This approach within the RFx process involves a detailed inventory of existing organizational practices in order to test where solution partners would apply their specific expertise. This exploratory effort does not have a set outcome but is intended to solicit solutions without a known problem. See RFx, Request for Information (RFI), Request for Proposal (RFP), Request for Quotation (RFQ)
Any worker who has been evaluated and determined to meet the legal requirements to perform work as an Independent Contractor (IC) (See Independent Contractor (IC – Not SOW))
A pricing model whereby a payroll provider charges its clients the actual statutory costs legally required by any government body for acting as a worker’s employer plus the payroll provider overhead costs and profit for its services.
An arrangement between an organization and an independent contractor that has established itself as a legal entity (LLC, corporation, or S corporation) rather than a sole proprietor independent contractor (1099). In the UK, a limited company established by an IC which is owned and controlled by the independent contractor is known as a “personal services company.”
Any company to which you provide Agent of Record or Employee of Record services. This may be an end-user hiring entity or it may be a staffing intermediary. Only in situations where you have a separate contract with a different business unit or division of a client company should you count these as separate clients.
A service segment of the Payrolling/Compliance Industry, Independent Contractor Evaluation and Compliance (ICEC) describes a service provided to a hirer to ensure the hirer is not exposed to any legal and/or financial risk related to the sourcing, recruiting, hiring and/or management of independent contractors. Independent contractor evaluation and compliance (ICEC) service providers will evaluate a hirer’s processes and worker status to ensure that the hirer has commercially viable risk mitigation programs in place with regard to the classification of independent contractors. Depending on the legislative environment within a particular country, employee misclassification risk (and the liabilities imposed) can vary as it relates to the independent contractor, the staffing intermediary and the end-user.
An arrangement in which a service provider acts as the employer of a contingent worker recruited by and working for a third-party hirer. This arrangement is found in different business models across the globe, such as the typical US “payrolling” model also found in the Netherlands. Payrolling services are typically billed at significantly lower mark-ups than traditional temporary staffing because the staffing firm or other intermediary has not incurred any recruiting costs.
A segment of the Payroll/Compliance Industry, a payroll service is a business service that provides payroll processing, pay check writing, and payroll tax administration, for a fee. A payroll service is an administrative function provided on the basis that no co-employer or joint employer relationship exists. The service is usually provided by specialist payroll companies but can, sometimes, be provided by staffing companies for an administration fee.
Staffing of research professionals and research technicians, primarily serving the pharmaceutical (clinical trial), biotech, chemical, and food and beverage industries. Common job titles include scientist, research assistant, clinical trial coordinator and chemist. Roughly corresponds to the US BLS’s Life, Physical, and Social Science Occupations group and to the ISCO’s Physical and Earth Science Professionals and Life Science Professionals groups.
A method by which the staffing firm or managed service provider markets the position under the client’s brand rather than its own.
The Workforce Solutions Ecosystem highlights interconnected components of the Staffing Industry and
other types of Workforce Solutions. It comprises six primary segments all of which are further defined in
this Lexicon:
• Staffing,
• Process Outsourcing,
• Payrolling/Compliance,
• Contracting/Consulting,
• Talent Acquisition Technology, and
• Other Workforce Solutions
Businesses in this Ecosystem operate in a broad and complex network of related and unrelated products
and services which interact and compete with each other.
We have placed the Staffing Industry at the core of this Ecosystem, though, of course, we realize that this
will appear to be a somewhat biased perspective if the center of your particular universe lies elsewhere.
We are confident that the Workforce Solutions Ecosystem provides a good representation of the market as it
exists today, but we are equally confident that it will need reviewing and updating on a fairly frequent basis,
owing to the rapid evolution of technology and globalization.
The advanced application of procurement methodologies and disciplines to the acquisition of enterprise services; such as travel, catering and other forms of service based spend. In terms of contingent labor, it is most often used in reference to the provision of more complicated services categories, which are usually executed under a discrete contract per engagement such as Statement of Work (SOW), Management/Project Consulting and Outsourced Services (e.g., Call Centers, IT Support etc.).
