staffing technology: trends to transform your business sara moss & jonathan novich, co-founders,...

Staffing Technology: Trends to Transform Your BusinessSara Moss & Jonathan Novich, Co-founders, The Code Works Inc.

Agenda

•Staffing technology landscape

•The value of a technology roadmap

•Top 2009 trends that may impact your plans

Staffing Technology Landscape

•Staffing firms are exceptionally dependent on technology, but don’t necessarily recognize this fact

•So many technologies, vendors, opportunities, challenges…

Front Office

Reporting Engine

Time

Client Portal

Job Distribution

VMS / Supplier

Portal

Job Marketing

Social & Professional

Networks

Drug Testing

Skill Testing

AccountingTax

Updates

Banking

Search & Match

Parsing

Typical Staffing Firm Technologies

Back OfficeMarketingWeb

Sourcing Candidate

PortalBackground

CheckingPayroll

Processing

©2009 The Code Works Inc.

How to develop a Technology Roadmap

Review Business Strategy & Drivers

Investigate Competitor Trends

Update Org Structure Doc

Update Application & Tools Inventory

Review Business Goals

Identify Quick Win & Longer-Term Building Blocks

Document Strategy & Assumptions

Document Business Processes

Manage to Roadmap

Update Roadmap (Quarterly)

Ide

ntify

Bui

ldin

g B

lock

s

Upd

ate

& T

un

e

Gather Process & Project Ideas (Observation & Reuse)

Blue Sky Session

Brainstorm Solution Approaches

Evaluate Solution Approaches

Prioritize Building Blocks

Overlay Projects onto Timeline

Obtain RoadmapSign-off & Budget

Dev

elo

p

Pla

n

Doc

um

ent

Cur

ren

t &

Fu

ture

O

pera

tion

s

Incorporate into Annual Business Plan

High-Level Code Works Technology Strategy Methodology


a 3-5 year view on how technology will enable your business strategy & goals

Sample Technology Strategy Contents

1. INTRODUCTION- Document Purpose- Background- Key Inputs

2. CURRENT BUSINESS ARCHITECTURE- Business Context (corp or business unit)

- Business Overview- Strategic Business Drivers- Business Goals- Strategic Decisions & Assumptions

- Current Business Process Model- Company Business Process Differentiators- Current High-Level Business Process (Level 0)- Level 1 Processes

- Planned Business Process Model Changes- Current Organization Structure

- Organization Overview- Key Business Roles & Responsibilities- Current Organizational Initiatives- Organizational Gaps

- Planned Organizational Changes

3. CURRENT TECHNICAL ARCHITECTURE

- Current System Context Diagram

- Application & Tool Inventory

- Current Technology Initiatives

4. BUSINESS PROCESS ANALYSIS

- Identified Problem Areas & Root Cause Analysis

- Competitive Analysis Insights

- New Business Capabilities

5. TECHNOLOGY ROADMAP

- Required Technology Building Blocks & Building Block Dependencies

- Technology Building Block Descriptions

- Prioritization Criteria & Evaluation

- Technology Architecture Considerations

- Technology Roadmap

6. METHODOLOGY FOR UPDATING ROADMAP

7. CONCLUSION

8. APPENDIX

- Interviewee List

- To-Be-Determined List (TBD)


The Value of Technology Roadmap

•Valuable because they: - Ensure technology’s enablement of the business processes and

business strategies

- Provide an end-to-end view of your existing (and future) technology and how things fit together

- Articulate the business triggers behind technology projects

- Estimate technology investments over time

- Provide a context in which to identify market and technology trends that transform your business and those that just waste your time

•Most staffing firms do not have a documented technology roadmap though you probably have some thoughts


Factors that Shift Technology Roadmaps

• Technology roadmaps and roadmaps are dynamic plans that need to be reviewed and updated routinely (1-4 times per year)

Technology Roadmap

Available Budget

Industry Standards & Competitive Landscape

Economy

Available Technology

Business Optimization Opportunities

Business Strategy Changes

New Market Trends & Practices

Top 2009 Trends Impacting Staffing Technology

Top 2009 trends that may impact your technology plans:

1. Rapid deployment of new business models

2. Staffing takes on more traditional HR functions

3. VMS adoption accelerates

4. Effective enterprise-oriented mobility solutions

5. Social & professional networking experimentation matures

6. Job marketing becomes more sophisticated

7. Time to develop & maintain talent pools

8. Inching along toward the paperless back office

9. Reports and dashboards are easy to create, personalize and distribute

10. The Recession


Questions, Comments?

