Agreeing on a cost savings methodology begins with agreement within your company of what are the hard savings, soft savings and opportunities for cost avoidance. Ideally, these need to be established with your company finance function as part of the initial program business case, and agreed upon by your key stakeholders. This should be done well before engaging with suppliers.

Traditionally, the most common way to look for hard savings is through driving rate savings. The methodology used to calculate rate savings is important to consider and examples of these are outlined in this report. 

This reference guide can be applied to all types of contingent workers according to the SIA definition of Total Talent Management, be they SOW workers such as consultants, IC, temporary workers or workers sourced through FMS platforms. CW programs are increasingly encompassing broader worker types and to evaluate all opportunities for savings, all worker types should be considered.