5 Tips to Create a Network of Teams from Contingent Labor
Recently, we discussed two significant trends in human resources for people professionals: contingent labor and a network of teams. Both represent sizable shifts that people professionals like yourself have dealt with other the past few years. Today, both contingent labor and a network of teams represent the future of staffing.
Instead of being a passing trend, 40% of the U.S. workforce was comprised of contingent labor in 2015. With tech making the world more accessible, this number has surely gone up in the following years. Meanwhile, the network of teams concept is shaking up long-standing hierarchies in the office. Today, companies are more mission focused, led by experts and encourage employees to work across their departments. By breaking down walls, employees and the business thrive as a cohesive unit.
In today’s technologically advancing world, a network of teams is your best option for building a thriving contingent labor workforce. If you are about to build your team, consider the following tips to successfully scale your contingent labor pool.
Creating a Network of Teams from Contingent Labor
Creating your network of teams can take you down a variety of options. PeopleTicker’s 2016 year in review found the following breakdown of contingent labor:
- 16.2% are standard hourly contingent workers
- 12.9% are independent contractors who find their own clients
- 3.5% are on-call hourly workers
- 3.3% are self-employed
- 3% are contract workers
- 1.3% are sourced from staffing agencies
Each avenue can be your key to creating a network of teams from the contingent labor workforce. To successfully hire your team, consider the following tips:
1. Be good and generous
Employees do not belong to their employers anymore, so it doesn’t matter if you hiring for a long-term position or just closing a small gig with a designer on the other side of the world.
You should think about your employer brand all the time.
Staffing is and will continue to change. Embrace the changing times and lean into bringing your organization into the future.
Brief them with your vision, goals, and values, share how your team usually work and ask if he has other suggestions.
Give feedback when things get done on time, and to your satisfaction, take the time to write a review, pay on time, offer them to use the company logo and showcase your work in their portfolio of possible. Don’t wait for them to ask, be kind enough to help them grow their business and brand and look for the win-win all the time.
Doing so will improve your brand and will create a better relationship with you outsource workforce.
2. Work with contingent labor when you have the skills in your team
The best assignments and roles to outsource work was, up until recently, on tasks that are repeatable and clearly detailed. These requirements have shifted. Now, you need to consider roles that are more abstract and less task-centric. A few years ago, transcription and maybe some blogging would be your top outsourced roles. Today, numerous teams turn to contingent labor when they need to clear their backlog. In short, is your team fretting the work and at its bandwidth? Then, it may be time to bring in some additional workers.
The starting point to determine the need for outside work is to know what your team can produce in-house within its bandwidth. If it can’t produce the work, consider going with contingent labor. The best way to stay informed on the team’s bandwidth is to occasionally check-in with them to gauge the needs of their department.
3. Consider contingent labor when you don’t have the skill in your team
When it comes to new tech skills it’s getting hard to find talented professionals that willing to commit to one employer. Use the contingent ecosystem not only as more hands to help your teams with the load. But also to search and offer to professionals to teach and guide your team, share their knowledge and their skills and engaged with your team in more ways. Doing so makes outside workers feel more part of the team and less a cog in the machine. Also, this is might be the only way you can offer that one passive candidate you’ve been stocking for months a side gig that he might be willing to consider.
4. Remember the goal of each hire
Company goals vary and shift frequently. It’s your duty as the company’s people operations to understand the needs of the hire. After consulting with the hiring managers and hiring a team, understand how their work gets done and how another hire will help their productivity. Be sure to come away knowing if the role is going to be crucial in scaling the business goals quickly, producing sustained quality work or fill a need during a sprint. With the goal in mind, you can tap into your network of teams to find the right person. Alternatively, if you are building your contingent labor team, now you know the top needed skills and qualities you need to staff.
In this step, you get to go beyond asking if this requires extra workers, and instead asks “why”? Then ask if this hire assists in maximizing results. What is the positive impact of their joining the team? By asking yourself these questions, you ensure that the goal of the company gets considered before a job posting is listed.
5. Know where to source talent
It is crucial to have your go-to streams to staff your network of teams. It’s more important to know which streams work best for you. As you move along, this may become less of a concern as you’ll have recommendations and stable contingent workers to rely on. However, in the beginning, it is vital that you have your streams. For some, it is LinkedIn. Others rely on staffing firms. Then, there are those that use sites like Upwork, Fiverr, People Per hour and other freelancers platforms.
Each comes with its own set of pros and cons. While you’ll find more talent on broad range sites, you’ll have to sift through numerous that don’t qualify. On a site like Angellist, you can meet more specific to your search, especially in startup spaces, but run into a competitive, fast-moving space. If that isn’t how your company hires, you could lose your top targets on these sites. Whichever your path, analyze the talent pool, any applicable costs and answer any other questions you have about the platform before posting an ad.
With the arrival of Peoplzz, we intend to make services around business and people operations more accessible and easier to engage for all parties. Soon, HR, people analytics, talent acquisition and other professionals around Talent experience market will be able to showcase their skills and credentials for companies. In the Peoplzz market network, HR and Talent acquisition professionals will be able to connect and get more work done. The market opens soon. We can’t wait to make the varied and meaningful more accessible than ever before!
Also, let us know how you staff your contingent labor pool. We’d love to hear how you built your network of teams!
