Do you need help with temporary versus permanent recruitment? Perhaps you are unsure how to evaluate if it is best to hire a temp or a permanent employee. So, in this article, discover what is best, when it is best to use a recruitment agency, and what other companies doing.
About Temporary Versus Permanent Recruitment
Firstly, consider the differences between temporary versus permanent recruitment and what it means to you. Evidently, temporary employees work in a company for a limited period, as agreed before starting. Obviously, this hiring style is popular in businesses and industries that:
- Have periods of workload increase due to busy seasons.
- Require additional people for special projects and therefore staff temporarily.
In this situation, the demand can range for a few days, weeks or months.
You probably refer to temporary employees as 'temps', an abbreviation used for many years. Furthermore, you may have hired temps to cover absences such as staff holidays or sickness. Moreover, recruiting specific permanent staff may not be sustainable for your business. Therefore, temps can help maintain your correct levels of staff without having to commit to permanent employees.
Understand Temp Opinions
Some workers take on a temporary job to maintain income whilst finding their perfect permanent opportunity. For this reason, many people prefer not to be called temps, but rather as "temporary workers", a term that has become more popular in recent times.
Traditionally, many people prefer temporary work to provide a diverse work experience. In addition, this enables them to learn how various industries work. Also, when considering temporary versus permanent recruitment, temps also get to work with different teams and management styles.
How Can You Hire Temps?
Like many businesses, maybe you hire temps through a temporary recruitment service or recruitment agency. The reason is apparent because agencies have a pool of candidates. Therefore they have people available for your workplace at short notice, sometimes as quick as within the hour.
Outsourcing to a temporary recruitment service can also help you since they have significant experience in the market. Therefore these specialists can find the right people you need much quicker. In particular, Temp recruiters also take care of all the paperwork, payroll and other activities. For example, they check their right to work in the UK, carry out candidate interviews, pay their wages and much more. It is a very convenient and stress-free service for Human Resources and hiring managers.
You can also benefit from using a specialist agency to access different skill sets.
Availability of Temporary Workers
When it comes to temporary versus permanent recruitment, two factors have affected the labour market, these being Brexit, and Covid-19.
Due to the current health pandemic, the demand for hiring temps became increasingly popular caused by a shortage in the labour market. However, the combination of Brexit and the global health pandemic has unavoidable consequences in the labour market. Indeed, while there remains uncertainty, some people who enjoy temporary work have sought more permanent roles.
Find out more about how to hire temps
How Long Can a Temporary Worker Be Considered Temporary?
A temporary job can last from a few hours or cover a campaign or long term project. In this situation, an employee can be on successive fixed-term contracts for four years. Afterwards, if you renew the contract, they will become a permanent employee – unless you can provide a good reason for needing another fixed-term contract.
Of course, some employers hire temporary workers as a trial before committing to offering a permanent job. In that case, it is called Temp to Perm hiring.
However, temporary recruitment is different from contract work, which refers to an external supplier contracted to work for a business, typically under the supplier's terms and conditions.
Permanent Recruitment
Evidently, permanent recruitment is the most common and traditional way of working in the UK. For instance, you hire employees intending to be 'employees for life'. In other words, you typically hire employees permanently when they require a full-time employee. In this case, they are usually 40 hours-a-week positions.
Thus, in considering temporary versus permanent recruitment, there are benefits when hiring permanent employees. For example, you will secure the skilled people you need to help support your operations and business objectives.
When you are looking to align skillsets within your organisation and strengthen departments, hiring new permanent employees makes sense. Such an arrangement is indefinite until either party breaks the permanent contract. To clarify, as an employer you are fully responsible for permanent payroll and benefits.
With this in mind, you may prefer to seek assistance from recruitment agencies to help with your hiring process. Straightaway, you can take advantage of their resources such as:
- Access to many more candidates than employers do.
- The expertise to headhunt candidates with specific skillsets.
Permanent Candidate Agendas
Of course, permanent employees often look to develop their careers and grow. In the new world of work, this creates a more symbiotic partnership than the old style of boss and servant.
Bear in mind that for particular roles, the skills required are not always on the market, especially for high-level or specialist positions. Hiring might involve an experienced recruiter finding candidates in other companies who are considering a better fit or an opportunity for further career development.
How Do You Know if you Need a Temporary or a Permanent Employee?
When considering temporary versus permanent recruitment, the decision will completely depend on your business needs. In the first place, here are some questions to start you off:
Temporary versus Permanent Recruitment Assessment
- Is the employee/worker position critical for your business?
- Will you require the person's skills-set all of the time?
- Is the budget available for a permanent employee?
- Do you require an employee’s skillset only for a season?
- How certain are you that you definitely need a new employee, or can you up-skill and develop your staff?
When calculating costs for budget purposes, there are many factors to take into consideration. Furthermore a significant and sometimes hidden cost eating into your profit is staff turnover.
Did you see the point above about "up-skill and develop your staff"? Certainly, the cost of training and developing your existing employees can be significantly less than the cost of recruitment".
Another factor to consider between temporary versus permanent recruitment, is the actual cost of finding new staff can be significant. It is hard to forecast employee recruitment and onboarding costs for permanent staff. Moreover many intangible and often untracked associated costs can eat away at your profits.
Specifically, don't forget the amount of lost management time, and the impact on your business caused by lack of focus. Under these circumstances, managers are juggling recruitment simultaneously with their day to day jobs. Up against the demands and pressure of your business operations, managers who are not sufficiently skilled in recruitment, are likely to lose focus on their own jobs. In reality, this can impact on your business.
If you are unsure, you can always contact our business solutions agency, who can help and guide you in the right direction.
Current Hiring Trends
It is essential to take into account current hiring trends when assessing temporary versus permanent recruitment. The hire of temporary workers has been very popular in call centres, retail, and catering. However, it has become more common in other industries in the current economic climate, especially those whose demand has increased overnight.
According to Monster, there's been a steady increase in manufacturing job roles since June last year. For example, these roles include team assemblers, production workers, inspectors, testers, fabricators, and welders. These industries benefit from hiring temporary and permanent workers, depending on their needs.
Other industries currently booming are those involved with supply chain and logistics, such as warehousing and distribution, which are incredibly busy yet struggling to hire enough personnel. For these types of companies, the change in demand has become an opportunity to re-think their business, as some of the current trends on customer behaviour are here to stay. This case is a clear example of a situation in which companies could benefit from hiring temp to perm.
Why use a Recruitment Agency to Hire Staff?
Without a doubt, there are many advantages for you to use recruitment solutions provider. Indeed, take a look at these statistics:
We Can Help You
In reality, there is a severe shortage in labour supply across the UK in many sectors. To clarify, the rate of contraction for temporary and permanent roles is the worst since the late 1990's.
However, don't be disheartened when deciding about temporary versus permanent recruitment. Having the right recruitment solutions agency such as SVC Recruitment, you can get help and additional guidance. For instance, the best organisation for your staff and support finding the right people for your business.
Moreover, SVC Solutions has provided consultancy and solutions in Recruitment, Training, and Human Resources for over twenty years. Consequently, we understand the issues that clients face. With this in mind, SVC Solutions can evaluate your particular business needs at a larger scale and provide you with solutions by looking at the bigger picture.
For example, to resolve the potential problem of finding the right person, we also recommend upskilling or reskilling as a sensible approach. Subsequently, the return on investment can be significant.
SVC provide free consultations, so it is an ideal way to get a fresh point of view. In other words, you will benefit from specialists who understand the employee life cycle and who can advise on your workplace planning.