The ABC’s (or MSPs, VMSs, SOWs) of Temporary Labor

September 13th, 2016

Are you still sourcing contingent labor the way you have always done it, dealing with temporary labor service providers directly?

 

Today’s post is from our  SafeSourcing archives.

The landscape of temporary labor has changed drastically over the past 10 years.   New business strategic planning processes have created needs and opportunities to source help in ways not previously available before.  Companies are moving to defined stage-driven projects that have clear beginning and ending points that create the opportunity for hiring a contingent workforce driven by focused, definable parameters.  Instead of hiring a group of temporary workers to augment your staff and not knowing if you will really have work for them the entire time they are there, companies have projects with well-defined entry and exit points that can be easily staffed by a professional contingent workforce that optimizes their stay.   This style of contingent labor hiring has created new needs for companies for the management of this workforce and in today’s blog we will be covering some of these aspects.

SOW  – Statement of Work – This is a set of predefined criteria that combines timelines, deliverables, tasks and skillsets needed to complete a project or stage of a project for a company.  Often it will also contain details surrounding the safety, design or other legal terms and conditions which must be adhered to for completion.  The statement of work must clearly define the objective of the project along with expectations of the end result and the timeframe it needs to occur within.  For example a company may have a software project that is going to require 120 hours of development and 50 hours or testing.   To accomplish this they need 2 software developers, 1 database developer, 1 QA resource and a project manager to manage the project which needs to be completed in two weeks.  With an SOW, the need and expectations are clearly defined and contingent resources can then be easily added to accomplish the goal without carrying the burden of those resources long-term.

MSP – Managed Service Provider – With the embracing of SOWs to the contingent labor landscape came the need of partners to help manage the procurement and placement of the resources to make them happen.  While Managed Service Providers tend to be found mostly in the IT space, there are many other service and consulting areas that they can and do oversee.  MSPs may have their own contingent resources from which they can augment their clients’ staffs, but many times they are working with other temporary staffing agencies in order to manage the customer needs.  A good MSP will be able to handle a normal temporary labor staff augmentation as well as SOW needs as they arise.  They understand the needs of their customer and how to most efficiently use the contingent labor while they are onsite saving thousands of dollars in the process.

VMS – Vendor Management System – The tool that is used to manage this process of procuring, tracking and paying the contingent resources used, is typically an internet web-based application that allows a customer to submit a request for resources based on a staff augmentation need or statement of work need. This system will also handle the billing and reporting needed by a customer to track how and when they are spending their contingent labor dollars.  Managed Service Providers will either have an in-house VMS or have partnered with an external VMS provider for this solution.  This tool will help the customer streamline the interview and hiring process as well as act as the collection of time worked and approval system of payment.  Having a VMS makes the SOW process much more effective as it allows the customer to focus on finding resources to fill a specific need more efficiently, finding the right people, quickly, and delivering on-time results.

SafeSourcing has successfully helped dozens of companies evaluate and hire Managed Service Providers and Vendor Management Systems.  For more information on how we can help your team in its own search or on our “Risk Free” trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative.  We have an entire customer services team waiting to assist you today.

We look forward to your comments.

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