Category: Contingent Workforce Management

7 direct sourcing best practices in talent acquisition

Posted on by akessler

Direct sourcing has emerged as a pivotal talent acquisition strategy, empowering organizations to proactively identify, attract, and engage candidates. As the growth of the gig economy blurs the line between full-time and temporary employment, workers are increasingly open to both permanent roles and contingent placements.

By using your own talent database rather than third-party agencies, direct sourcing allows you to build pools of qualified candidates. Instead of starting fresh with every opening, you cultivate ongoing relationships with people who already know your organization, such as former employees, past applicants, and referrals. Ultimately, nurturing a blended talent pool enables organizations to eliminate friction and connect with top talent more efficiently.

Below are seven best practices for implementing direct sourcing within your organization.

1. Start with the talent you already have

The quickest way to build a direct sourcing program is often to look at who’s already in your ATS. Many organizations hold years of candidate data, including past applicants, expression-of-interest submissions, and candidates who reached the final stages of an earlier search but didn’t receive an offer. Former employees and contractors who left on good terms are another valuable source, because they know your culture and ways of working.

Rediscovering this talent gives you a head start. These candidates have some familiarity with your brand, and you’ve already invested in attracting them once. Before you reach out, check that your candidate data is current and that you have permission to contact them, in line with local privacy rules. Starting here can help you show results early, which makes it easier to build support for the wider program.

2. Focus on your employer brand 

A strong employer brand showcases what makes your company unique and appealing, serving as a powerful magnet for skilled professionals seeking temporary, project-based, and full-time work. To build an effective employer brand, start by developing a compelling employer value proposition (EVP) that highlights the distinct advantages of working with your organization. This should encompass your company’s values, culture, and the opportunities you offer. Consider factors such as flexible work arrangements, challenging projects, and professional development opportunities. Communicate these elements clearly and consistently across your website, social media platforms, email nurture campaigns, and other channels to create a cohesive brand image.

Because direct sourcing talent pools often include both permanent and contingent workers, it’s important to ensure that your EVP applies to both. Have you formally defined the value proposition for contractors? Contingent workers are a part of your culture, too, and deserve the same experience as full-time workers. It may help to shift from using the term EVP, which implies the value is only experienced by those you employ directly, to using talent value proposition (TVP) to make it more inclusive. Direct sourcing gives you a way to share that value proposition with every worker in your talent pools, regardless of classification.

3. Segment your talent pools 

Segmenting your talent pools by skills, experience level, and job type helps you target your efforts. When a permanent role or contract assignment opens, you can go straight to the right group of candidates.

It also helps you coordinate outreach, so the same candidate isn’t approached separately for a permanent role and a contract assignment. Over time, analytics can show you what each segment values, which helps you tailor your talent value proposition for different groups.

4. Keep your talent pools engaged 

Once your talent pools are in place, the goal is to keep them engaged until the right opportunity comes along. Tailor your outreach to each segment, sharing relevant updates, feedback, and opportunities so candidates stay connected to your organization. Use the channels each group is most likely to respond to, whether that’s email, text, social media, or industry events.

By staying in touch with passive talent, you build a ready pipeline of qualified candidates you can call on as your hiring needs change.

When someone from your talent pool does apply, the hiring process should reflect the relationship you’ve built. In PeopleScout’s Inside the Candidate Experience 2026 report, 64% of candidates heard nothing back from more than half of the employers they applied to. Silence at that stage can quickly undo months of nurturing. Whether a candidate is being considered for a permanent or contingent role, keep the process transparent, set realistic expectations about timelines, and close the loop with everyone.

5. Use technology to scale 

Most of the practices in this article depend on having the right tools in place. Technology provides the infrastructure that makes direct sourcing work at scale.

Look for solutions with AI-powered matching that can surface a pool of strong-fit candidates from your existing database and rank them against a role’s requirements. Recruiters and hiring managers can then start with the strongest matches rather than a blank search, while people continue to make every hiring decision. External sourcing tools can extend your reach further, and inbound channels like custom career sites, internal job portals, expression-of-interest forms, and programmatic advertising can all feed your talent pools.

To keep those pools engaged at scale, you’ll also need a CRM and recruitment marketing tools that automate personalized outreach, freeing your team to focus on building relationships.

6. Measure what matters

Track key metrics such as time-to-fill, quality of hires, cost-per-hire, candidate engagement rates, and source of hire. Additionally, monitor the size and quality of your talent pools, the effectiveness of your engagement strategies, and the overall satisfaction of both candidates and hiring managers.

A few measures are specific to direct sourcing and show whether the program is paying off.

  • The share of hires and placements that come from your talent pools
  • Changes in your staffing agency spend
  • How often contractors move into permanent roles and vice versa

Regularly analyzing these metrics will give a clear view of your direct sourcing program’s performance and highlight areas for improvement. For instance, if you notice a particular talent pool consistently yields high-quality candidates with shorter time-to-fill rates, you might allocate more resources to cultivating that segment. Similarly, if certain engagement tactics result in higher response rates, you can refine your communication strategies accordingly. The goal is not just to collect data but to turn it into program improvements.

7. Consider a talent partner 

Implementing direct sourcing well requires substantial resources, expertise, and ongoing management. This is where a total talent partner can help.

