How effective is your organisation at finding and engaging with early contingent talent?
You might think your MSP’s current approach to hiring young temporary, contract and freelance workers is fine as it is. After all, there are plenty of providers out there that can source high volumes of candidates faster than you can say ‘overreliance on job boards’.
But the old ways of filling roles are gone. Thanks to unpredictable labour markets and shifting economies, many employers are asking their recruitment partners how they can build early talent pipelines that increase workforce agility and responsiveness. So it’s no surprise that the spotlight is now fixed on a new kind of MSP – one that proactively engages younger workers to address future hiring needs.
Moving beyond traditional sourcing
As the contingent workforce continues to grow, Managed Service Providers are seeing increasing demand for their services. Talent Acquisition teams are now much better equipped to contribute to the decisions around hiring early talent – which means they’re looking for more than traditional sourcing. They want to nurture relationships with younger candidates to not only reduce reliance on reactive hiring, but also ensure they have the right skills and perspectives to drive future growth.
Some MSPs are answering this call. But even in today’s landscape, organisations can often find that:
- Recruitment partners prioritise filling positions quickly with any candidate available – even if they’re not the best fit for the role.
- Candidate experiences aren’t prioritised, leading to negative reviews and difficulty in attracting future talent.
- Jobs appear on numerous platforms (even if the roles are no longer open) to give the impression of high activity.
- Firms don’t actively engage with candidates beyond their original application, missing out on opportunities to build relationships with suitable early talent.
- The recruitment process doesn’t align with the values of new contingent talent.
Sound familiar?
New workforce, new expectations
To attract younger candidates, organisations and recruitment partners need to start thinking more strategically. They need to consider how they shape opportunities to match the aspirations and expectations of the new contingent workforce.
Early or Gen Z talent have a different approach to work than previous generations. Raised as digital natives, they prioritise flexible, remote working, and feel closely aligned with organisations that offer purposeful work. Career stability and development are critical, but there’s more. Many candidates want to work for employers where diversity, equity and inclusion aren’t treated as an afterthought.
This means employers need to rethink how they engage, manage and support their contingent workforce – along with their MSPs.
The benefits of identifying talent early
Thankfully, some providers are offering the support organisations need. These MSPs are laser-focused on building contingent workforce propositions, embedding Gen Z values into core recruitment processes, and creating open dialogues with candidates. This helps you maintain a steady flow of talent to meet your business’s changing needs.
A strategic Managed Service Provider will help you:
Overcome future talent shortages
In times of talent scarcity, having a robust pipeline of young contingent workers will offer organisations a valuable lifeline. As older generations retire, modern MSPs will be able to maintain an active talent pool to fill gaps and cultivate skills internally. This approach to contingent talent management ensures organisations can quickly scale teams and respond to new market challenges and opportunities.
Drive efficiency
Managed Service Providers that build early talent pipelines reduce the need for traditional sourcing and staffing agencies. In turn, this reduces cost-per-hire and time-to-hire, as your organisation will already have access to the future talent it needs. By proactively engaging young candidates, your hiring process becomes more intentional and less reactive. This enables better workforce planning and operational efficiency.
Enhance employer branding
A strategic MSP will be able to offer expertise on building and maintaining your employer reputation through a strong contingent value proposition; this will improve your messaging and communication with younger candidates at every touchpoint in your hiring process. The best providers will go one step further to help your organisation participate in early talent programmes. They will offer development opportunities that are aligned with Gen Z expectations.
Improve talent quality
Engaging with talent early means MSPs can create a higher-quality workforce. Why? Because they gain a deeper understanding of candidates’ ambitions, expectations, skills and potential fit for your organisation. Using this nuanced approach to talent engagement means you can match contractors with assignments more easily and boost job satisfaction at the same time. This is critical for retaining sought-after talent in competitive markets.
Build a diverse and inclusive workforce
Some MSPs focus on bringing numbers through the door. A proactive provider will help you build a broader pool of potential candidates than traditional resourcing, and ensure potential hires feel included at every stage of the recruitment lifecycle. Your MSP should be working with your teams to address unconscious bias that may exist in your hiring practices, and use untapped resources to find candidates outside of core demographics.
Conclusion
In times of unpredictability, workforce planning isn’t always easy to achieve. But one thing is certain: young talent will be increasingly valuable. How organisations go about building early talent pipelines is crucial to future growth opportunities, and will affect their ability to drive quality talent, efficiency and meaningful DEI initiatives.
This can be achieved more easily with a proactive MSP that not only understands the aspirations of young candidates, but also has the expertise to deliver modern contingent workforce solutions. If organisations are serious about engaging talent early, they need a capable partner who can move with the tides.
