CWS 3.0: June 13, 2012

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Strategy: Why the MSP’s Role Is Crucial

Being a good communicator with your MSP helps you to experience a rather painless recruiting and onboarding process. MSPs can aggregate your recruitment process to smooth a potentially cumbersome system. Program managers need to educate hiring managers on what to expect and what their role is in the process, which then can help yield the best results.

Let’s start with a new project. A recently hired IT manager in your company needs to supplement his existing team with three developers. The CW program manager explains the ropes to the IT manager, who then proceeds on his own in the interests of time and the fact that in his department, using temporary workers is common. After gaining verbal approval from his VP to augment his team, he contacts the MSP to discuss the best way to get the finest resources to supplement his team and speed up the development process.

That’s just the beginning. The MSP tells the hiring manager how to log into the VMS and enter requisitions. The manager follows instructions and submits his order. After that, the order goes through the approval process with ease, with his VP approving it in the system quickly. The process is rather painless so far and the hiring manager only had to explain his project needs first to the VP and then to the MSP.

But here’s actually what transpires.

The Inner Workings
The order goes to all the preferred suppliers, and the MSP receives 27 calls from suppliers and recruiters, clarifying and prioritizing the skills. By the following morning the MSP has had conversations with the suppliers’ recruiters about their candidates, shortlisted the candidates from 50 to 10 to fill the three positions and has sent you potential interview time slots via Outlook. The MSP contacts you to confirm interview schedules and plans the logistics. The MSP provides the hiring manager with a schedule, the candidate resumes/CVs, and cover letters, and the hiring manager is ready to complete the process. The candidates begin arriving at their designated interview time.

The interviews go well. In fact, the hiring manager feels he can build his team from this pool of candidates. The MSP checks in after the interviews to get feedback on each candidate, which is then passed on to the suppliers. You have chosen your three candidates, but the MSP’s job is still not done. The rates for your preferred candidates are very different. The MSP suggests that it contact the suppliers and negotiate the rates to be more in line with each other, once rates have been secured, the MSP also contacts the suppliers of the rejected candidates. Within 24 hours, the candidates accept the positions and agree on a start and end date for the project.

The MSP contacts the suppliers to begin the onboarding process and complete all onboarding activities. The candidates show up for their first day of work, with badges, work space, computers, systems access, and they are ready to be productive on their first day of work. The MSP checks in at the end of the first day for feedback and again at the end of the first week to make certain that the individuals are progressing as expected.

Understanding how your CW program office and MSP functions will hold you in good stead and improve your hiring manager experience. There are companies that have small CW programs with insufficient manpower to help all requests for getting temp workers on board. Making sure your hiring managers are familiar with the temporary worker hiring process and the MSP will pay off. Be sure they and you are clear about what skills each job requires. Add regular communications with your MSP to that and you will increase hiring manager satisfaction and be assured of good quality contingents.