Metric	Junior	Mid	Senior	Staff+
Typical salary band (US)	$85,000 - $110,000	$120,000 - $160,000	$160,000 - $220,000	$200,000 - $280,000
Weeks to 50% velocity	8	5	4	5
Weeks to 90% velocity	22	12	9	16
Mentor peak / week	20 hrs	14 hrs	10 hrs	8 hrs
Total first-90-day cost	$15k - $25k	$25k - $45k	$40k - $65k	$60k - $85k

Junior (0-2 yrs)

$15k - $25k onboard, 22-week ramp

RC-JUNIOR

Cheapest hire on the salary line. Most expensive hire per productive hour. The slow-start logistic curve means you pay full salary for very little output during weeks 1-6.

Plan for 4-6 months to 90% velocity
20+ hrs/week of mentor pairing peak (weeks 2-4)
Highest variance: well-bootcamped juniors ramp twice as fast
ROI dominated by retention - juniors who stay 18+ months pay back several times over

Mid (2-5 yrs)

$25k - $45k onboard, 12-week ramp

RC-MID

The volume sweet spot. Reasonable ramp, moderate mentor needs, fastest payback per dollar invested. Most engineering organisations should optimise their onboarding programme around mid-level hires.

8-14 weeks to 90% velocity
Peak mentor: 12-16 hrs/wk in weeks 2-3
Best target for structured 30-60-90 plans
Codebase complexity dominates cost variance

Senior (5-10 yrs)

$40k - $65k onboard, 9-week ramp

RC-SENIOR

Fast code output starts in weeks 1-2, but the hidden cost is tech-lead time. Senior hires need architectural context, not pairing. Ramp is short on the curve, but fully-loaded weekly salary is the highest line item.

6-10 weeks to 90% velocity
Peak mentor: 8-12 hrs/wk - mostly architecture walkthroughs
Tech lead time consumed > junior mentor time on a $/hr basis
On-call eligibility from week 6-8 typical

Staff+ (10+ yrs)

$60k - $85k onboard, 16-week ramp

RC-STAFF

The hidden ramp paradox: staff engineers ship code from week two, but reaching full strategic impact takes 3-6 months. Cost driver is not productivity loss - it is organisational context absorption and cross-team relationship building.

Code velocity arrives quickly; strategic impact 3-6 months
Peak mentor: 6-10 hrs/wk - mostly principal engineer / VP time
Tech-debt grandfathering and ADR catch-up dominate weeks 1-4
Onboarding success measured in influence, not commits

When to hire at each level

A simple decision frame.

Hire juniors when you have mentor capacity, a calm codebase, and a 12-month investment horizon.
Hire mid-level when you need volume velocity and have a structured 30-60-90 day plan.
Hire senior when you need a shipping lift in quarter and can spare tech-lead time for architectural onboarding.
Hire staff+ when you need to change technical direction, untangle a critical system, or unlock a stuck team.

Common questions

Why are juniors so expensive to onboard?+

Salary alone is misleading. A junior earning $95K still costs the company $73 per hour fully-loaded. Spending 22 weeks at sub-50% productivity, plus 20 hours of senior mentor time per week early on, means each junior absorbs $15K-$25K in onboarding cost despite the lower salary line.

Why are staff engineers slow to ramp despite seniority?+

Staff-level impact is not about code commits - it is about influencing technical direction, untangling tech debt, mentoring teams, and aligning roadmaps. That requires deep organisational context. The first 30 days of code output is misleading; real impact lands at month four or five.

Should we hire juniors or seniors during a growth phase?+

Seniors if you have onboarding capacity. Juniors if you have mentor capacity. Most teams default to seniors during growth because the per-hire payback is faster, but a mature platform engineering team can absorb 2-3 juniors per quarter cheaper than one senior.

Where can I get current salary data?+

Levels.fyi (2025-26 data, US TC bands), Stack Overflow Developer Survey 2025, and Robert Half tech salary guide. The numbers on this page are blended midpoints from those three sources for US-based hires.