Providers that offer both recruitment process outsourcing (RPO) and managed service provider (MSP) programs bring scale and specialization. They invest in sourcing technology, follow market trends, and refine their strategies using data from clients across industries. A partner can also bring a consultative view, assessing your skills gaps against anticipated demand to support more formal workforce planning, so your talent pools are ready when you need them.

With the right partner, direct sourcing can become a foundation for bringing your permanent and contingent hiring together, and a step toward total workforce management.

PeopleScout Direct Sourcing is powered by Affinix®, our AI-powered total talent technology suite. It helps you rediscover strong-fit candidates already in your database, search more than 1.3 billion external candidate profiles, and nurture talent pools through personalized email and text campaigns. ScoutAI, a built-in AI assistant, shows candidate match scores and insight summaries to recruiters, so they can focus on the strongest matches first.

How to improve candidate engagement for total talent acquisition

Posted on by akessler

Employers put a great deal of time and energy into candidate engagement. Even in a slower hiring market, where many roles attract more applicants than recruiters can review, candidate expectations remain high.

Yet our latest research shows that effort isn’t translating into a better candidate experience. In PeopleScout’s Inside the Candidate Experience 2026 report, featuring data from a global survey of more than 1,000 job seekers across 10 markets, just 11% of candidates rated their experience as very positive, down from 18% in 2023. Ghosting was a big part of the problem, with 64% of candidates hearing nothing back from more than half of the employers they applied to. Employers that want better outcomes across their hiring programs need to rethink how they engage candidates.

That challenge grows when permanent and contingent hiring run as separate processes, because candidates can have very different experiences depending on the type of role they apply for. Organizations are starting to close the gap. Everest Group research shows nearly half of enterprises are now actively working to unify their permanent and contingent hiring strategies. With economic uncertainty continuing and many employers relying on contingent talent to respond to shifting demand, that work is becoming more pressing. A total talent acquisition strategy, encompassing both full-time and contingent  hiring, can help organizations reduce agency costs and fill the roles the business needs most.

In this article, we’ll look at how siloed permanent and contingent hiring affects the candidate experience, share best practices that work across both worker types, and explain what to look for in a total talent partner.

A tale of two candidate journeys: permanent and contingent workers

Permanent hiring typically involves thorough vetting, with recruiters responsible for moving candidates through the process. Contingent hiring often includes more stages and handoffs as suppliers pass candidates to hiring managers, and it’s sometimes decentralized, with each department managing their own hiring.

Recruitment process workflows for both permanent employees and contingent workers

Ownership is split, too. Typically, procurement leaders oversee contingent labor spend, while talent acquisition leaders look after full-time hiring. As a result, a candidate applying for a permanent role and a contractor applying for a temporary assignment at the same organization may go through entirely different processes, with different contacts, timelines, and levels of communication.

The importance of a total talent acquisition strategy

To the business, the need is usually simple: hire the right talent to get the work done. Recruitment, however, usually isn’t organized that way. As the two journeys above show, permanent and contingent hiring often run as separate processes. When both sides compete for the same talent pool, the costs can add up.

  • Both sides may pay a premium to reach the same candidates.
  • Each side may advertise, source, and screen for similar roles separately.
  • A strong candidate turned down for a permanent role often isn’t considered for a contract assignment—the same is true in reverse. In both cases, talent you’ve already paid to attract is lost.

The cost can also extend well beyond the hiring program. In our 2026 research, 37% of candidates who had a negative experience said they would tell others not to apply, and 36% said they would stop buying from the company. For consumer-facing businesses with large contingent workforces, a poor experience for one group of workers can quickly become a brand reputation problem.

A total talent acquisition strategy brings permanent and contingent hiring together under one view of demand. Organizations can start with the work that needs doing and then find the best route to the right talent, rather than deciding first whether a role should go to an employee or a contractor. Just as important, every candidate gets a consistent experience of your brand, however they come to you. That consistency is the foundation for better candidate engagement.

How to improve engagement for every candidate

So, how do you create an engaging candidate experience that gives both full-time and contingent candidates what they want? The fundamentals are largely the same, whatever the worker classification. In our 2026 research, candidates ranked respect for their time (4.36 out of 5), a transparent process (4.28), and fair assessment (4.27) as the most important parts of the hiring journey. In practice, that means holding contingent hiring to the same standard as full-time recruitment.

Let candidates drive the process

Wherever possible, candidates should be able to move themselves through the hiring process, whether they’re applying for a permanent position or a three-month contract. Self-service steps like mobile applications, text-based screening, and automated interview scheduling can reduce the friction that leads to drop-off. For contingent workers—who are often on tighter timelines and evaluating multiple immediate opportunities—speed and self-service are crucial to securing top talent before a competitor does.

Focus on your candidates, not your company

Start by thinking about the specific talent personas you’re targeting. Your recruitment marketing campaigns and job postings should feature thoughtful messaging that highlights what’s in it for them. A contractor may care most about pay transparency, speed to placement, project scope, and flexibility, while a permanent candidate may focus more on career growth, culture, and benefits. Tailoring your messaging helps both groups feel understood.

Make your career site work harder for you

Your career site is often where candidates decide whether to apply at all, yet contract roles may only be advertised through staffing suppliers. Unifying your career site to showcase both permanent and contingent opportunities helps reduce confusion.