The use of technology, and more specifically artificial intelligence, to automate parts of the recruitment process from sourcing through to matching, shortlisting, fulfillment and onboarding.
An automated computer program that conducts an online conversation to convincingly simulate how a recruiter would behave during the initial stage of the hiring process. Employers use Recruitment Chatbots in order to stay in contact with candidates once they have submitted their details and update them on where they are in the hiring process so that all candidates are properly engaged and dealt with efficiently and respectfully. Thereby, chatbots can bring efficiencies and cost savings to the hiring process especially where the employer is having to deal with high volumes of applications.
Some Recruitment Chatbots have been designed with the job seeker in mind to act as their ‘virtual’ agent in administering the multiple job applications they have made.
Blockchain is a distributed, decentralized peer-to-peer ledger system. A ledger system is a database of transactions; thus, a blockchain can be thought of as a decentralized database where anyone has write access and no one maintains centralized control. It is the technology that underpins cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, though it can be used to create many kinds of decentralized applications and has implications for any industry that is transactional in nature, relies on intermediaries, or is reliant on data (that is, virtually all industries, including staffing).
The use of technology, and more specifically artificial intelligence, to automate parts of the recruitment process from sourcing through to matching, shortlisting, fulfillment and onboarding.
Services procurement (Workforce Services Procurement) is the advanced application of procurement methodologies and disciplines to the acquisition of enterprise services; such as travel, catering and other forms of service based spend. In terms of contingent labor, it is most often used in reference to the provision of more complicated services categories, which are usually executed under a discrete contract per engagement such as Statement of Work (SOW), Management/Project Consulting and Outsourced Services (e.g., Call Centers, IT Support etc.)
Temporary help services typically comprises a third party recruiting and hiring its own staff and assigning those staff to perform work at, or services for, other organizations that need the services of those staff. Assignments of such staff are used typically to support or supplement the other organizations’ workforce in situations such as, but not limited to, employee absence, skills shortage, seasonal workload, or to perform special assignments or projects. On termination of the assignment, the third party providing the temporary help services customarily attempts to reassign the staff to other organizations.
Proactive approach to registering and managing a group of passive and active candidates and organizing these into interest groups and creating communities of prospective candidates to support candidate interests and to meet client objectives (e.g., diversity, skills, location, seniority). Evidence of talent pool management would include metrics that monitor the size of the pool against pool targets, including new additions as well as how many drop out of the pools. The talent pool is actively managed through a communications plan (supported by CRM technology) and candidates are often given the opportunity to join a pool or unsubscribe after which they may or may not receive company updates or communications that relate to their area of interest or expertise.
A pool of workers most commonly used in the healthcare sector for supplemental staffing of clinical nursing positions (sometimes referred to as a nurse bank). The ultimate objective is to provide a database of available personnel without having to go through a third party. The float pool provides consistency in supplemental staffing by utilizing experienced nurses and assuring a more highly prepared nursing team is available with consistency of orientation toward the organization, its policies and departments, thereby fostering shared cultural values. Float Pool workers are offered a variety of work by being given opportunities to work across different departments.
In addition to staffing, many staffing firms in Latin American markets offer an outsourcing arrangement Staffing Industry Analysts defines as “Staff Outsourcing.” In this arrangement, the firm provides workers to complete a project for a client, for example, and the workers remain on the supplier’s payroll. The firm, however, is not typically managing the project on behalf of the client as in other forms of outsourcing. Because staff outsourcing is not legally considered a temporary arrangement, it is less regulated and has thus become a popular business model among staffing companies.
A combined platform of human resource management technology that seeks to automate repetitive and time-consuming tasks and, thereby, frees up time for the HR department and enables it to focus more on culture issues, retention, and other highly impactful areas. Modules within a typical HRMS will include managing payroll, recruitment and onboarding, gathering, storing, and accessing employee information, keeping attendance records and tracking absenteeism, performance evaluation, benefits administration, learning management, employee self-service and employee scheduling.
