Sprachbarrieren kosten Zeit und Geld.

Sie bremsen den Wissenstransfer aus, verursachen Reibungsverluste zwischen den Teams und erhöhen die Fluktuation. Das Problem ist real, lässt sich aber ohne Daten nur schwer belegen.

Dieses Tool hilft Ihnen dabei, die Kosten der Untätigkeit zu berechnen und einen Business Case zu erstellen, dem Ihr Management Gehör schenken wird. Geben Sie die Ziele Ihres Unternehmens, die Teamgröße und die aktuellen Kosten ein, um sich ein klares Bild davon zu machen, welche Kosten Ihnen durch Sprachbarrieren entstehen

Step 1 of 4 Choose your north star

Build the business case

Build the business case for language training in 5 minutes

Start with what matters most to your business. We'll walk you through the numbers and produce a CFO-ready business case you can take into your next budget conversation.

Choose your north star

Which business outcome are you building the case around?

Pick an outcome to start · takes ~5 minutes · no login required

Step 2 · Context

Tell us about your team

Every input comes with a sensible default, so you've got a realistic starting point. You can change any number to match your programme.

Employees in scope How many people would the language programme cover? Average annual salary Per employee, in your selected currency. We use it to size replacement cost and the value of time your team gets back.

€

Your annual budget for this programme The total annual budget you'd put behind this initiative. We compare the value created against this, so use a figure you own.

€

Currency Used for display only.

EUR € GBP £

Step 3 · Analysis

Voluntary turnover: let's quantify your retention opportunity

Four short questions to size the opportunity: the metric that matters, where it sits today, where you want it, and what language training can shift.

What are we measuring?

Voluntary turnover — the share of people who leave by choice each year, not through redundancy or restructuring.

Every voluntary leaver carries a replacement cost: recruitment, onboarding, ramp-up, and lost knowledge.
It compounds — the longer language barriers limit engagement and progression, the more embedded it becomes.

Source: SHRM 2025 CHRO Benchmarking · Work Institute 2025 Retention Report

Where is it today?

Current voluntary turnover rate

Industry average sits around 18%. Retail, frontline, and BPO contexts often run higher.

Where does it need to be?

Target turnover rate

A 5-point improvement is a typical year-one target for a focused learning and development (L&D) programme. LinkedIn's research reports strong learning cultures achieve up to 57% higher retention over time.

Replacement cost (multiple of annual salary) SHRM benchmark: 50–200% of salary depending on level. Defaults to 1.0× (mid-level); drop to 0.5× for frontline roles, or raise it for specialists.

How much of this is down to language training?

Language is one factor among many. Pick the confidence level that fits — most teams leave this on Balanced.

We apply it as a range and use the midpoint for the headline. A higher band credits more of the gain to language training.

What are we measuring?

Language friction — the time your team loses each week to clarifications, rework, slow threads, and meetings that need a translator in the room.

McKinsey finds knowledge workers lose about 1.8 hrs a day to information friction; language amplifies that in multilingual teams.
It becomes embedded the longer it goes unaddressed.

Source: McKinsey Global Institute · Microsoft Work Trend Index 2024

Where is it today?

Hours lost per employee per week

hrs / week

A rule of thumb: pick ≈0.5 hrs if language friction is occasional, ≈1.5 hrs if it happens most days, 2+ hrs if your team works across languages constantly. Busuu's model assumes 1–2 hrs/week is recoverable per learner once they reach prerequisite proficiency.

What's the cost per hour?

Hourly cost per employee (salary plus overhead)

€ / hr

We work this out from the average salary you entered (salary × 1.4 for benefits & overhead, over your working weeks at 37.5 hrs). Adjust if you know your real loaded rate.

Working weeks per year

weeks

How much of this is down to language training?

Language is one factor among many. Pick the confidence level that fits — most teams leave this on Balanced.

We apply it as a range and use the midpoint for the headline. A higher band credits more of the gain to language training.

What are we measuring?

Revenue at risk — the annual value of sales that customer-facing staff struggle to close because of language friction.

