Across the nation, more employers are feeling the pinch of finding and attracting quality talent during a lingering skills gap and heated war for talent. To compensate, many savvy employers ranging from industries such as IT to healthcare, have embraced the use of contingent workers. Staffing Industry Analysts estimated in 2014 that as many as 18% of U.S. employers were now using contingent labor, up from 12% in 2009. This shift towards acquiring skill based talent shows no sign of slowing. The U.S. Government Accountability Office estimates 40.4% of our workforce has a contingent labor job, whether in addition to or in place of a traditional employment agreement. As these programs continue to grow, what comes into focus is challenges with contingent workforce management- from cost containment to compliance and regulatory issues, and more. To solve these challenges, employers using contingent labor are increasingly turning towards partnering with a managed service provider. But there are still many myths that prevent employers from embracing the managed service provider partnership model. Are these myths holding your organization back?
Don’t Lose Out On the Benefits of a Managed Service Provider Because of these Myths
Under a partnership with a managed service provider, employers are able to realize many benefits, including cost containment, diversity spend, process efficiencies, improved compliance, and more. It seems as if it’s common sense that these benefits would be attractive to employers. Yet, persistent myths may be holding your organization back from realizing these benefits. Let’s examine them here:
Myth #1: Hiring managers are able to manage contingent workforce programs in their spare time. One of the most persistent myths that prevents employers from realizing the benefits of a managed service provider partnership is that their hiring managers can manage growing contingent labor programs on their own.
Fact: Hiring managers are unable to create proactive and compliant programs that drive cost savings and strategic alignment with organizational goals. Hiring managers are not skilled in the many complexities of contingent work- non-employee classification, regulatory compliance, cost savings approaches, process efficiencies, and more. Often, acquiring contingent labor is a fragmented process when hiring managers are responsible for these programs. Suppliers often respond quickly, but charging crisis rates that drive the cost of the program higher. Compliance is often an afterthought in these scenarios. Managing these critical elements of contingent workforce management are best left to the experts in the field. Those experts are a part of your managed service provider partner.
Myth #2: Managed Service Providers operate as “middlemen” who add complexity and remove direct access to candidates. Because a managed service provider is a third party entity, many view them as simply a “middleman” who adds complexity to the program and distances hiring managers from candidates.
Fact: Managed service providers are skilled in process optimization and efficiency, providing direct access to candidates through the use of VMS technology. The experts at a managed service provider partner are experts in risk management and compliance. While this may seem a little more complex to hiring managers, it ultimately benefits employers by reducing risk of costly fines, audits, and penalties associated with risky strategies. By partnering with a managed service provider such as RightSourcing, the leading healthcare- focused vendor neutral MSP, employers gain access to onsite program management teams that assist hiring managers with the entire engagement process. Using VMS technology, hiring managers are able to directly collaborate with staffing suppliers, maintaining close contact with the candidate selection and engagement process. These processes become optimized and streamlined under the careful guidance of the experts at a managed service provider partner.
Myth #3: Employers will fail to get the best candidates if they work with a managed service provider instead of one staffing supplier. A concern many employers have is that they’ll somehow lose quality of candidates by working with a managed service provider instead of maintaining a close relationship with a staffing supplier but this is a myth.
Fact: By partnering with a managed service provider, employers are assured increased access to qualified candidates. In today’s marketplace, candidates sign up with multiple staffing suppliers. No one supplier maintains a monopoly on their candidate pool. When employers partner with vendor neutral managed service providers, they’re able to increase access to candidates, enlarging their pool of qualified talent. This is because a vendor neutral MSP does not compete with staffing suppliers to place candidates. Thus, they maintain large networks of thousands of staffing suppliers across the nation. Suppliers working in partnership with a managed service provider submit to every open requisition they can to continue working in large volume with their partner. Because compliance and risk mitigation are such strong core values of a managed services program, candidate quality is assured.
Myth #4: Partnering with a managed service provider will be expensive. Many employers fear that partnering with a managed service provider will add unnecessary expense, but this too is a myth.
Fact: Clients are able to realize large cost savings with a managed service provider. By partnering with a vendor neutral MSP such as RightSourcing, employers are able to see large cost savings. This is due in part to the creation of a fair and competitive marketplace created by submitting open requisitions to multiple suppliers at once. Further cost savings are achieved from market intelligence, process optimization, accounting and HR efficiencies, and more.
Outsourcing contingent workforce management to a managed service provider partner can be a daunting idea if an employers is still operating under these myths. However, the facts remain that employers are able to realize cost savings, improve risk mitigation and compliance, and obtain access to qualified candidates to fill their open positions.