A service segment of the “Other Workforce Solutions Industry” within Staffing Industry Analysts’ Workforce Solutions Ecosystem, including a number of different software solutions that can be deployed post-sourcing of workers in order to better manage, engage, and motivate these workers. These solutions include the following activities offered as a standalone activity (or point solution): onboarding, personnel administration, benefits administration, performance management, learning management, time and attendance, expenses management and engagement/recognition. These point solutions can also be bundled as part of a suite of Human Resource Management System (HRMS). Within our definition, HR Tech excludes technologies used to acquire talent (such as ATS and VMS) and payrolling, as these appear elsewhere within our Ecosystem. While we might categorize them separately, some vendors do include these services within their wider HRMS portfolios.
From an HR perspective, Silver Medalists are qualified candidates who have applied for and reached the shortlist but did not get a position. As these candidates represent a significant investment of your recruiters and hiring managers’ time, their details should be retained in your Applicant Tracking System (ATS) and can be great candidates for future job positions. Proactive employers implement policies to have an ongoing engagement with these potential new hires.
Multi-component software designed to automate and facilitate the processes involved in finding, attracting, assessing, interviewing and hiring new personnel. The RMS is often integrated with an organization’s own website and can be accessed by corporate recruiters via Web browsers anytime in order to reach candidates in a resume database quickly and accurately. An RMS will typically offer features such as real-time online job posting management, candidate search and candidate management with user alerts and filtering technology to screen out unqualified candidates.
A category of outsourcing offered to staffing firms from companies based in lower-cost labor markets (primarily India and the Philippines) that can help staffing firms to lower cost and improve their flexibility and efficiency. Many ORS providers promote themselves as Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) firms and a number even include this service description within their brand name. However, the offshore support available to staffing firms goes beyond the processes directly related to recruitment.
An employee who is employed on a Fixed-Term Contract. The employee will have the same rights as other employees, and in Europe has the right to be treated no less favorably than a comparable full-time employee working for the same employer.
From an employment perspective, a contract that will terminate at a future date when a specific 'term' expires – e.g. the completion of a project or task, the occurrence or non-occurrence of a specific event (covering for an employee who is on sick or maternity leave, for example). The contract may be an employment contract with an employee or a service contract with a contractor on the basis of a statement of work. Fixed-Term Employees have employment rights and, in Europe, have the right to be treated no less favorably than a comparable full-time employee working for the same employer.
A sub-category of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) that refers to the practice of a law firm or corporation obtaining legal support services from an outside law firm or legal support services company (LPO provider).
A labor contract describing the conditions of work but without any guarantee of work. Employees issued with this type of contract are typically obliged to accept any work that is offered to them, and make themselves available for work. This type of employment contract has been prohibited in the UK and New Zealand. Variations are possible, for example with the guarantee of a certain minimum amount of work in a given period, e.g. weekly or monthly. These are often referred to as “Fixed or Guaranteed Hours” contracts.
Workforce Solutions are third-party products and services relating to the sourcing, engagement and development of employed and non-employed (including contingent) workers. Workforce Solutions includes the Staffing Industry and five other important segments; Talent Acquisition Technology, Process Outsourcing, Payrolling/Compliance, Contracting/Consulting, and Other Workforce Solutions.
The practice of using the right percentage of each workforce category
(employees or contingent workers) to accomplish corporate objectives as profitably and safely as possible.
The situation in which two or more workers may “share” one full-time position at a
company, often for the purpose of schedule flexibility. The workers often stagger their schedule in order to
meet outside personal commitments such as family responsibilities. In other cases, an employer, in lieu of a
layoff, may combine two jobs into one and retain both workers, each working a reduced schedule.
Refers to a request from an organization for a specific type of service to be provided by one or
more temporary employees for a specific period of time.
Fees that apply to the transition out of a service as the service is then taken in-house or
transitioned to another supplier. Fairly common in outsourcing arrangements.