Missed upsells, lost negotiations, and interactions that fall short.
The bigger the team and the higher each relationship's value, the larger this gets — and stronger language confidence lifts conversion and CSAT.

Source: Busuu Calculating Business Value deck, sales revenue uplift scenario

Where is it today?

Customer-facing sales employees in scope How many sales or customer-facing employees will the programme cover?

Annual revenue at risk per employee Roughly how much revenue each person manages that's exposed to language gaps. Pick a band, or enter your own figure.

What share is language-driven, and what improvement do you expect?

Share of at-risk revenue you'd attribute to language gaps (%)

Start at 25% and adjust to your team's language mix and customer base. If language is a key barrier in your sales environment, this may be higher.

Expected sales improvement from better language skills (%)

How much of that at-risk revenue stronger language skills could win back. Adjust it to how much language matters for your team.

How much of this is down to language training?

Language is one factor among many. Pick the confidence level that fits — most teams leave this on Balanced.

We apply it as a range and use the midpoint for the headline. A higher band credits more of the gain to language training.

What are we measuring?

Production waste — errors, rework, and scrapped output that trace back to communication breakdowns.

A clear, real cost operations leaders recognise.
Language barriers also carry a safety and compliance dimension — surfaced alongside your results.

Source: Busuu Calculating Business Value deck (internal) · Vesselinov et al. 2025 (language-skill ROI, Duolingo/Harvard)

Where is it today?

Annual operating cost of the teams in scope Your annual operating cost for these teams. A quick way to estimate: in-scope headcount × revenue (or cost) per employee. This is the one finance figure worth confirming with your ops or finance lead.

€

Estimated waste / rework as % of production cost

Poor-quality work usually costs from a few percent up to the mid-teens. Default is 7.5% — adjust it to your operation.

How much of this waste is communication-driven?

Share of waste you'd attribute to language gaps (%)

Set this from what you see on the ground — you know your operation best. Default 35%.

Expected waste reduction from improved communication (%)

Default 30%. Your estimate of how much language-linked waste better communication could remove.

How much of this is down to language training?

Language is one factor among many. Pick the confidence level that fits — most teams leave this on Balanced.

We apply it as a range and use the midpoint for the headline. A higher band credits more of the gain to language training.

What are we measuring?

Revenue at risk — when customer-facing teams don't share a language with customers, deals slip and customers feel unheard.

A daily reality for support, onboarding, and account-management teams working across markets.
Shows up as missed renewals, unresolved escalations, and avoidable churn.

Source: Busuu buyer research, customer-facing roles

Where is it today?

Customer-facing employees Your headcount for customer-facing roles. Default 100 is a starting point.

Estimated % of customer interactions involving language friction

Start at 15% and adjust to your language mix and customer base.

Annual revenue at risk per customer-facing employee The revenue each person manages that's exposed to language gaps. Pick a band, or enter your own figure.

What's the expected improvement?

Expected improvement in friction-affected interactions (%)

Default 30%. Your estimate of how many language-friction issues stronger skills could fix.

How much of this is down to language training?

Language is one factor among many. Pick the confidence level that fits — most teams leave this on Balanced.

We apply it as a range and use the midpoint for the headline. A higher band credits more of the gain to language training.

Calculating your ROI…

Step 4 · Results

Your business case, at a glance

Based on your inputs — adjust anything and the numbers update live. Full methodology, formulas, and citations are on the page below.

Projected annual value with Busuu

€0 to €0

After your programme attribution, before programme budget

Return on investment

Return multiple

0×

Payback

—

Ready to turn this into your business case?

Talk to the team that has done this for 600+ organisations — we'll help you build a board-ready plan.

Get in touch

Here's the value your team could create

Total exposure is the whole problem if nothing changes. The ROI above compares only the part language training can realistically move — across your programme attribution — against your budget.

Your value statement appears here.

This is the business case you will need to make to your CFO in 12 months. The sooner the programme starts, the stronger that case becomes.

