When I first entered the staffing industry 25 years ago, joining my family’s temp staffing firm as an employment counselor (which is now called a full desk executive search recruiter), my main goal was to simply put “butts in seats.” When it came to learning the ropes, I picked up what I needed to do from my mentors and bosses. My counterparts on the contingent workforce management side had similar experiences. They rushed to fill roles while learning the complexities of the job from others in the industry.

Neither side had the benefit of a formalized educational program.

Despite the evolution and growth in the staffing industry over the last few decades, I’m fascinated by the fact that contingent workforce management is still not offered as a formal discipline or area of study within a university.

Contingent labor can be one of the largest areas of indirect spend for an organization, often exceeding a billion dollars annually. It’s also one of the most complex, requiring a deep understanding of issues ranging from technologies such as artificial intelligence to ever-changing legislative and regulatory requirements.

These needs lead me to ask: Should the external workforce industry have a dedicated academic major within a university like human resources or procurement do? My answer is a strong yes. It would go a long way toward easing organizational stress, disorganization and higher-than-needed costs — and it would help our dedicated CW managers gain skills and strategies to lead effectively even in the early stages of their careers. 

Here’s why: Many organizations, even now, struggle with determining which business unit should be responsible for managing contingent labor. The human resources department is often assigned this responsibility — even as HR professionals argue that it shouldn’t fall under their purview because it’s related to nonemployee labor.

Another seemingly logical choice is procurement. It might seem a good fit since this division is tasked with procuring products/services, including the technologies and services procured to manage a contingent labor program as well as supplier onboarding of staffing suppliers. However, procurement professionals do not always believe that the ongoing governance and management of a successful contingent labor program sits within their purview.

Amid this confusion, many organizations have created other business units specifically to manage contingent labor. Still, whichever group tasked with program management is forced to learn the industry and all it entails without the benefit of formal teachings.

I believe if contingent labor management was offered as a major or even a minor within human resources or procurement disciplines, organizations would follow course — no pun intended — and assign management of the contingent labor program to that business unit.

For now, though, the educational opportunities for aspiring CW program professionals are woefully small. Some coursework pertaining to HR and procurement degrees certainly would carry over into contingent workforce management — i.e., employment law, talent acquisition, contract management and supplier evaluations — but the intricacies of nonemployee labor management necessitate its own area of study.

In the next 25 years, I’d like to see this become a degree-based program. Until then, aspiring professionals can build skills via industry events, webinars and professional networking as well as through continuing education programs such as SIA’s CCWP program and the ASA’s Certified Staffing Professional program. Check back with me in 2049.