Staffing firms are more than just middlemen

I think I mentioned it here before but a while back I did a presentation to a group of jobseekers consisting of project managers, financial analysts and some engineers. The presentation was about “how to work with a staffing firm.”

I had a few slides prepared but didn’t really get to use them because my audience quickly took over with their questions before I was done with my first bullet point.

Judging from the questions my audience believed that staffing firms serves no other purpose than be the middleman.

I was just revising the presentation so here’s a quick rundown on what purpose staffing firms serve — from the job seeker perspective.

Advocate — As your recruiter is trying to place you, your recruiter is basically your advocate. A good recruiter has well-established relationships (read: “is trusted”) by the hiring managers he or she is working with, as well as with the candidates he or she is trying to place. By design, contingent staffing is set up (at least in my experience) to ensure that “pushing bodies” does not happen. How? Most contingent staffing programs are set to bill by the hour so the only way to be profitable is to keep each placement in billing capacity (ie working). Staffing firms cannot achieve profitability with high turnover rates, so it is NOT in the staffing firm’s interest to push a candidate that’s simply not a fit for one reason or another because that person will not last and therefore not bill. Just like any other industry, we gotta deliver great products to keep our consumers buying. Keep this in mind when talking to a recruiter who is trying to place you on contract. That recruiter wants to give you an assignment/contract that’s the perfect fit. Sounds cliche, I know. But really, that’s the way it is.

Employer — a lot of job seekers don’t realize this and fail to take this into consideration when accepting an assignment or a contract. It’s not just about who can find you that assignment, but more importantly, who would you want to work for? The staffing firm’s role does not stop at placement. They cut the check, provide benefits, and handle your issues if anything goes wrong (workplace injuries, conflicts, sexual harassment complaints, you name it). If you don’t think that’s a big deal, imagine someone who missed a paycheck because the staffing firm’s payroll messed up. Sure that happens anywhere, but how would the staffing firm handle it? How quickly do they resolve issues? It doesn’t seem like a trivial thing now, does it.