Writing a specification for temporary recruitment

There are many things to think about when writing a specification for example, it is crucial to get key stakeholders involved such as HR, hiring managers and procurement.

Having a strong specification allows the providers to offer a beneficial service for temporary recruitment and allows you to tailor your needs to ensure every aspect is met.

Early engagement allows stakeholders to be involved and look back on how you currently procure temporary recruitment, this also gives time to do some pre-engagement with providers and understand what could have changed in the sector.

There are many things to think about when creating a specification for an MSP (Managed Service Provision) for temporary recruitment, below are just a few examples of things you should consider whilst creating your specification document;

1. Give plenty time to engage with key stakeholders and the providers in the sector to understand what is available.
2. Review the frameworks available and understand what could work well for the temporary recruitment requirements.
3. What is it that works well currently for your temporary recruitment and what doesn’t work? Is there anything specific needed in the requirement such as utilising local agencies, or thinking about key category areas like social care.
4. Do you have any challenges in recruiting any roles currently, or any hard to fill geographical areas?
5. Think about other areas of recruitment such as high level executive roles, permanent recruitment or even consultancy – how do these fit in with the recruitment strategy and are they required as part of the full recruitment specification?
6. How would you want the provider to deliver the services – a neutral vendor uses agencies to fulfil the requirement, a master vendor can use their own supply of workers and also 2nd or 3rd tier agencies and a hybrid (outcome-based solution) is where the provider understand the requirement can deliver a bespoke solution with the desired outcome.
7. Understand the patterns in your temporary recruitment spend for example people may require temp staff at the end of the financial year or for seasonal requirements.
8. Analyse your current temporary staff and understand the current spend.
9. Consider how social value will fit into temporary recruitment.
10. Think about any potential changes in legislation in regards to recruitment including things like IR35 and agency workers regulations.
11. Outline the contract management with the provider and who needs to be involved.
12. Think about invoicing agencies and the process required.
13. Any technology changes or requirements – there may be a lot to consider in terms of implementing new systems or any barriers with technology.
14. What do you need from the technology? Think about areas of spend and if talent pooling could support, or is there any specific tasks the IT platform may need to do.
15. Implementation with the provider needs to be considered and allowing time for this in the process.

We can help and support with engaging stakeholders and helping to guide you towards pulling the specification together. Don't hesitate to get in touch with the HR Services team.