Ensure the site is easy to navigate and eliminates duplicate postings. For example, a retailer hiring full-time and part-time seasonal staff across multiple locations should make it clear whether applying to one role opens consideration for others. Adding FAQ content that outlines the application process for both permanent roles and contingent assignments gives every applicant confidence upfront.

Streamline interviews

The shelf life of an engaged candidate is short. While permanent roles typically involve thorough, multi-stage vetting, contingent hiring often gets bogged down by multiple handoffs between staffing suppliers and internal department managers. Match your interview stages to the role type. Using pre-recorded video interviews or automated scheduling tools helps you connect with candidates quickly, preventing contractors and full-time applicants alike from getting lost in scheduling delays.

Keep candidates informed at every stage

Our research found communication was one of the weakest-performing parts of the candidate experience. While TA teams often have automated communication set up for permanent hires, contingent candidates rely on staffing suppliers to keep them updated, and standards can vary widely from one supplier to the next. A few best practices can help:

  • Set clear expectations about timelines and next steps at the point of application.
  • Deploy automated status updates by text and email, and set the same communication standards for your staffing suppliers.
  • Close the loop with every candidate, including contract workers who weren’t selected. A contractor who isn’t the right fit for one assignment could be exactly the talent you need for the next.
candidate engagement for contingent workers

Build pathways between contingent and permanent roles

A total talent approach works best when talent can move between worker types. A contractor who performs well on assignment already knows your organization, your teams, and the work, which can make them a strong candidate for a permanent role.

Direct sourcing can make those moves easier. Rather than relying on staffing suppliers to find talent for each role, you use your existing talent database to build and engage talent pools for both permanent and contingent roles. Those pools can include former employees and contractors, referrals, and strong runners-up from past searches. Because these candidates are already familiar with your organization, you can often fill roles faster.

Three steps can help you get started:

  • Keep talent pools engaged between roles with regular, relevant communication, so candidates stay connected to your brand until the next opportunity opens.
  • Give contractors visibility of permanent openings and a clear route to apply.
  • Track contractor performance so hiring managers can identify strong candidates for permanent roles.

Choosing a total talent partner for better candidate engagement

Executing a unified recruitment strategy across talent acquisition and procurement, two functions that have historically worked separately, isn’t easy. Coordinating technology, aligning processes, and shifting organizational mindsets often require specialized expertise. That’s why many organizations choose to work with a total talent partner.

When evaluating a partner to help achieve your total talent goals, three things matter most.

  • Dual-market expertise: Look for a partner with a clear view of both permanent and contingent hiring along with demonstrated success in your specific labor categories. They should have the market intelligence required to map candidate personas across both talent pools to effectively identify, engage, attract, and retain talent.
  • A unified tech stack: Your partner should offer talent technology that balances sourcing, AI, and automation to move candidates smoothly through the funnel—regardless of worker classification—while keeping candidates informed and ensuring humans remain in control of every hiring decision.
  • Customized total workforce solutions: A partner should create a solution unique to your business, combining approaches like direct sourcing, internal mobility, and employer branding to bring your permanent and contingent talent strategies together.
total talent acquisition solution

See how this works in practice

When a global food manufacturer brought permanent and contingent hiring under one total workforce strategy with PeopleScout, it filled about 40% of staffing requests the same day and cut compliance deficiencies by 91%. Read the case study.

Total workforce strategy boosts compliance by 91%

Posted on by akessler
Total workforce strategy boosts compliance by 91%

Total workforce strategy boosts compliance by 91%

PeopleScout helped this global food manufacturer bring permanent and contingent hiring under a single total workforce strategy to fill critical production and maintenance roles in a tight labor market.

40 % of staffing requests filled the same day
98 % onboarding compliance
91 % reduction in overall compliance deficiencies

Situation

A global food manufacturing organization needed to fill a high volume of roles across 25 locations that called for specialized, in-demand skills, and it needed to happen fast. Production lines depended on it as any delay in hiring meant a real risk of downtime which would result in loss of revenue.

The hardest roles to fill were maintenance technicians in a location with a limited talent pool and strong competition for skilled workers. The client’s internal recruiting team was making progress, but the urgency of the demand called for more capacity.

The organization ran permanent and contingent hiring programs as separate efforts. Without a shared view across both, sourcing work was sometimes duplicated. The same candidates risked being approached twice, and no one had a complete picture of hiring.

Solution

The company first engaged PeopleScout as its RPO partner for permanent hiring. On the strength of that program’s results, it expanded the scope to include contingent hiring, bringing both workforces under one total workforce strategy with MSP and RPO teams working from a single plan and shared accountability.

The two teams started by identifying the most critical contingent hiring gaps and workforce constraints, then engaged suppliers with a strong local presence and access to the talent pools the client needed. Supplier staffing calls were conducted to align hiring requirements, market conditions, and sourcing strategy before the work began.

To find maintenance technician talent, the MSP team negotiated a targeted sourcing strategy that allowed select suppliers to support direct sourcing alongside the RPO team. Participation was deliberately limited to suppliers with a proven track record on performance and candidate quality, so the client’s openings reached the right candidates without oversaturating a small local market.

Throughout, PeopleScout’s dedicated program management office (PMO) kept the manufacturer’s internal team and the PeopleScout RPO team informed with daily updates on candidate activity, actions taken, hiring progress, and upcoming start dates. On the MSP side, the PMO held frequent status reviews to help set clear supplier expectations, drive accountability, surface issues early, and keep decisions moving at the pace the deadline demanded.

