UK Interim Procurement and Supply Chain Recruitment Market Update, September 2022
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We are seeing a rise in demand for Interim Procurement and Supply Chain talent. From our own figures we have seen a 100% rise in Interim jobs over the last 3 months and we expect demand to continue to increase as our clients adopt more cautious cost and risk averse short and medium term recruitment strategies, as they wait to see how far the World and UK economies dip into recession. Economic fears and HR planning… -------------------------------------------------------- Rates are now definitely increasing, for example good IT Category Management rates have increased circa 25% in the last year. Disparity between Inside and Outside IR35 assignments is Down! Outside IR35 roles are still more popular amongst contractors, however with the rates increasing for inside IR35 roles the difference is becoming less pronounced. Interim Demand will Increase! With the summer holiday period behind us and ongoing recession uneasiness, we expect a further increase in interim activity in September, October and November. -------------------------------------------------------- Specialists and Categories in Demand IT: Cyber Security, SAAS Required across most sectors, but we have seen the greatest demand within FinTech, Financial Services, Media, and Tech organisations. Digital Marketing: Required across almost all sectors, although changing working and customer interfacing methods in Financial Services and Retail sectors have seen the greatest demand. HR & Professional Services: Changing work pattern, recruitment methods the challenges of securing the best talent has led to an urgent increase in demand for Procurement specialists with Professional Services and HR category experience, particularly looking at Managed Service Providers and Recruitment. Vendor Management / Risk Management / Supplier Governance: Procurement specialist with solid Supplier Risk and 3rd Party Risk experience are in high demand, including looking at: Supplier Risk, Fraud, Quality, Compliance, Governance and Regulation, De-carbonisation / Sustainability. Contract and Supplier Managers: Particularly with long term framework contracts applied in complicated cross-function environments. Currently, we are seeing most demand for the mid-level (‘doer’) roles rather than at senior manager level. For detailed information on the current recruitment market, please contact the Beaumont Team on T: +44 (0)1403 248 448 E: info@beselect.co.uk ---------------------------------------------------- Why Interim Staffing might be the better option than Permanent… Securing a truly talented and proven Interim Contractor might be a good way to help protect against the volatility of the current labour market in these uncertain economic times, here are a few thoughts as to why an Interim option might be a better choice than a permanent hire: Agility: Operating model that enables your organisation to adopt Interim Resourcing, based on dynamic business needs, can certainly help your organisation to be more responsive and agile to economic volatility and competitive activity. In the current post pandemic, Brexit, war-in-Europe and high inflationary economic environment, this is more critical than ever. It’s becoming increasingly important for organisations to take an agile, adaptable approach to the unique challenges and opportunities businesses are currently facing. Incorporating Interim talent into your workforce can make your teams more dynamic and better able to succeed in a rapidly changing environment. Expertise: Utilising a talent pool of available, verified and ‘hit the ground running’ specialists provides easy and quick access to the expertise that your organisation might not be able to summon internally. Securing the right Interim can bring in, and impart knowledge and expertise to your internal team, that is simply not available within the organisation. Good Interims will have built expert skills through multiple projects; and will be able to bring these ‘hit the ground running’ skills to your organisation. They can provide the expertise to your organisation, that is not available internally or would take significant time and investment to cultivate within. Flexibility: Interims can be taken on faster, cheaper and much easier than recruiting permanent hires. A lot of time and resources go into hiring permanent talent, with considerable financial commitment with costs like advertising, onboarding, training, salary and benefits to consider. Companies also lose money and productivity while positions are left unfilled. Bringing in flexible talent can help organisations make optimum use of their HR budget by ensuring only the skills and services required, when required, are being paid for. Speed: A good specialist agency can provide suitable, verified and ‘ready to go’ Interim talent, specific to your specialist needs, within a day or two. The average recruitment process, from engagement to first day, for a permanent hire can often exceed 3 months, given many employees contracted notice period and on-boarding challenges. That’s a long time and a lot of causal effect, when a critical job needs to be done, but it isn’t! Risk: Hiring the wrong permanent person is very expensive, in every way! Costs of employing the wrong person will be compound by the day, and impact every aspect of company performance, at a time when human innovation and team coherence is critical to business success. The hire of a bad employee can drive down productivity, hurt morale, and alienate clients and good employees alike, all risking damage to your procurement or supply chain functions; and worse case, across other areas of the business. In a talent short market as we have now, hiring managers are under significant pressure to fill. Positions. When suitable talent is almost impossible to find. There is always the possibility that the hiring manager can make permanent recruitment compromises: be too hasty in their hiring decisions; shrug off permanent candidate’s shortcomings or overlook red flags. The downsides of hiring the wrong contractor are less severe and using the services of an experienced specialist Interim Agency (that can provide verified proven specialists) will maximise the opportunity of securing a great contractor; and minimise the risk of engaging a bad contractor. In a talent short market, and with a volatile and uncertain economic outlook; getting rid of a permanent hire/s a few months down the line isn’t as painful as cutting back on your Interim resourcing. Verifying Talent: Engaging with a contractor with the option to moving to a permanent employment, can be a good option, where the Interim’s potential as a permanent hire can be assessed. One-Off Workforce, Project Challenges: Sometimes, an organisation will simply need to fill a temporary talent gap with an immediately available but short-term contractor – for example to cover off a permanent employee on maternity leave. Interim contractors can prove particularly useful if you have a short or medium-term requirement, for example, to complete a one-off project, maternity coverage or to meet a seasonal/economic spike in demand. ------------------------------------------------------- Conclusions Overall demand for procurement and supplychain talent remains high, both for Interim and Permanent Talent. While permanent demand has remained consistent over the last few months, we have clearly seen an increase in demand for Interim talent, most notably over the last 3 months. The need for a flexible workforce is more important than ever and utilisation of proven, verified ‘hit the ground running’ interim procurement, supply chain and vendor management talent should be considered as a strong option in and HR resourcing decision makers stratagems. We anticipate demand for Interim procurement, supply chain and vendor management talent, to increase as we move into more challenging economic conditions.
The Beaumont Select Recruitment Team Source: Beaumont Select Market Bulletin, September 2022 |