Sara [email protected]

650.208.2055

Jonathan [email protected]

650.575.5950

mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

Staffing Trends & Technology Impacts

Assuming you have your technology roadmap in place, let’s touch on the key staffing trends for

2009 that may impact your plans….

Rapid deployment of new business models

• Trend: Rapid deployment of additional business models

- Staffing firms being flexible to support existing clients and their evolving needs

- Increased revenue via new revenue streams

- Especially RPO, MSP and project staffing

• Technology roadmap considerations:

- Can your existing technologies support these new models? How much effort will be needed to bring this new business model live? Will there be incremental costs (software, labor) once it’s live?

- Will your existing systems and data be affected by introducing this new business model?

- How mature is the business model you’re pursuing? Is it something you’ve done before? How well will you be able to translate that into system requirements?

- What additional models might you be considering in the years ahead? How do they relate to the model under discussion today?

- How does this model impact all your technologies and service providers? Front, Back, Reporting, Infrastructure.


Staffing takes on more HR functions

• Trend: Staffing takes on more HR functions

- Increase in pre-employment verifications, tests and assessments

- More and more client-specific paperwork and requirements

- Hiring firms outsourcing HR functions to decrease costs & improve results

- RPO & BPO pushing onboarding functions & complex compliance requirements to staffing suppliers


- When do you need electronic forms, e-signature and electronic document management functionality?

- Will you integrate with your existing 3rd party suppliers or change to service providers who are already integrated with your software or are more integration friendly?

- Do you plan to configure workflows to client-specific needs?

- Which compliance requirements do you need to enable for the business models and clients you support? How can you minimize this effort?

- What retention requirements are you taking on for your clients? What is your strategy for ensuring that you’re meeting their needs?


VMS adoption accelerates

• Trend: VMS adoption accelerates

- Staffing Industry Analysts survey on VMS adoption finally breaks 50% mark

- VMS adoption will continue to increase

- Proven business case for VMS adopters (transparency, reduced costs, etc.)

- Recession creating buyer’s market and driving appetite for near-term cost cuts

- VMS adoption hits critical mass


- Do you need to accelerate your VMS strategy?

- Do you need to quickly determine your VMS strategy?

- What technology enablers need to be in place to actualize your strategy (e.g. automated submissions, apply to all job orders, reduce overhead costs)?

- What are the triggers that will drive your FO and/or BO integration with key client or leading VMS vendors?

- Despite the clear presence of technology, have you considered the business impacts? Contact with client, shrinking margins, amortizing the costs of the implementation over time?


Effective enterprise-oriented mobility solutions

• Trend: Mobility makes sense

- The enterprise mobile device will be an ‘extension of your enterprise’

- iPhone accelerates user desire for mobile access to mobile applications / web and makes the mobile experience fun

- Mobile phones are ubiquitous and mobile habits are better understood

- Mobile web is faster creating better user experience

- Staffing vendors are designing great mobile user experiences


- How can mobility solutions make your workforce more effective? What are the specific roles and business processes that could benefit?

- How can mobile solutions be leveraged to make it more likely that quality data is entered into your systems faster?

- What policies / programs do you need to put in place to manage mobile costs?

- How will you measure the success of your mobile strategy?

- What policies and audits do you need to consider to ensure that the security of your data is maintained despite its ubiquity?


Social & Prof Networking Processes Mature

• Trend: Social & professional networking processes mature

- Network popularity, functionality and costs are very dynamic and uncertain

- Staffing firms have been in experimentation mode & tie to revenue generation tenuous; Inconsistent usage and practices across recruiters

- Data often resides outside of core staffing systems

- There is a business need to define & stick to value-adding networking activities

- Experimentation may need to be driven by management, e.g. Facebook applications


- Is management clear on how networking support revenue generation? On best practices and processes for candidate & lead generation?