The program also strengthened the client’s recruitment foundations. At launch, PeopleScout ran a full new hire onboarding audit to establish a compliance baseline and pinpoint process and documentation gaps. Corrective actions, tighter onboarding controls, standardized processes, and ongoing program governance have improved performance every year since.

Results

  • All hiring demand was fulfilled ahead of the required deadline, with no disruption to production lines.
  • Approximately 40% of staffing requests were filled the same day they were received.
  • 35% of maintenance technician placements were filled through direct hire, expanding access to a scarce skill set.
  • Onboarding compliance improved from 77% to 98%.
  • 91% reduction in identified compliance deficiencies overall, strengthening audit readiness and lowering risk.

Our Total Talent approach helped the client successfully address ongoing workforce demands in a highly competitive labor market. The manufacturer gained broader access to talent, more agility on hard-to-fill roles, and a more reliable onboarding experience. Most importantly, it kept production running through a period of high-demand hiring.

At a glance

  • COMPANY
    Global food manufacturing company
  • INDUSTRY
    Consumer goods
  • PEOPLESCOUT SOLUTIONS
    Recruitment Process Outsourcing, Managed Service Program, Total Talent
Contact Sales

Powering Digital Innovation: MSP Solution Transforms Tech Recruitment in India

Posted on by akessler
Powering Digital Innovation: MSP Solution Transforms Tech Recruitment in India

MSP in India

Powering Digital Innovation: MSP Solution Transforms Tech Recruitment in India

Through strategic total workforce solutions across India’s technology centers, PeopleScout helped a global tech leader scale its talent acquisition by over 50% while maintaining quality and compliance.

Situation

PeopleScout has been a strategic talent acquisition partner to this client, a leading technology company, for over a decade, supporting the company’s continuous growth and workforce transformation initiatives. Throughout this journey, our engagement has expanded significantly, scaling by more than 50% to address their evolving hiring surges and business priorities.

As technology demands intensified, the client needed a robust recruitment partner capable of navigating IT skills shortages, managing high-volume hiring across multiple disciplines, and delivering services across diverse cultural contexts and cities. The requirement spanned a wide variety of functions, including:

  • Professional services, finance and legal roles
  • Infrastructure support and security roles
  • Customer experience and support roles
  • Global sales and marketing roles
  • IT roles (including expertise in .NET, Java, Oracle, SQL and testing)
  • Analytics and data science roles (including expertise in big data, Hadoop, SQL queries and advanced MS Excel)

The challenge was not just about scale but also about ensuring seamless operational execution across India’s major tech hubs—Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Gurgaon, Navi Mumbai and Chennai.

Solution

To address these complex hiring needs, PeopleScout deployed Managed Service Provider (MSP) and Total Workforce Solutions, offering end-to-end talent management across the recruitment lifecycle. This included sourcing, screening, assessment, onboarding and offboarding of contract and project-based professionals across multiple business lines.

Our approach was centered around collaborative workforce planning with the client’s HR and business teams, aligning resource allocation with project timelines and delivery milestones. A dedicated PeopleScout delivery team managed workforce compliance, optimized candidate experience and ensured that diversity and inclusion goals were embedded in every hiring initiative.

By acting as an extension of the client’s internal talent team, PeopleScout not only managed India recruitment operations but also supported broader strategic activities such as vendor audits, employee grievance resolution and workforce analytics reporting.

Results

PeopleScout’s MSP solutions have become integral to the client’s talent strategy. On an annual basis, we successfully hire over 2,500 professionals across IT, finance and accounting and customer experience. Through a tech-enabled recruitment process, our teams have delivered:

  • Scalable hiring outcomes without compromising quality or timelines
  • Seamless contract lifecycle management—from requisition creation to onboarding and exit formalities
  • Diverse and inclusive hiring practices to foster a balanced and equitable workplace
  • Proactive collaboration with the client’s project managers and vendor ecosystem to protect client interests and drive continuous improvement

The longevity and growth of this engagement underscore PeopleScout’s capability to deliver strategic, agile and future-ready workforce solutions for global technology enterprises.

At a Glance

  • COMPANY
    Leading Global Technology Company
  • INDUSTRY
    Technology
  • PEOPLESCOUT SOLUTIONS
    Managed Service Program, Total Talent
  • LOCATIONS
    Multiple locations India’s major tech hubs—Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Gurgaon, Navi Mumbai and Chennai
  • ABOUT THE CLIENT
    As one of the world’s most influential technology companies, this global organization plays a pivotal role in developing cutting-edge technology solutions across sectors.
Let’s Connect

Direct Sourcing

Posted on by akessler

Direct Sourcing by PeopleScout

PeopleScout’s Direct Sourcing is a tech-powered solution for engaging top talent for permanent and contingent roles, while leveraging the power of your employer brand. We lay the framework for a sustainable total talent strategy by proactively creating a pipeline of freelance, temporary and permanent talent from your existing database combined with our global reach of 1.3B candidate profiles.

Download this fact sheet to learn more.

Download Fact Sheet

Learn more about PeopleScout’s Direct Sourcing solution.

