Evaluating its temp staff is vital for any successful temporary staffing agency. A candidate might seem great on paper, but once he comes in for an interview or is put into the workplace, he fails miserably. In order to have the most qualified and quality temp staff, agencies need to be constantly evaluating their candidates—both before and after being placed on a job. This is the only way a temporary staffing agency can ensure that it is effectively meeting its clients’ needs by providing them with top talent.
Here are five standard ways your temporary staffing agency is—or should be—evaluating its temp staff.
1. Resume Screening
Once a potential candidate sends a temporary staffing agency his resume, the first step should be reading through it and verifying that the information presented is accurate.
When you’re in need of work, it can be tempting to exaggerate skills and past experience in order to get hired. However, this can be detrimental to a company’s productivity so lies need to be weeded out. If the temp doesn’t have the qualities he claims he has on his resume, the company can be losing out on time and money because that worker won’t be able to start working right away. He’ll need to be trained on the basics that he should already understand.
A temporary staffing agency should be contacting past employers and asking the right reference check questions, looking for inconsistencies or unrealistic exaggerations, and asking for photocopies of any certificates, licences, or diplomas the candidate claims to have.
2. Background Checks
In order to make sure a candidate can be trusted, staffing agencies may perform criminal background checks if required. This is a basic way to evaluate their temp staff’s trustworthiness, credibility, dependability, and honesty.
3. The Interview
Even if a person looks great on his resume, he can completely bomb an interview. Conducting an interview is how a temporary staffing agency can truly see a candidate’s potential. The interviewer can see how well he thinks on his feet, what type of personality traits he has, and what his strengths or weaknesses are. The interview stage makes it easier for the staffing firm to match up candidates with the right employers.
4. Testing
Some agencies will stop evaluating once they get past the interview. However, great agencies will go beyond this and use personality, computer, and other skill testing questionnaires and assessment processes to gauge a candidate’s proficiencies for necessary skills.
5. Feedback
One of the most important evaluation methods for a temporary staffing agency is the use of client feedback. The employer will be able to give honest input about a temp worker’s work ethic, abilities, and attitude. He can give real-time feedback that is unmatched by even the best tests and evaluation methods.
This feedback is vital for knowing if you should cut a worker loose or keep him in the candidate pool for future jobs. Every temp isn’t suited to every position, though, so the testing process helps you figure out which workers are worth keeping but avoid placing them in jobs they’re unsuited for. Client feedback weeds out the bad apples so you only keep the best talent. Your future clients will undoubtedly thank you for this diligence.
Top staffing agencies make sure you only get the best workers. To make this guarantee, they constantly evaluate their temp staff. They screen their resumes, interview them, test them, and request client feedback.