- Which networking sites are important to your business and niche today? Which sites / types of sites will you monitor and how frequently? Can you gain access to your key networks through web sourcing tools?

- What is your expectation about the quality of information that you collect through these networks?

- How will your ensure important data and recruiter networks reside in your system of record and not in disparate 3rd party databases (e.g. LinkedIn)?


Job marketing becomes more sophisticated

• Trend: Job marketing becomes more sophisticated

- More candidates are starting their job search from web search engines like Google; fewer candidates are going to traditional job boards

- Candidates are more likely to be found where they ‘hang out on the Web’

- Job distribution to traditional job boards alone is not going to be enough, especially when the economy recovers

- Job posting specific search engine optimization strategies can be very effective e.g. paid search, traditional forms of web advertising for specific jobs, microsites, niche distribution


- What job distribution capabilities do you utilize today?

- How can you streamline these new forms of “posting”?

- How do your jobs get found by candidates? Which sources have the best ROI?

- How do you intend to experiment with new methods of job advertising?

- How will you track and report on new forums of job marketing? The typical “source” field may be insufficient!


Time to develop & maintain talent pools

• Trend: Time to develop & maintain talent pools

- Candidate databases tend to have a “freshness” issue --- out-of-date candidate status data

- Many staffing technology and tools offer extensive relationship management tools that are underutilized

- Most CandRM process are not well defined and many staffing firms have difficulty investing in long-term relationships when the business seems so transactional

- At the same time, staffing firms tend to be relationship focused and CandRM has a compelling business case -- multiple placements multiples profit with little additional investment even though pay out may be difficult to measure


- What CandRM functionality do you already have in your tool chest (e.g. candidate status, candidate skills & interests, email templates, relevant content)? Which providers to you work with to guarantee that you can track receipts?

- Do you understand your candidate relationship management business case?

- What is your candidate relationship management strategy and process?

- When do you want to commit to taking action?


Inching along toward the paperless back office

• Trend: Inching along toward the paperless back office

- Candidates and clients accept online time entry and approval

- Mandatory electronic pay policies acceptable (direct deposit, p-cards)

- Email/PDF invoicing option common

- VMS further automates payment process


- Do you have a strategy to achieve a paperless back office?

- What are your back office automation plans?

- How does plummeting storage costs and the plethora of online storage services affect your image archiving policies and strategies?

- Can you partner with other service-providers to reduce your head count? Is there an incremental approach to consider?


Reports & dashboards made easy

• Trend: Reports and dashboards are easy to create, personalize and distribute

- Clients require routine, data-driven performance reviews of their staffing suppliers

- Staffing firms need to understand analyze their own performance in near real-time

- Business intelligence tools make data analysis user-friendly

- Staffing firms have to accommodate client-specific metrics and reports

- Branch management expects to be pull and analyze data directly, and does not want to rely on IT resources for reporting and analysis needs

• Technology roadmap considerations:- How many reports do you really need?

- How do you handle the ad-hoc reporting needs of your field organization?

- Is there such a thing as too many reports?

- What about report distribution? How do you know people receive, read, and react to the reports?

- How often do you need to report?

- To what extent does your reporting need to span other systems?


The Recession

• Trend: The Recession

- HR and process outsourcing

- VMS adoption accelerates

- Automate candidate workflows due to high candidate volume

- Automate and improve the online application

- Automate screening and testing steps, reducing the manual effort required to qualify candidates

- Better search and match to find and submit the best candidate faster

- Fast growing firms are investing in technology

- Available resources for the effort

- Preparing to scale without adding headcount when economy recovers


- Is now the time to score a deal and kick-off software selection processes to be ready for the recovery? Are there good deals out there right now?

- In a candidate-rich market, what can you do to build your inventory, and, when employed, your future clients?


staffing technology: trends to transform your business sara moss & jonathan novich, co-founders,...

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