Learn More

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7 direct sourcing best practices in talent acquisition
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7 direct sourcing best practices in talent acquisition

Direct sourcing has emerged as a pivotal talent acquisition strategy, empowering organizations to proactively identify, attract, and engage candidates. As the growth of the gig economy blurs the line between full-time and temporary employment, workers are increasingly open to both permanent roles and contingent placements. By using your own talent database rather than third-party agencies,…

Video Case Study: Tech-Powered Direct Sourcing in Healthcare
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Case Study: Tech-Powered Direct Sourcing in Healthcare

Direct Sourcing
Fact Sheets

Direct Sourcing

Direct Sourcing by PeopleScout PeopleScout’s Direct Sourcing is a tech-powered solution for engaging top talent for permanent and contingent roles, while leveraging the power of your employer brand. We lay the framework for a sustainable total talent strategy by proactively creating a pipeline of freelance, temporary and permanent talent from your existing database combined with…

Overcoming Healthcare Talent Shortage with Tech-Powered Direct Sourcing

Posted on by akessler
Overcoming Healthcare Talent Shortage with Tech-Powered Direct Sourcing

Direct Sourcing

Overcoming Healthcare Talent Shortage with Tech-Powered Direct Sourcing

An Australian radiology network sought PeopleScout’s Direct Sourcing solution after two acquisitions expanded their geographical footprint, making it increasingly difficult to fill critical skilled healthcare roles amidst a talent shortage and an imbalanced distribution of practitioners across regions.

401 roles filled in just 5 months
112 roles filled in remote locations
83 % engagement rate on doctor campaign

Situation 

This Australian radiology network operates in 270 clinics, employs over 350 doctors and 4,000 staff and performs over six million patient procedures a year, making them one of the largest medical imaging providers in the world. The organization needed to hire high-volume, critical healthcare roles across both metropolitan and regional locations, but they were struggling because of the talent shortage across their newly expanded regional footprint. In addition to the unique talent challenges facing the healthcare sector globally—including employee burnout, widening skills gaps and rising demand among the aging population—the diagnostic imaging sector in Australia faces the additional challenge of ensuring staff distribution across metropolitan, regional and rural areas is proportionate to the population. Historically, most radiology workers have resided in metropolitan areas, creating a gap in rural locations. 

Prior to engaging PeopleScout, the client used disparate, short-term solutions and lacked a single view of the skills within their existing workforce. They did not have a talent technology platform, but instead managed requisitions and candidate outreach efforts using Excel spreadsheets. Our team developed a Direct Sourcing solution to help the client overcome the healthcare talent shortage and meet their workforce goals in all locations. 

Solution 

PeopleScout augmented the internal recruitment team with Direct Sourcing for both contingent and permanent roles ranging from medical receptionists to radiographers, sonographers to IT personnel, by developing and implementing 360-degree talent sourcing and engagement strategy that included:  

  • Multi-Channel Sourcing: We deployed Smart Search, an Affinix® tool that simultaneously scours multiple external databases, capturing and saving profiles that match desired skills and experience. 
  • AI-Powered Talent Rediscovery: Using artificial intelligence, we matched job descriptions to all candidates in the platform, generating a list of recommended candidates that were scored for suitability, based on industry experience, skills, previous job titles and management experience. 
  • Cutting-Edge Recruitment Marketing: Leveraging Affinix’s capabilities, we built an internal career site and external job portal. These engagement hubs allowed employees and candidates to explore openings, learn about different roles or submit expression of interest forms for hard-to-fill positions. 
  • Sophisticated Talent Nurturing: Candidates were segmented into talent pools by role and region, then added to customized, automated nurture campaigns. This allowed our client to engage or re-engage with active and passive candidates, alumni and referrals effectively. 
  • Data-Driven Insights: Custom Affinix dashboards provided real-time insights on the most active candidates, enabling the team to build automated drip campaigns that kept jobseekers engaged and interested. 

Results 

The impact of our tech-powered Direct Sourcing solution was swift and substantial. In the first five months following program launch, PeopleScout filled 401 roles for the radiology network across 33 locations, including every state and territory where the organization operates.  

Some campaign messaging was role-specific—the campaign targeting 800 doctors had an engagement rate over 80%.  

Other messages focused on the benefits of working in the more remote locations, highlighting the “perfect combination of a vibrant city life in a rural setting.” Of the roles filled, 112 were within these regional locations, where recruitment had historically been more difficult.  

At a Glance

  • COMPANY
    Radiology network
  • INDUSTRY
    Healthcare
  • PEOPLESCOUT SOLUTIONS
    Total Talent, Affinix
  • LOCATIONS
    33 locations across Australia and New Zealand
Let’s Connect

What is Direct Sourcing? Why It Could Open the Door to Total Talent Acquisition

Posted on by akessler

The evolution of remote work has resulted in the growth of the gig economy and the blurring of lines between full-time and temporary employment. Workers who traditionally seek full-time employment are increasingly willing to take up temporary gigs—and vice versa. Organizations that create and nurture blended talent pools of both permanent and contingent workers can be more intentional with workforce planning to address skills gaps and diversity goals. Enter direct sourcing—a game-changing strategy that’s reshaping how companies approach talent acquisition.  

By integrating direct sourcing into your total talent acquisition strategy, you can turn these talent pools into your strongest channel for growing your workforce, bringing forward pre-engaged talent. This results in faster hiring and improves overall organizational productivity. With direct sourcing, you can uncover hidden talent and gain a competitive edge in attracting top-tier candidates. 

