Staffing and Recruiting Post-Recession:  "How will the recession impact the way the staffing firms operate in the coming years?  How will it change company strategy?"

Avionte Staffing Software CEO John Long

This recession has forced staffing companies to look at all aspects of their business in order to maintain profitability.  What can they do without and what can they do differently.  Most have cut staff and attempted to do more with less.  As business starts to increase, staffing firms will be reticent to add more staff, therefore searching for ways to efficiently handle the increase in business while keeping overhead low.  Below are a few examples of how staffing firms will be using technology to drive business processes and keep costs down.

Technology Driven Future

• Self Service Capabilities: Using technology to provide self-service capabilities to customers and employees. Similar to how the banking industry launched ATM's, gas stations allowing credit cards at the pump and shopping online, the staffing industry will handle the recovery - and we all think eventually, a big recovery - by scaling to customer and employee demands by providing the tools for them to get the information they want on their own. As always, the average person continues to accept and use technology more. The Great Recession, though, demanded staffing companies be more efficient and the lingering effects of the downsizing and altering procedures will help push the staffing industry to look for better processes without adding staff. Examples include - online applications (every staffing company needs this), employee portal (to see direct deposit stubs, apply for new jobs, see their schedule, update preferences without calling in) and customer portals (see who is coming, evaluate personnel, submit new order requests, analysis reports, invoice issues)
• Electronic Time-Collection and certification: I believe that within the next couple of years, the majority of time will be collected through electronic means. Besides saving time, electronic time collection is more accurate, saves money and is more secure than paper timecards with handwritten signatures.
• Integrations: The norm will be to integrate most, if not all, ancillary products/services with the staffing companies core system. Even just a couple of years ago, many crucial products/services like background checks and test scores were primarily processed manually. During the coming recovery, with the focus being efficiency and ability to scale - that pressure will demand software systems to integrate with these products and services
• Resume handling, communication and other Front Office processes will rely more on electronic means than the traditional methods that have worked for decades.
• Efficient Management: Historical management practices have relied heavily on Excel or other outside the core system/manual processes. These include the actual tracking and creation of the report. For examples, the management should look at the reports they use to manage their business. Ask the two main questions - 1) how was this report created and 2) how was the data created? A growing trend is the use of Dashboards and other business analytics in a self serving, self discovering model.

John Long is the founding Partner and CEO of Avionté, a customer-focused provider of staffing software solutions.  He has extensive knowledge of the staffing industry that began with four years at Paychex, where he developed an in-depth understanding of back-office functions, specifically with payroll software processes.  Over the next several years, John worked for established staffing software firms in advanced roles that included President, Vice President of Sales and Chief Revenue Officer.   John's ability to empathize with staffing software users and fully comprehend their needs is a direct result of his hands-on involvement at every level. John holds degrees from St. Olaf College in Math, Computer Science, and Statistics.  John Long can be contacted 651.556.2121, or by email at jlong@avionte.com.  Visit Avionté online at www.avionte.com.