Model in which vendors are invited to fill positions in a well-defined order and often with time triggers. For example, a temporary vacancy will go to Tier 1 vendors first, and then to Tier 2 vendors if not filled within a certain time period.
On-site coordination of a customer’s temporary help services through an exclusive, long-term general contractor relationship with a temporary help company. The designated vendor on premise may enter into subcontracting relationships with other temporary help suppliers, or such relationships may be specified by the customer.
A term used to describe a model in which a managed services or VMS technology handles
its tasks (e.g. order distribution or candidate selection) based on client-defined policies that mandate that
all (or a pre-defined set of ) staffing suppliers (vendors) be (a) given an equal opportunity to fill each order,
and/or (b) selected for each order based on the same criteria. Under a vendor-neutral model, a managed
services or VMS provider could not, on its own accord, push orders to itself or any other staffing vendor. The
presumed advantage of a vendor-neutral model is that the best supplier with the best candidate will fill each
position. The term is sometimes used in a stricter form to refer to an independent managed service provider
that is completely autonomous, or semi-autonomous, from the staffing suppliers.
A common alternative model is a combined MSP/master supplier approach. Here the master supplier also
acts as the MSP, and, with the full support and knowledge of the client, pushes a disproportionate share of
orders to itself. Orders it cannot fill itself are sent to other staffing suppliers. The presumed advantage of
this approach is volume pricing discounts for the client, and potentially a supplier that gets to know the
client’s needs more intimately.
A service segment of the Talent Acquisition Technology Industry. A VMS is an Internet-enabled application that acts as a mechanism for business to manage and procure staffing services through third party staffing suppliers (temporary help as well as, in some cases, permanent placement services) as well as outside contract or contingent labor. VMS systems now often include the management of Statement of Work (SOW) consultants and outsourced services within their scope of coverage. Typical features of a VMS include supplier management, order distribution, consolidated billing, risk mitigation, headcount tracking and significant enhancements in reporting capability over manual systems and processes.
A comprehensive approach to managing an enterprise’s interactions with the organizations that supply the goods and services it uses. Vendor management includes both business practices and software (e.g. VMS) and attempts to streamline and make more effective the processes between an enterprise and its vendors.
A list of approved vendors that an organization can consider using to fill its staffing needs. Organizations typically manage their approved vendor list as a way to control rogue spending with suppliers that have not negotiated a favorable contract with the company.
Contracting with an outside business service to provide either on-site or off-site vendored services that may have been previously handled directly by the customer.(See also: Outsourcing.)
The provision of business services by an outside supplier (vendor), where the vendor brings its own employees on-site to perform a specific function, such as running a cafeteria or providing security services, or uses its own employees off-site to perform a specific function that was formerly done by the customer.(See also: Outsourcing, Insourcing.)
Contract with a supplier defining the general conditions and the subsidiaries,
services, geographical regions or job-profiles included. For the respective deliverables of the supplier
specific additional conditions might apply.
UK legislation based on the European Union Business Transfers Directive designed to protect the rights of employees including continuity of service, conditions and terms of work in a situation in which an undertaking or service provision — in part or whole — is transferred. This can be an issue when an existing contract for the provision of temporary workers is terminated and transferred to another supplier that does not wish to take on the existing staff.
Pricing model that is based on a unit that can vary over time. For instance, price
per applicant or price per contractor.
A service segment of the Other Workforce Solutions Industry, there are many
forms of work-related Training provided by third-party experts. Some may relate to a very particular job
role such as electrical engineering, accounting or nursing, some provide education on broader skill sets such
as sales techniques, public speaking/presenting, health and safety and leadership, while others help workers
develop better skills on a particular software program. Many staffing firms will provide training where it
can improve the skills (and, therefore, the value) of a temporary worker and, in certain countries, such as
France, such training is a legal obligation. Accreditation is formal, third-party recognition of competence to
perform specific tasks.
A segment of temporary staffing that includes, but is not limited to, workers with the skills, knowledge and training required for occupations in light industrial, office/clerical and general labor categories. Sometimes referred to as “Commercial Staffing.”