But what is direct sourcing, and why should talent acquisition leaders pay attention? In this article, we’ll delve into the importance of direct sourcing, it’s role in total talent management, its benefits, and the crucial role of technology in a direct sourcing solution.  

What is Direct Sourcing? 

First things first, what is direct sourcing anyway? Direct sourcing is a recruitment approach that leverages an organization’s employer brand and existing talent database to build and manage talent pools for both permanent and contingent positions. This method allows organizations to engage directly with potential hires, including former employees, retirees, referrals, interns, and even “silver medalists” and candidates who were runners-up in previous hiring processes. Unlike traditional methods that rely heavily on staffing agencies, direct sourcing creates a pipeline of freelance, temporary and permanent talent, reducing costs, improving hiring efficiency and allowing employers to take control of their hiring needs. 

At its core, direct sourcing involves: 

  • Utilizing your employer brand to attract talent 
  • Creating and managing exclusive talent pools 
  • Proactively engaging with potential candidates 

Direct Sourcing: The First Step to Total Talent Acquisition? 

According to Everest Group, 46% of enterprises are actively exploring ways to combine approaches for contingent and permanent talent acquisition management, and 74% see direct sourcing as the way to do it. By sharing people, processes and technology across vacancy types through direct sourcing, organizations gain efficiency and get closer to total workforce management.  

So, it’s no surprise that more and more organizations are choosing to outsource their direct sourcing program, either coupled with their Managed Service Program (MSP) or through a Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) provider.  

Partners like PeopleScout excel at direct sourcing, as their specialty lies in seamlessly integrating with client teams, leveraging the client’s employer brand to attract top talent. Plus, with a partner, you gain access to specialized technology for managing and curating talent pools, ensuring a streamlined and efficient process while still maintaining the benefits of direct engagement with potential hires. 

The Benefits of Direct Sourcing 

Direct sourcing offers numerous benefits that are driving its adoption among forward-thinking organizations. Let’s explore the top advantages: 

  • Faster Hiring Cycles: With always-on talent pools, direct sourcing can significantly reduce time-to-hire. By eliminating the need for a staffing agency and leveraging candidates who already exist in the ATS and CRM (and are familiar with your employer brand), direct sourcing puts engaged candidates at your fingertips. Having regular access to qualified candidates, referrals and former employees allows you to easily adjust to changing workforce needs. 
  • Greater Cost Savings: Direct sourcing can significantly reduce recruitment costs by minimizing reliance on staffing agencies and their associated fees. An RPO partner who can offer AI-powered sourcing and innovative ways to ensure smarter media spend can reduce your costs and maximize your ROI for direct sourcing.  
  • Higher Quality of Candidates: By leveraging your employer brand and creating curated talent pools, direct sourcing allows you to attract higher-quality candidates who are better aligned with your organization’s culture and needs. Through personalized engagement with candidates, RPO providers can gain a deeper understanding of their skills, experiences and motivations. Additionally, direct sourcing allows companies to build lasting relationships with top talent, creating a talent pool that can be tapped for future openings. 
  • Enhanced Candidate Experience: Direct sourcing means more personalized and human interactions, which improves the candidate experience. By engaging proactively with potential hires, you can provide a smoother, more informative process that reflects positively on your brand. 
  • Employer Brand Attraction: In a direct sourcing engagement, your RPO partner is an extension of your team, transforming your employer brand into a powerful tool in attracting top contingent and permanent talent. Direct sourcing allows you to showcase your company culture, values and opportunities through relevant and engaging touchpoints, helping you become an employer of choice.  
  • Access to Data & Insights: With extensive experience across job families and regions, RPOs are well suited to evaluate your unique recruitment metrics against market trends to enable data-driven decision making for your direct souring program. Detailed analytics help decode top talent behaviors and predict cultural fit, willingness to change companies and future tenure potential to improve hiring speed and accuracy over time. 
  • Improved Diversity: The targeted nature of direct sourcing means you can identify, select and engage candidates from various audiences to meet diversity goals.  
  • Improved Hiring Manager Experience: Direct sourcing provides hiring managers with better access to high-quality and diverse talent pools, freeing them up to focus on leading their teams instead of recruiting. 

The Role of Technology in Direct Sourcing 

While the concept of direct sourcing is powerful on its own, technology unlocks its true potential. Modern direct sourcing solutions leverage AI, multi-channel sourcing, communication automation and analytics to supercharge the approach. 

When deciding on a direct sourcing solution, consider the following technologies: 

