractor burden rate builds the 24% line by line.
KORE1 Contract Rate Index 2026-Q4 and KORE1 contract placement records.
What the partner quote leaves out
Open the staffing page of any implementation proposal and you’ll find the partner’s people. Hours by role, a blended rate, a hypercare line if you’re lucky. Yours aren’t there. They aren’t the partner’s cost.
They’re your cost, though. Somebody on your side approves the design, cleans the customer master, runs acceptance testing and answers the phone during the first close, and without the hours the project borrows them from the month-end close, which is the one thing you can’t borrow from.
That line is what the ERP program team staffing desk prices, and it’s where ERP staff augmentation picks up once the partner rolls off. Our guide to ERP implementation team structure names the roles, and how long ERP implementations take shows what the clock does to the seat count.
Pricing the whole project means adding licenses and partner hours, which the NetSuite implementation cost calculator and the Dynamics 365 implementation cost calculator do, while this one prices only your side.
What breaks if the customer-side team is understaffed?
Testing, data cleanup and decisions slip first, because those are the seats a partner can’t fill for you, and every week they slip either moves go-live or moves the defects into production.
- Testing gets the leftovers. The default sheet gives the tester 18 weeks. Squeeze that to six and the date holds while the testing doesn’t.
- Duplicates survive the load and turn up in the first invoice run.
- An integration goes live that nobody tested end to end. Who finds out first, you or your customer?
- Scope grows. The one person who can say no is also running a department.
A seat doesn’t have to be a contractor. It has to be somebody with the hours. Hours, not titles.
If you do buy one, the median offer-to-start at KORE1 is 3 days (n=1,997) and the median contract assignment runs 116 days (n=1,887), and because our contract-to-hire conversion rate is 37.5% (n=552), a seat you buy to cover a build can become the person who stays. Our ERP go-live and hypercare staffing page covers the weeks after launch.
How the numbers are built
Two kinds of cell. Always labeled. Observed cells are KORE1 placements, with n shown, and modeled cells start from BLS wages.
Observed cells
KORE1 W2 contract placements started 2023 to 2026, five or more per cell, labeled multi-state or primarily Southern California.
Modeled cells
BLS OEWS May 2025 wages plus a 24% burden, times the bill-to-cost range KORE1 observes on its own placements.
Thin cells stay visible
The business systems analyst cell has six placements and a four dollar spread. We show it and say so.
Next refresh
The index updates every quarter, and this sheet’s rates follow it as new placements and BLS data arrive.
Common Questions
How many contract seats does an ERP implementation need?
A mid-market implementation with two subsidiaries, four integrations and three modules needs five customer-side contract seats in this model, peaking at five at once, and fewer when your own people cover some of them.
Small projects lose the analyst seat, and one subsidiary loses the data seat. Big ones add a second functional lead at four or more modules, so change an input above and watch the lines move. Try it.
What does a contract ERP consultant cost for three or six months?
One contract ERP consultant at KORE1’s median bill rate of $91 an hour costs about $47,200 for three months and $94,400 for six, at 40 hours a week.
That’s the all-levels cell from KORE1’s own placements, n=15, multi-state, billed at $73 to $123. Level moves the number. The modeled mid-level cell runs $75 to $95 with a median of $84, about $43,700 for three months, and senior runs $95 to $115 with a median of $106, about $55,300.
What do contract project managers and business analysts cost?
KORE1’s contract project managers billed $105 to $124 an hour (median $116, n=21) and business analysts billed $90 to $120 (median $116, n=10), about $60,400 for three months of either at the median.
Business systems analysts billed $99 to $103 (median $99, n=6), a thin cell we show and label, and all three are primarily Southern California, so your metro will move them, which the IT contractor rates by city page shows in detail.
How long should a customer-side contract seat last?
Match each seat to its phase, not to the whole project, because a project manager runs from kickoff to hypercare while a tester might run 18 weeks. KORE1’s median contract assignment is 116 days (n=1,887).
Weeks come from the clock. Seats that stop at go-live cost less than seats you extend in a panic, and our guide to how long ERP implementations take shows what moves the date.
Why do two quotes for the same contract seat differ so much?
Usually one price includes burden, recruiting and account management while the other states a markup on pay, so ask which number a percentage sits on.
A contractor paid $100 an hour costs $124 loaded at 24% burden, and a bill rate near $150 to $160 covers that plus recruiting, account management and margin. Round numbers, not KORE1’s.
The contractor burden rate page lists what the 24% pays for.
Hit me up with the quote and the go-live date.
Colin Boothe, CIO at Foretopia
Send the partner proposal and your go-live date to the ERP program team desk. A KORE1 recruiter will mark which seats to buy and which to cover yourselves, and our average time to a first vetted candidate is 17 days.
Talk to the ERP Program Team Desk →