Staffing All the Way to the Bank – 5 Benefits of Using a Staffing Agency
Hiring costs for even an entry-level employee might be several thousand dollars. Here are five benefits of using a staffing agency that make them an invaluable resource for hiring managers.
Steep Recruiting and Hiring Costs Highlight Benefits of Using a Staffing Agency to Get Better New Hires
For hiring managers and business owners, turnover is a four-letter word. The cost of recruiting, hiring and training new staff – even entry level staff – can run into the thousands of dollars. In fact, data recently published on Investopedia.com indicates that the real cost of hiring a single employee at just $8 per hour could be as much as $3,500.
Of course, that’s only the cost of making a good hire. The Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) estimates that the cost of making a bad hire could be as much as 5x their annual salary, and that number goes up the longer they remain in the position. Among the benefits of using a staffing agency are reduced direct costs when it comes to hiring activities and the ability to get better new hires from the start.
5 Benefits of Using a Staffing Agency to Improve Quality of New Hires
1. Focus
Working with a staffing agency allows your team to stay focused on the tasks and tactics that make your business most profitable. With fewer tasks to be completed in-house, distractions are minimized. Let a staffing agency do the busy work of filling your candidate funnel and eliminating those who are not qualified or who are not likely to be a good fit for your company’s culture.
2. Expert Advice
Staffing agency recruiters are trained and experienced experts who can efficiently sift through the hundreds – or even thousands – of responses your job posting may solicit and bring you a short list for consideration. What’s more, their insights about candidates or their resumes can be invaluable in helping you decide which candidates should make the cut and move on to an interview.
3. Better-Informed Candidates
Few things are more frustrating within the recruiting and hiring process as moving a candidate all the way through the process to the point of making an offer, only to discover that they had unrealistic expectations about the job, its salary range or responsibilities. One of the benefits of using a staffing agency is that they give candidates information about your company and the position ahead of time, so that candidates who want to self-select out of the process for any reason can do so, saving you time and resources in the process.
4. Pre-Screened for the Fast Track
Recruiting and hiring processes can take months! You can short-cut the process by working with staffing agencies who have already recruited, interviewed and pre-screened candidates who can be in place within a day or two, instead of weeks or months.
5. Try Before You Buy Options
Having the ability to work with candidates on a trial basis as temporary employees placed through a staffing agency gives you the opportunity to bring in top talent and see how they fit within the team and perform without making a long-term commitment. It can be equally positive for candidates themselves as they have a chance to find out whether the job and your corporate culture is a good fit for them. If you have experienced the pain and high cost of making a bad hire, this reason alone might make the benefits of using a staffing agency preferable to doing the recruiting and hiring yourself.
Benefits of Using a Staffing Agency – Calculating the Cost of a New Hire
The cost of a new hire is far greater than the cost of posting position openings or running a new hire screening, and not all costs can be measured in dollars. For instance, how can you calculate the negative impact of turnover on an understaffed department, or time lost to productivity when new hires are shadowing other employees?
If you are trying to come up with the real cost of recruiting and hiring in your organization in order to weigh the benefits of using a staffing agency against completing the work in-house, here are some costs to consider:
- Time spent writing job post ad copy
- Time spent researching job boards, social networks and publications for placements
- Cost of placing position openings in print and online job boards
- Time spent reviewing submissions, monitoring all placement channels and responding to applicants
- Resources (time, money and materials) spent on written responses to applicants
- Time spent doing pre-interview phone screenings and setting up interviews
- Time spent conducting interviews and lost productivity for interview participants
- Time spent conducting reference checks
- Time and resources spent on pre-employment screening/s
- Food, beverages, lodging or travel costs
- Cost of reimbursement for parking or transportation
It’s a lot! When you begin to tally up the cost of time spent on-boarding new hires, doing paperwork, setting up payroll and benefits, completing training and lower productivity while they get up to speed, you can begin to understand the high cost of employee turnover and better appreciate the benefits of using a staffing agency, especially when it comes to improving the cost of new hires.
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I loved how you mentioned that they can give you insights about candidates. My husband was telling me last night about how he needs to hire some more employees for his company, but how it’s so hard to do it on his own and that he wishes that he could have help. I’ll make sure to pass this information along to him so that he can look into hiring a staffing agency to help him with hiring new employees.
I had no idea that using a staffing agency can help you look and work with candidates on a trial basis before fully accepting them into the company. My friend has been stressing himself out looking for a biotech executive and I believe I have found the answer to his worries. I should share this with him so he’d consider using staffing agencies to find one.
I liked that you mentioned working with a staffing agency will provide you with expert advice to find the right prospect for your company. My husband and I are thinking about how to find good employees for his company, and we are looking for advice. I will let him know about your recommendations to understand the benefits of working with a staffing agency to help us.
I appreciate that you talked about the reasons why bring a staffing agency is more convenient to avoid going through all the hiring, interview, and time-spending process. My husband and I are planning to open a business in which we will need to hire people and reading what you recommended is very convenient. I will definitely have in mind what you said and made sure my husband knows about this too so that we take the best decision.
It was interesting to learn about how a staffing agency can give people accurate information about the job, so that people can be more prepared. I can see how a business could really benefit from getting the right recruiting in order to be more effective. Making sure that they can work with people that work well on a team could be really useful for them.
You made a good point when you shared that your company can cut short the process of recruiting and hiring by working with staffing agencies. This is because they have already recruited, interviewed, and pre-screened candidates. I would like to think if a company needs to fill in a position immediately, it should consider looking for a reliable staffing agency to help find the right candidate.
It is wonderful that this post shared that when choosing a staffing agency, it is important for us to consider their reputation. The other day my sister mentioned she needs to hire new and better recruits. I will suggest to her to consider working with a staffing agency.
Elizabeth, I really appreciate all of the information you provided about the benefits of using staffing recruiters to hire new employees. Your point about how using a recruitment service allows you to use their experience and training to your advantage to decide on candidates. I think that it would be smart to look into the reputation of the staffing service before you hire them so you know they are trustworthy.
It’s great that you talked about how a staffing agency focuses on finding the right candidate for a job. In my opinion, both an employer and employee could benefit from working with a staffing service. If I were to look for an applicant, I’d like to work with a company that’s specialized in finding the perfect fit. Thanks for the information on recruiting services and how they help a business.