Your inputs

Defaults are starting estimates — adjust them to your figures. Full methodology, formulas, and citations are on the page below.

Get in touch

Setzen Sie Sprachtraining in Relation zu den Kennzahlen, auf die es ankommt

Die erfolgreichsten L&D-Führungskräfte präsentieren Sprachkurse nicht als Zusatzleistung. Sie stellen einen direkten Zusammenhang zu geschäftlichen Kennzahlen wie Mitarbeiterbindung, Produktivität, Risikominderung und Umsatz her.

Dieses veränderte Framing verdeutlicht dem oberen Management, dass Sprachtraining echte betriebliche Probleme löst. Wenn Mitarbeitende klar kommunizieren, kommen Projekte schneller voran, passieren weniger Fehler und bleiben Top-Leute im Unternehmen.

Die Kosten der Untätigkeit anhand von Daten zu belegen, kann schwierig sein, da dies von den Zielen Ihres Unternehmens, der aktuellen und zukünftigen Teamgröße, den Durchschnittsgehältern und vielen anderen Faktoren abhängt. Deshalb konzentrieren sich die überzeugendsten Business Cases auf Ergebnisse, die Ihrer Unternehmensleitung bereits am Herzen liegen, und stützen sich dabei auf Zahlen, die sie anerkennt.

Häufig gestellte Fragen

Wie misst man den ROI von betrieblichem Sprachtraining?

Der ROI hängt davon ab, was für Ihr Unternehmen am wichtigsten ist. Für manche ist es eine geringere Fluktuation. Für andere stehen eine schnellere Einarbeitung, weniger Sicherheitsvorfälle oder eine höhere Kundenzufriedenheit im Vordergrund. Entscheidend ist, zunächst Ihr Ziel zu definieren und anschließend die Kennzahlen zu verfolgen, bei denen Sprachkenntnisse den Ausschlag geben.

Welche Kennzahlen sollten in einem Business Case für Sprachtrainings berücksichtigt werden?

Ein überzeugender Business Case verknüpft das Training mit Ergebnissen, die Ihrer Unternehmensleitung wichtig sind, und mit Kennzahlen, die sie anerkennt. Gängige Kennzahlen sind die Mitarbeiterbindungsrate, die Durchschnittsgehälter und die Kosten pro Lernender bzw. Lernendem. Probieren Sie unseren Rechner aus, um herauszufinden, welche Kennzahlen für Sie wichtig sind, und verschaffen Sie sich einen guten Überblick darüber, welchen Mehrwert Sprachtraining für Ihr Team bieten könnte.

Wie wirkt sich Sprachtraining auf die Mitarbeiterbindung und die Produktivität aus?

Mitarbeitende, die sich in ihrer Entwicklung unterstützt fühlen, bleiben eher im Unternehmen. Sprachkurse beseitigen zudem alltägliche Reibungsverluste, was zu weniger Missverständnissen, einer schnelleren Zusammenarbeit und einem reibungsloseren Wissenstransfer führt. Wenn Mitarbeitende klar kommunizieren können, arbeiten sie effizienter und fühlen sich stärker mit ihrem Team verbunden.

Was sind die „Kosten der Untätigkeit“?

Die Kosten der Untätigkeit sind das, was Sie bereits dadurch zahlen, dass Sie Sprachlücken nicht schließen. Mit anderen Worten: Es sind die Kosten für verzögerte Projekte, wiederholte Fehler, verlorene Kunden und eine höhere Fluktuation. Dieses Tool hilft Ihnen dabei, diese versteckten Kosten abzuschätzen, damit Sie klare Argumente für eine Investition vorbringen können.

ROI-Rechner für Sprachtrainings

Sprachbarrieren kosten Zeit und Geld.

Build the business case for language training in 5 minutes

Choose your north star

Tell us about your team

Voluntary turnover: let's quantify your retention opportunity

Your business case, at a glance

Here's the value your team could create

Setzen Sie Sprachtraining in Relation zu den Kennzahlen, auf die es ankommt

Häufig gestellte Fragen