short-staffed

British  

adjective

1. lacking an adequate number of staff, assistants, etc

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Explanation

If a business is short-staffed, it has fewer workers than usual. When a small cafe is short-staffed, servers might have to help wash dishes and ring customers up at the cash register. A short-staffed workplace suffers from an inadequate number of employees. This can be an ongoing problem: "Don't go to that grocery store, they're constantly short-staffed and the lines are always too long." It can also be a temporary situation, like the day several librarians happened to call in sick, leaving the library short-staffed. The term is from the "having too few" sense of short and the verb staff, "provide with workers."

Example Sentences

Assessing what went wrong after a boy died by drowning in 1985, on a day when she was short-staffed, Ms. Fash says she began to question her boss’s tight control over the system.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 24, 2026

“You’ve been nothing but a distraction and disruption since you’ve been here. I’m already short-staffed and I just lost five nurses and half my environmental services team because you walked in,” he shouts.

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 20, 2026

If the IRS is short-staffed, that puts the onus on taxpayers to make sure everything is correct and accurate on their returns.

From MarketWatch • Jan. 8, 2026

But as air traffic controllers remain short-staffed and customers face frequent flight delays, both social media users and aviation experts say Duffy is missing the point.

From BBC • Nov. 26, 2025

Mom had been working overtime because the bookstore she manages is short-staffed.

From "Liar, Liar" by Gary Paulsen