Our preferred term for what previously has been called “permanent”
employment. Because no job is truly permanent, “traditional employment” provides a better contrast to
“contingent employment.”
A model of talent or workforce management that includes an organization’s acquisition and management of all human talent in the broadest sense including “permanently hired” workers and all types and sources of “contingent” workers (see Talent Management,
Contingent Work/Workforce),
as well as non-human talent including robots, bots, software and automation. Spurred by organizational bifurcation and the rising importance and preferences of contingent workers, this model seeks to integrate the respective management of “permanent hire” and the “contingent” workforce by HR and Procurement functions. An employer that practices Total Talent Management (TTM) will consider various options such as hiring an employee, using a contingent worker, acquiring or hiring a robot, etc. And when thinking about “engaging” talent, an employer that practices TTM will design programs/approaches that engage ALL Talent, not just employee talent.
Alongside this comprehensive definition of TTM, there is a spectrum of solutions that are rather less than “total” and only partially meet the definition such as a program that includes permanently hired workers and some types of contingent workers (i.e., temporary agency workers). Nevertheless, such programs may be described as TTM by those supplying and using them.
While Total Talent Management is a term that tends to be used by hiring organizations, RPOs have begun using the term “Blended Workforce Management” to refer to the same concept but provided as an outsourced service by an RPO. Total Talent Management is Staffing Industry Analysts’ preferred descriptor for this phenomenon/development. (See: Contingent RPO, Blended Workforce.)
A model for Talent Acquisition, subsumed within the concept of Total Talent Management and therefore encompassing the acquisition of all human talent in the broadest sense including “permanently hired” workers as well as all types and sources of “contingent” workers (see Talent Management, Contingent Worker), as well as non-human talent including robots, bots, software and automation. Total Talent Acquisition (TTA) refers not only to the operational approaches to sourcing, recruiting, and engaging talent, but also to higher level strategic considerations of structuring or managing the talent supply chain (i.e., decision about outsourcing, sourcing geographies, etc.).
Alongside this comprehensive definition of TTA, there is a spectrum of solutions that are rather less than “total” and only partially meet the definition such as the acquisition of permanently hired workers and some types of contingent workers (i.e. temporary agency workers). Nevertheless, such approaches may be described as TTA by those supplying and using them.
TTA differs from Total Talent Management (TTM) in that it does not incorporate policies and practices for the ongoing management and motivation of workers. As such, TTA may be a precursor to the implementation of a full TTM program.
A business analysis that assesses cost to include direct cost (purchasing price) and indirect cost (related to the use of a service or product). In temporary staffing services, this is often used by employers to ask temporary staffing agencies for proposals to decrease the total cost of using temporary employees, besides the hourly bill rate. Options to reduce TCO are implementing specific Sourcing Models (see definition), close monitoring (e.g., consolidated reporting), or additional services like wage management.
Time and materials is a standard phrase in a contract in which the
buyer agrees to pay the provider based upon the work performed by the contractor’s employees and
subcontractors, and for materials used in the performance of the Assignment. This is opposed to a fixedprice
contract in which the buyer agrees to pay the contractor a lump sum for fulfillment of the contract no
matter what the contractor pays its employees, sub-contractors and suppliers.
A system and method for collecting and recording time and expenses. Time
and Expense systems can be stand-alone products or integrated in other applications, such as VMS or ERP
software.
A service segment of the Other Workforce Solutions Industry, Testing is the practice of
administering written, oral, or other tests as a means of determining the suitability or desirability of a job
applicant or for evaluating the suitability of an existing employee. These may include the evaluation of hard
skills such as performance assessments and job knowledge tests but also soft skills by way of personality
examinations using various psychometric techniques. Pre-employment screening undertaken before
someone is offered a job or temporary position may also include background checks and drug testing
which are commonly conducted for hiring in safety critical roles such as heavy machinery or driving and
government agencies although there is a growing trend for tests to be administered in a wider range of
industries.