  • AI and Machine Learning: These technologies enable superior skills matching, connecting the right candidates with the right opportunities more efficiently than ever before. PeopleScout Direct Sourcing helps you rediscover candidates who are already in your applicant tracking system (ATS) with the use of AI. Affinix®, our proprietary total talent suite, compares your job description against profiles in your database and identifies a list of the best candidates—whether they’re previous applicants, individuals who have filled out an expression of interest form for the role, or silver/bronze medalists from previous requisitions. You receive a weighted role suitability score for each candidate (based on previous job titles and experience, skills profile, and management experience) along with a written summary. Your hiring manager can then determine which candidates they want to pursue immediately, and which to add to a talent pool, where they’ll receive additional outreach before being invited to apply. 
  • Smart Search: In addition to your existing ATS, consider a direct sourcing solution that enables you to search across multiple external talent databases—such as LinkedIn and Indeed—simultaneously and save relevant candidate profiles into your own database. This helps you beat your competitors to hard-to-find talent and source more efficiently with a seamless experience for your hiring managers. AI can be applied to these candidates as well to identify strong candidates—passive or active, known or new to you—within seconds of opening a new job requisition. 
  • Multi-Channel Sourcing: To truly capitalize on your employer brand with your direct sourcing program, a multi-channel approach that leverages recruitment marketing to reach top talent is crucial. This includes custom career site and microsite development, for both internal and external job portals, expression of interest forms and programmatic advertising. This holistic approach will re-engage talent and excite them about your opportunities. 
  • Personalization at Scale: Your direct sourcing solution should feature recruitment marketing technology that helps you develop a series of automated targeted communication touchpoints to engage or re-engage with passive candidates, silver/bronze medalists, contractors, alumni and referrals. Personalized emails and automated drip campaigns will keep your brand top-of-mind. Use analytics from communication and nurture campaigns to access insight into which candidates are engaging most with your content and whether the content you’re distributing resonates with the candidate pool. 
  • Data-Driven Insights: For your direct sourcing program, insist on robust reporting and analytics capabilities. However, according to Everest Group, 52% of organizations who are considering direct sourcing cite the lack of technology integration between permanent and contingent tools as a challenge they are currently facing or anticipate facing. Integrating your existing VMS and ATS into one analytics platform is a must for total talent management in order to gain insight into both your permanent and contingent openings.  

Conclusion 

As the world of work continues to evolve, direct sourcing is poised to play an increasingly important role for organizations aiming to streamline their total talent acquisition processes and attract the best candidates.  

As you consider implementing direct sourcing in your organization, remember that while the human touch remains invaluable, technology is a crucial enabler. Industry leading direct sourcing solutions are AI-powered, combining cutting-edge technology with expert talent curation and engagement strategies. 

By embracing this approach, organizations can position themselves at the forefront of talent acquisition innovation, ready to attract and engage the best contingent and permanent talent in an increasingly competitive landscape. 

MSP Upgrade Cuts Contingent Worker Hiring Pace by 50% for Food Producer

Posted on by akessler
MSP Upgrade Cuts Contingent Worker Hiring Pace by 50% for Food Producer

Contingent Workforce

MSP Upgrade Cuts Contingent Worker Hiring Pace by 50% for Food Producer

PeopleScout helped this food and beverage employer smoothly integrate newly acquired locations while cutting time-to-fill rates nearly in half.

885 Annual assignments
84 Locations supported over three years
50 % Reduction in time-to-fill

Situation

This food and beverage employer purchased three distributors in late 2022 and sought PeopleScout’s support with the transition as their managed service provider (MSP). They needed support integrating the new facilities into their vendor management system (VMS)—including manager access, incumbent supplier onboarding, and transitioning temporary workers in accounting and finance, administration, business and professional services as well as industrial and technical roles. The client had also implemented a new policy requiring workers on-site to be vaccinated for COVID-19 which they needed help enforcing with suppliers.

The organization was utilizing an outdated and manual requisition request process, due in part to the fact that many industrial supervisors struggled with technology and spent most of their time on the production floor. This often resulted in missing information or other errors on the requisition requests, which required information gathering from the hiring manager, costing the team valuable recruiting time.

Solution

PeopleScout’s MSP team developed a technical solution that effectively integrated the newly acquired facilities, including a workflow that met hiring manager needs to keep the contingent hiring process moving smoothly. To improve access to the client’s VMS, PeopleScout facilitated a transition to a new single sign-on technology. Additionally, the MSP team developed an easy-to-use form to collect all necessary reacquisition information upfront, reducing time-to-fill.

PeopleScout worked with the client to identify and implement several other process improvements. The team developed an onboarding documentation storage process to aid suppliers and expedite audits, as well as a supplier optimization process that removed 17 inactive suppliers. The employer also added supplier town hall meetings to address trends, market issues, changes to the program and more.

The MSP team coordinated with all suppliers to ensure all on-site workers had received the COVID-19 vaccination and collaborated with managers to allow unvaccinated employees to work remotely. PeopleScout also established a new sourcing process to ensure that candidates being placed at corporate locations were up to date on vaccinations.

Finally, PeopleScout began working with the client’s newly acquired facilities two months before the final sale to help make sure the locations were ready and that managers at the new sites were integrated into the organizations systems on the first official day of the transition.

Results

PeopleScout’s updates to the client’s program have eliminated a massive administrative burden on both suppliers and hiring managers. Leaders at the client’s new sites applauded the smooth integration into the new systems. The technology and process improvements led to a 100% compliance score and an overall reduced time-to-fill, with some finance and industrial roles seeing a 50% improvement.

At a Glance

  • COMPANY
    Food and Beverage Producer and Distributor
  • INDUSTRY
    Consumer Goods
  • PEOPLESCOUT SOLUTIONS
    Managed Service Program
  • LOCATIONS
    84 locations across North America
  • About the Client
    This global leader produces and distributes some of the world’s most well-known food and beverage products across 19 countries.
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Serving Up a Winning Contingent Workforce for Sporting Events

Posted on by akessler
Serving Up a Winning Contingent Workforce for Sporting Events

Hospitality Contingent Workforce

Serving Up a Winning Contingent Workforce for Sporting Events

PeopleScout helped a food service provider manage contingent labor hiring for large events, delivering 100% customer and supplier satisfaction.

