SIA recently published the findings of its 2019 survey of US staffing companies. This year’s survey reflects responses from executives at 441 staffing firms operating in North America, with roughly 100 firms indicating that light industrial staffing was their largest segment by revenue. This was the 11th consecutive year that SIA has conducted the survey, and the 475-page report is both a compilation of 2019 results along with historical findings and trends since 2009 on a variety of topics and metrics. This article highlights a couple of report findings.

When asked about adoption of “human cloud” technologies — that is, internet platforms that can connect candidates with staffing clients directly without a recruiter — slightly more than half of survey respondents at commercial staffing firms (those focused on light industrial and office/clerical roles) are either using such technology or investigating use in the near future. Eight percent of commercial staffing firms own such technology, 3% partner with a vendor, and 42% are considering use in the next two years. Use and interest among staffing firms supplying professional workers was a bit lower, at 44% of staffing firms.

Separately, when asked about revenue characteristics, 64% of commercial staffing firms had revenue from “on site clients” where internal staff are based at the client work site. This was a much higher proportion than for professional staffing firms, for which 41% indicated revenue from such arrangements. Regarding client use of a VMS or an MSP, 36% of commercial staffing firms had no clients with a VMS and 48% of such staffing firms had no clients with an MSP.

These findings may be useful to industrial staffing firms trying to benchmark their technology offerings and client characteristics, and represent two topic examples from a very data rich report of industry insights. The complete report is available to SIA corporate members here.