Transition of a temporary worker to permanent employment status. This may be on an ad hoc reactive basis where an employer finds that a temporary worker can fulfill a permanent job vacancy or a more formal employment service concept where a client company proactively plans to make a traditional hiring decision during or after a temporary help assignment. The term is falling out of favor due to aversion to the use of “permanent” when referring to a typical “at-will” employment situation. The fee for transitioning a temporary worker in this way would normally be charged at a discount to the staffing company’s standard permanent placement fee and normally related to the length of time the temporary has been assigned to the client. Temp-to-perm fees may be subject to legislation in certain European jurisdictions.
SIA counts fees from “temp-to-perm” conversions as a form of direct hire revenue. (Other terms used to describe this process are temp-to-direct, temp-to-hire, try-before-hire or try-before-buy.)
A service segment of the Staffing Industry that provides temporary help and related staffing services to businesses and other clients. The temporary staff provided are recruited, screened, possibly trained, and (in most cases) employed by the temporary staffing provider, then assigned to client organizations. Although the customer typically assumes supervisory responsibility for these workers, in certain service arrangements coordination or supervisory functions may be provided by the supplier.
A group of in-house employees hired directly by a company and used to fill temporary
job assignments at that company.
A term that is often used to distinguish between the temporary help services of
a staffing firm and its “permanent placement” activities. In a legal sense, the term may be used incorrectly,
because “placement” refers to affecting an employment relationship, and providing a temporary worker
involves the provision of a service by a person already employed by a temporary firm.
An organization engaged in the business of furnishing its own employees
(temporaries) to handle customers’ temporary staffing and special projects needs. A temporary help
company recruits, trains, and tests these employees, then assigns them to clients for a finite (albeit
sometimes very extended) time period.
The furnishing of employees to meet the short-term and/or project needs of another
employer. Originally used primarily as replacements for office or light industrial workers, temporary help
has come to be used across a broad range of skills and occupations. Most of the companies delivering this
service are now referred to as staffing firms or temporary staffing firms.
An employee who performs work for an organization with the expectation that the work will be for a fixed duration. Temporary employees may be hired directly by the employer or sourced through a staffing company and work fulfilling client assignments. May also refer to temporary workers from an internal pool employed directly by an organization for an intentionally limited time period.
Common abbreviation or colloquial expression for temporary worker.
Working at home, or at another off-site (satellite) location, for an organization whose
office is located elsewhere, with one-way or (usually) two-way electronic linkage to that organization via
phone, fax, modem, and/or the Internet or a company Intranet. Home work may be full-time, occasional, or
a scheduled part of the workweek.
A firm that locates, recruits, and hires technical and/or engineering skilled
personnel and then contracts with another company to assign its workers at the customer’s location for a
specified duration and/or project.
The provision of technical and engineering personnel including engineers, computer
programmers, systems analysts, designers, drafters, writers, editors and illustrators.
Passive and active sources of talent who are selected based on common interests, location or
skills who are potential targets for the sourcing of future candidates.
A talent management system (TMS) is an integrated software suite
that addresses recruitment; performance management; learning and development; and compensation
management.
Interconnected human resource processes designed to source, attract, select, train, develop, retain, promote, and move “regular employees” (as opposed to contingent workers) through an organization with the aim of improving revenue, customer satisfaction, quality, productivity, cost, cycle time, and market capitalization. The major aspects of talent management normally include recruiting, performance management, leadership development and workforce planning/identifying talent gaps. (See:Workforce Management, Total Talent Management)
An online (possibly cloud technology-based) platform spanning worker type (direct employee or contract, task-based, project-based or position-based), location (work where appropriate, needed), and time (global environment, work when it makes sense). This broad definition could conceivably include job boards/social networks, crowdsourcing platforms, and what Staffing Industry Analysts identifies as “Human Cloud” platforms such as oDesk, Elance, etc., and is used in the e-recruitment process.(See also: E-recruitment, Human Cloud, Job Board, Crowdsourcing, Online Staffing, Online Services.)