27 % Diversity spend, exceeding client goals
$ 645,000 Dollars in cost savings
100 % Customer and supplier satisfaction

Situation

This food service provider supports large public and sporting events at arenas and stadiums requiring thousands of contingent workers. In order to scale up and down to staff these peak season events and maintain their steady, day-to-day contingent worker staffing needs, the organization engaged PeopleScout as their managed service provider (MSP).

Further, the client was also struggling to create detailed purchase orders for each shift of an event. Their vendor management system (VMS) was not set up to support shift timecards, creating an excessive burden on suppliers and managers to create multiple job postings, work order assignments and timecards.

Solution

PeopleScout’s MSP team developed a solution that allows the client to scale up and down to meet peak season needs and is managed by PeopleScout’s highly trained program specialist to provide a high-level of support. This peak season strategy includes proactive planning for high-volume large events, including weekly meetings with the PeopleScout team, the client and suppliers to provide market analysis and ensure that the client is able to fill essential roles for the events. PeopleScout also conducted a full-scale market rate analysis for all active job titles to inform candid conversations about competitive pay rates.

PeopleScout is also working with the client to update their VMS to streamline the hiring manager, supplier, project manager and user experience. The new technology reduces manual tasks and provides more visibility into trends, spend, and overall program performance, so the client can operate more strategically.

Finally, monthly audits of the client’s internal accounts payable systems are conducted to help manage compliance and onboarding requirements to mitigate risk, provide visibility and reporting, and manage quarterly performance.

Results

The updates to the client’s program have eliminated a massive administrative burden on suppliers and hiring managers, leading to 100% customer and supplier satisfaction. The PeopleScout MSP solution achieved a cost savings of more than $645,000, with additional cost savings expected following the full deployment of the new VMS. At one high-profile event, proactive strategy planning resulted in placement of over 3,000 contingent workers. As an added bonus, PeopleScout has exceeded the client’s DE&I goals, with 20% of suppliers considered diversity suppliers and a 27% increase in diversity spend.

At a Glance

  • COMPANY
    Food Service Provider
  • INDUSTRY
    Food Service and Facilities Services
  • PEOPLESCOUT SOLUTIONS
    Managed Service Program
  • ANNUAL HIRES
    73,000 contingent assignments annually
  • About the Client
    This multinational food service and facilities services provider supports organizations across healthcare, business, hospitality, education, prisons and more.
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Contingent Workforce Solution Opens the Door to a $500K Cost Savings & a Total Talent Solution

Posted on by akessler
Contingent Workforce Solution Opens the Door to a $500K Cost Savings & a Total Talent Solution

MSP for Manufacturing

Contingent Workforce Solution Opens the Door to a $500K Cost Savings & a Total Talent Solution

PeopleScout helped a leading door and window manufacturer achieve a $500K cost savings within twelve months of launching an effective MSP program. Plus, PeopleScout introduced Recruiter On-Demand™ to support an increase in demand for permanent recruitment, as part of a total talent solution.

1,500 Annual contingent hires
$ 500,000 Dollars in cost savings in the first year
250 Full-time hires over 11 months

Situation 

PeopleScout has partnered with this door and window manufacturer since 2017, providing Managed Service Provider (MSP) support for contingent talent solutions in the areas of light industrial, technology and professional roles. Initially, PeopleScout supported locations in the U.S. only, but in 2021 expanded into Canada, playing a key role in supplier vetting, contract negotiations, data collection and manager and supplier trainings.  

The organization was also having challenges filling full-time roles, providing the opportunity for PeopleScout to supplement their contingent staffing support with our Recruiter On-Demand™ solution.

Solution

Over the course of this partnership, PeopleScout’s MSP team has made several technology and process improvements, including a vendor management system (VMS) transition, streamlined documentation requirements, a new approach for managing and improving supplier performance, and a candidate experience assessment.

The team also collaborated with PeopleScout’s Recruiter On-Demand™ (ROD) team to conduct a discovery session to understand the primary areas of increasing demand for full-time roles. Together, the teams developed and implemented an ROD strategy, focused on ten primary locations. The ROD solution included a daily applicant tracker for client visibility into the talent pipeline, and marketing and employer brand support. PeopleScout’s recruiters sourced qualified candidates, who were then interviewed by the client’s hiring managers.

The candidate experience assessment, conducted by PeopleScout’s technical solutions architects, identified opportunities to improve the look and feel of the organization’s careers site, particularly to appeal more to full-time candidates.

Results

The updates PeopleScout has made to the client’s technology and documentation processes have eliminated administrative burdens on both suppliers and hiring managers. The MSP solution achieved cost savings of more than $500,000 in the first year alone.

PeopleScout also seamlessly integrated a Recruiter-On-Demand™ program to support full-time hiring needs, as part of a total talent solution for the door and window manufacturer. The ROD program generated 250 hires over just 11 months across the selected 10 locations.

At a Glance

  • COMPANY
    Door and Window Manufacturer
  • INDUSTRY
    Manufacturing
  • PEOPLESCOUT SOLUTIONS
    Recruitment Process Outsourcing, Managed Service Program, Total Talent
  • ANNUAL HIRES
    1,500 contingent hires and 250 full-time hires
  • LOCATIONS
    U.S. and Canada
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