20 Observations from the World’s Premier Recruitment Industry Conference

Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA) 2013 Executive Forum.

This conference and exhibition drew over 900 staffing industry senior executives and had a global agenda.

It is an understatement to say I was impressed. My initial observations are below.

1. Agencies everywhere are struggling with the changes in the industry – increasing compliance requirements, new recruitment models, reducing margins, economic uncertainty. Agencies in our region may describe their issues differently, but they are common. The best agencies see change as opportunity.
2. The US industry and its supporting functions are able to attract significant private equity investment.
3. The US industry is able to attract high calibre CEO’s from outside the industry to head leading companies.
4. There is a lot of revenue and profit to be made by agencies that learn how to support RPO and MSP providers. But it is a completely different business model.
5. If you don’t include offshore outsourcing in your business function mix you are giving your competitors a 5-7% head start on costs. And then there is flexibility, time to market …
6. SIA provides quality industry analysis for both North America and Europe and is very serious about growing its capability and presence in Asia Pacific.
7. Part of SIA’s scope is to provide analysis and feedback to the recruitment industry’s clients – it is important that you understand that feedback.
8. A significant debate in the USA is “the death of the branch office”, or at least “what functions can’t we centralise”. There has been a large decline in branch offices since the recession and the trend has not reversed.
9. Globally there are surprising hotspots for the recruitment industry, such as Poland in Europe and Columbia in South America.
10. The trends seen with websites such as freelance.com and 99designs.com will evolve and impact the recruitment industry.
11. Technology choice and adoption will become critical to success [HHMC believes this is already the case]
12. Total Talent Management will become ubiquitous – organisations will incorporate all temp & contract labour into their strategy and planning framework.
13. SIA research shows the size of your agency impacts profitability – in the USA those agencies that have revenue greater than $10Mpa and up to $100Mpa have the best profitability ratio.
14. There is a positive correlation between using an advisor for M&A and recording greater satisfaction in the outcome of the transaction
15. Those agencies that are the “best places to work” ranked highly in profitability and grew the fastest.
16. The Net Promoter Score is used extensively in the USA. It is unambiguous and impressive. [For further information see the book “The Ultimate Question” by Fred Reichheld]
17. One in four temp workers go to an agency through a personal recommendation and they value trust, honesty and politeness.
18. Focus on external KPI’s to grow your business and achieve profitability – benchmarking, financial performance, value proposition.
19. Social media is not a major topic of conversation, even though agencies are some of the biggest users of social media.
20. Finally, late at night a very rough guide to the global staffing world was offered: it is easier to do business in countries that drink beer and not just wine and spirits! [HHMC will undertake more research]

Related: Observations From The World’s Premier Recruitment Industry Conference

For further discussion on trends relevant to our region please contact Rod Hore

For further reading see Staffing Industry Analysts and the 2013 Executive Forum. Enquiries for SIA Corporate membership can be sought from the SIA webpage or by email