An opt-out clause successfully negotiated by the Swedish delegation when the Agency Workers Directive was debated among social partners in the European Union. This derogation means that the AWD rights to equal pay of a temporary agency worker do not exist when the temporary agency worker is directly employed on a permanent basis by the temporary work agency and receives pay in-between assignments. While the derogation was credited to the Swedes, it is also a crucial factor for the German and (to a lesser extent) Dutch staffing markets, where it is normal for temporary workers to be employed full time by their temporary work agency.
A term to encompass a variety of services related to staffing or payrolling services.
Talent Engagement is made up of the following categories, all of which have their own definitions in this
lexicon: Managed Service Providers, Recruitment Process Outsourcing, Payrolling, Online Staffing, and
Professional Employer Organizations.
Industry segment of the Workforce Solutions Ecosystem, defined as technology based businesses related to attracting, sourcing, recruiting, and hiring (or placing) employees and non-employed workers within an organization. This includes elements of employment branding, candidate attraction, networking, and relationship building with potential candidate communities to continually build and enhance the talent pool for an organization. Talent Acquisition Technology is a broad category which includes Job Boards for advertising vacancies online, Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) for processing new hires, Vendor Management Systems (VMS) for managing staffing suppliers and an emerging category of online services operating within the ‘Human Cloud’.
The ongoing cycle of processes related to attracting, sourcing, recruiting, and hiring (or placing) employees within an organization. This includes elements of employment branding, outreach, networking, and relationship building with potential candidate communities to continually build and enhance the talent pool for an organization.
Supply Chain Management (SCM) is the management of the flow
of goods and services. It includes the movement and storage of raw materials, work-in-process inventory,
and finished goods from point of origin to point of consumption. Interconnected or interlinked networks,
channels and node businesses are involved in the provision of products and services required by end
customers in a supply chain. In a contingent progam supply chain management refers to the process of
optimizing a company’s contingent talent pipeline from candidate sourcing to onboarding and beyond.
MSP and/or VMS programs are funded through a small, negotiated margin
percentage or fixed fee added to the billing of each assignment.
Staffing firms are referred to as suppliers by some contingent workforce buyers (whether hiring organizations or VMS/MSP entities).
The provision of temporary workers to a client company to supplement the
current workforce for peak loads, special projects, or planned and unplanned worker absences. Also
describes the regular practice of using contract healthcare staff in hospitals and other medical institution
settings.
Selection of multiple suppliers in a specific priority, usually based on pricing level, combined with size and capacity. (See also: Sourcing Model.)
The process an organization undertakes to develop a holistic, long-term and proactive approach to strategically assessing and accessing all multiple forms of talent engagement. Specifically, Strategic Workforce Planning links corporate and strategic objectives and their associated workforce implications with multiple avenues of talent engagement and resourcing (Direct Hire, Contingent, SOW, Outsource, etc.).
The pre-planned use of alternative or flexible staffing strategies by the customer. May
include the use of temp-to-perm hiring, planned temporary staffing for work cycle peaks or projects, or
payrolling, for example.
A method established by the American Institute of Certified
Public Accountants (AICPA) for telling an auditor how to assess and issue an official auditor’s report about
a service provider’s internal controls. Standard 70 focuses on services that could impact a service user’s
financial reporting, including payroll services, benefits claims processing, outsourced IT operations or
data centers, and vendor management services or software. An SAS Type I audit presents a snapshot of the
service provider’s controls at a moment in time, whereas a Type II audit presents those same controls in
operation over a period of at least six months and is recognized by the Securities and Exchange Commission
(SEC) as an acceptable way of obtaining an auditor’s opinion for Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Section 404. (See
Also: SAS 70 Type II Audit). SAS 70 reports are issued on every continent and country leading to various
audit and accounting standards being used. To address the inevitable overlap that arises from multiple
similar standards, an initiative was started in 2007 by the International Auditing and Assurance Standards
Board (IAASB). The goal of the IAASB initiative is to issue two new international standards for reports on
controls at service organizations. One of the two standards will be for user organizations and their auditors
(ISA 402), while the second standard will be for service organizations and service auditors (ISEA 3402).
