More and more organisations are working with a flexible IT layer. A vast number of freelance or temporary IT staff have become available. Which is why you must have a good recruitment partner for successful resourcing. How do you ensure a good partnership? We explain how in this blog post.
The market has become increasingly flexible in recent years. More and more people are choosing to be self-employed or to join consultancy firms. This allows them to work on different projects for different customers. As a result of this trend, the volume of external manpower has increased enormously. We hear from customers that the balance is shifting. From eighty percent internal and twenty percent external to 50/50. Or as much as eighty percent external and twenty percent permanent staff. This means that the importance of selecting the right people for your temporary external workforce is increasing. But how do you separate the wheat from the chaff?
Too many options lead to decision fatigue
The trend towards a more temporary labour market, where contracting is preferred to permanent employment, has led to a ballooning in the number of freelancers, small recruitment companies and new business units within consultancy firms. The fact that the job title of “consultant” is neither defined nor protected means the fragmentation is total. As a hiring manager, this means that whenever you send out a request to a number of parties, the phone will be ringing off the hook all week long with recruiters who have heard rumors in the marketplace. Meanwhile, your inbox will be overflowing with unsolicited offers from people saying they know exactly what you need.
This situation with five, or more likely ten, suppliers automatically creates an atmosphere where people play their cards close to their chest. After all, competition is high. Before you know it, you have twenty matching profiles from which you need to select the one perfect candidate. How can you do that? And how do you prevent all these options and possibilities from making you doubt yourself? It may seem almost impossible for you to do it properly. But there is another way.
Invest in partnerships
Finding the right candidates starts with understanding each other in advance, mutual commitment and realistic expectations. This is achieved by involving two or three competent parties in your activities who have experience with the processes and applications for which you as a manager are responsible.
As soon as there is an actual need to hire someone, you only work with these two or three parties with whom you have a strong relationship. They will find the right consultant or freelancer for you in the market. Try to keep your focus steady, and do not try out a new supplier at this stage in the process. Have confidence and draw on the knowledge of your personal contact by talking through the proposed profiles together. Why are you putting this person forward? What do you see in their experience, why can they handle the job? What should I be looking out for when I interview the candidate?
When you show trust you gain trust
Good cooperation begins at the outset. Share your vision as an organisation and as a manager of how you want to work with third parties. By having regular discussions with each other, your partner will know what’s going on in your department and what matters to you. Share your project calendar with them, share information and involve them in the process. Think of it as an ecosystem where customer and supplier work together. Then review the collaboration regularly. Discuss the relationship, identify what has gone well, what shared successes have been achieved and what could still be improved. Trust your partners and they in turn will trust you.
In summary: talk to each other and invest in strong partnerships.
Managing long-term relationships takes time at the start, but then will help you when you need it.
