The 4 Most Common Issues With Poor Contractor Engagement
Recruitment is a fascinating industry. We get to sneak a peek at all aspects of the economy through the recruitment companies that we work with. Each of our clients is unique. Yet all businesses that source, screen, and place candidates have something in common. How you engage with your workers while they are on a job can make or break your business.
Challenges with Poor Contractor Engagement
- Business Development
Who’s the first to know about the need to hire more people? The people on the ground, those actually doing the job. This applies right across the board. Whether we’re talking about temporary cleaning staff, who hear from the client that they have expansion plans or the software developer who identifies the need for extra resources to hit project deadlines. Who’s the last to know about the need to hire more people? Your account manager.
There’s an old saying – Good people know good people. The most talented software developers interact with other high-caliber software developers. The best salespeople I know have extensive sales networks, one even runs a private group for high-end SAAS salespeople on the side. Consistent and hard-working tradespeople want to work with other reliable tradespeople. If you’re not leveraging the networks of the contractors that you’ve already placed, you’re missing a trick.
There are two types of issues that can happen during an assignment. The contractor can have an issue with your company – pay, timesheets. Or they can have an issue with the client – micro-management, misaligned expectations, scope-creep. If there’s an issue with your company, your operations team needs to be able to address the problem. If there’s an issue with the client, your operations team needs to be close enough to the contractor to actually hear about it and act. In the best-case scenario, they solve the problem outright. If that isn’t possible, at least they can proactively make plans for how to improve the situation. The worst thing that can happen for a recruitment business is a no-show no-call (ghosting). While those are rare at the higher end of the market, a disgruntled high-end contractor can have a negative impact on your company’s brand.
This one is a lot less tangible than the other points but bear with me. While studying the recruitment industry and how recruitment businesses work, I happened to connect with a retired Robert Half president. When he was with Robert Half he ran a small team out of the midwest in the US. His team consistently ranked among the highest revenue-producing teams in Robert Half. I asked him how he managed to consistently hit his lofty targets. His secret was that he had thousands of salespeople. Every candidate that they placed had a white glove experience and they were made to feel a part of the Robert Half team. Placed contractors were his number one source of high-quality, convertible leads.