Both ISA 402 and ISAE 3402 are assurance reports which aim to provide insight into the controls at a thirdparty
service organization.
An individual performing services in accordance with a document (the Statement of Work) that captures the work products and services to be delivered under a contract for services between a client and either the consultant (or usually their business entity) or a provider of consultancy services. (See also: Statement of Work.)
A document that captures the work products and services, including, but not limited to: the work activities and deliverables to be supplied under a contract or as part of a project timeline. In contrast to a typical temp or contingent work arrangement which is billed based on time worked, SOW agreements are usually billed based on a fixed price deliverable or for hitting specific milestones. Like typical contingent arrangements, they may also be billed based on time, including arrangements where there is a time-based billing that is capped at some “not to exceed” level for time and materials. (See also: Statement of Work (SOW) Consultant.)
The 2000 Standard Occupational Classification (SOC)
system is used by US federal statistical agencies to classify workers into occupational categories for the
purpose of collecting, calculating, or disseminating data. All workers are classified into one of more than 820
occupations according to their occupational definition. The United Nations administers the International
Standard Industrial Classification of all Economic Activities (ISIC) and national classifications tend to
relate to this global initiative. In the European Union, since 1990, members states have been obliged to
conform to Standard Industrial Classification (SIC92).
A concept that seeks to distinguish the HR outsourcing function from the staff leasing
co-employment relationship. “Staffsourcing” refers to the provision of various payrolling and personnel
administration services without the assumption of a general employer role.
A company providing staffing services.
An organization that represents and promotes the interests of the staffing industry and provides political lobbying and other services to its members. Members normally comprise staffing companies but may also include other ancillary service providers depending on the constitution of the association. Also referred to as Staffing Federation. Examples of staffing associations are the ASA (American Staffing Association), the REC (Recruitment & Employment Confederation) in the United Kingdom, and Prism’emploi in France. Many countries have more than one staffing association and some associations represent niche interest groups such as APSCO (Association of Professional Staffing Companies) in the United Kingdom. At a global level, the World Employment Confederation (WEC) is the international organization that represents more than 40 national staffing associations. Aligned to WEC is WEC-Europe, which seeks to protect the interests of the staffing industry at a European level and negotiates with social partners on e-related matters.
An industry segment of the Workforce Solutions Ecosystem. Major sectors of the Staffing Industry include Temporary Staffing and Place & Search, with the commonality of sourcing workers for a client. Place & Search comprises three activities: Direct Hire (or Permanent Placement), Retained Search and Temporary-to-Permanent Conversions.
Staffing services that supplement internal staffing teams where either part of the talent acquisition process is managed by an external supplier or a segment of the organization is supported by the external supplier, however the supplier is often using the company’s internal recruiting processes rather than its own processes to manage the staffing activities. IT staff augmentation services entail allocation of dedicated technical resources, usually offshore, hired as overseas development extensions of in-house application development teams on fixed or flexible terms and conditions. Using IT staff augmentation services provide a one-window solution to companies who might require application development across diverse technology verticals.
Splits are formal or informal agreements between staffing firms to “split” a temporary or direct
hire placement (and a fee) if one firm has the job order and another has an acceptable candidate. The Web
has facilitated this in various ways, with both exchanges and job networks. Within individual staffing firms
a split fee may refer to the internal assignment of commission where one office or consultant has the job
order and another office or consultant provides the candidate.
The amount of currency that was actually invoiced by suppliers (typically in an MSP/VMS relationship) for work performed during a given time frame. This excludes spending that has been identified, but not yet rolled into the program. Suppliers and program managers sometimes describe this spending by breaking it out by job family (professional and commercial) and by worker classification
(contract labor, SOW, outsource service contract). While not ideal, spend under management is the most common indicator of supplier and market sizing.
