As we continually remind our readership, tech is no replacement for the important, tangible relationship building between candidate, recruiter and company.
But tech has made some immense improvements in some crucial recruitment sectors, none more so than on the temp desk.
Tech is good for our industry. Tech augments recruitment service function, it drives efficiency and it does so in profoundly inclusive and modern ways.
Some of the models and platforms are incredible pieces of engineering that have reformed recruitment practice in positive ways, with cloud-based efficiencies now meaning connectivity is global and candidates and clients are managed from easy-to-access single points of control.
The rise of tech-based solutions and novel innovations has driven marked business improvements which have been most acutely felt in more reactive recruitment departments. Temporary staff hiring is the quintessential high-impact recruitment sector, and anyone who has manned the phones on a temp desk understands the vast importance of systems – systems of organisation, payment systems, right to work systems, contact systems – everything needs a system to guarantee rapid deployment of people to the right places, almost immediately.
In our digital present, it’s no exaggeration to say well-utilised tech is now the difference between temp desk success and temp desk failure.
Temp recruitment in 2022.
While it may be crass to say we’re going through a renaissance of temp work – and considering a good number of new contingent workers are not temp workers by choice, due to COVID – the working world is starting to find itself with more temporary talent, in more skilled professions, than ever.
“Recent data from the Office for National Statistics revealed the second largest group of contractors now operates within ‘professional, scientific and technical activities with 610,000 UK workers”.
However, the catch here is “now operates within”.
We may have more temps, but they’re all in work, and they’re all in incredibly high demand. Critically, candidates understand this, and the rigmarole of battling counteroffers, the aggressive retention strategies of employers, and pushy recruiters trying to help their clients can alienate every HR party pretty rapidly.
So, in this frame of mind, temp recruiters have a pretty tough task – how to be more visible, more contactable, more relevant to candidates, and how can they use the multitude of social networks and digital comms to connect with people?
And how does tech help temp recruiters do their job – and provide those much-needed systems – even better than they already are?
HR and temp workforce management.
Now, we understand that many different iterations of HR or recruitment teams utilise, support, supply and hire temp staff. But what unites them all is the simple task of how to engage and find temp staff in such a competitive market. It’s harder than ever to pull together consistently available temp teams, and in such a febrile environment any leverage that can be applied to impress opportunity upon contract or contingent workers will be applied.
Like everything recruitment technology-based, the right solution for one firm doesn’t necessarily mean it’ll retrofit straight onto another one. But, in the main, there are some prescient tech features that do work across most industries and across candidate bases.
So what are these pieces of tech that will help temp workers find employment, temp recruitment teams manage their temps, and employers benefit from their new short term charges?
Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) and Recruitment CRM.
The now-dominant model for temp candidate connection, communication, organisation and placement is the ATS or recruitment CRM.
The sheer scalability of modern ATS and recruitment CRM platforms means that a company or agency of any size can utilise platform efficiencies to their requirement, meaning they can benefit from a single point of candidate and client control, within budget, without having to fork out time and effort creating bespoke databases or in-house server networks.
Most recruiters – and medium to large employers – deploy an ATS or CRM. Finding the right ATS or recruitment CRM, and finding the right balance between tech implementation and existing business practice, is now the challenge of our time. With over 450 ATS providers in the UK alone, recruiters are rapt for choice.
Tech as connector .
ATS and CRM platforms offer maximum efficiency in one major way – they source all communications with clients and candidates under one roof.
Through integration with in-house email accounts, social media comms, SMS contacts and calls, tech offers the humble temp recruiter transparent comms and easily accessible data on candidate and client relationships.
And, when integrated with video interviewing, payroll, scheduling, and due diligence database maintenance, a well-curated ATS can become the central controlling point for all temp worker information and organisation.
Primary recruitment functionality.
Further on from that are the more holistic, diligence, and data protection elements of tech recruitment.
If a client needed a worker yesterday, getting through the temp worker paperwork (of which, for good reason, there is a lot) becomes a priority.
Some ATS’ provide features such as digital, video, or remote onboarding, automated payroll management and tax arrangements and online rota accessibility to help import a new staff member into a team (and into workflows) rapidly, thereby cutting the grey area between staff hire date and staff start date down, and helping candidates immediately integrate with new team members and projects.
Performance management and feedback.
Finally, temp recruiters need performance feedback almost in real-time, to help the client (is the new hire working out? Are they the right person?), the candidate (is this job the right sort of temp job for them? Are there any issues with the placement?) and recruiter (has the placement been effective and efficient? Is there anything we missed?).
Key ATS providers and CRM platforms provide this sort of solution, further helping enshrine efficiency of placement – and fair management of staff and client – into their tech stack.
A quick, responsive process is what you need to attract and engage the best talent.
At Rectec we help organisations to find the best Applicant Tracking System or best Recruitment CRM to suit your needs, accompanied by our unique complementary technology marketplace, to help you build the perfect recruitment tech stack for your business.
You can click here to register for Rectec Compare – and best of all, it’s completely free of charge.