When to Augment Your Staff

Is your company or organization experiencing a key employee’s resignation, a sudden termination, medical leave, retirement, structural change, or simply a shortage of skills? Is the company contending with a merger or acquisition, or experiencing a peak period of business? In many situations like these it might make sense for a company to augment its current management staff.

In today’s ever-changing and highly regulated business environment, companies are doing more work with fewer resources. Overtime is becoming the norm, service levels and quality are deteriorating, projects are repeatedly deferred and managers regularly handle day-to-day tasks.

By bringing on experienced professionals with industry experience, you can help ease the burden. Whether working as an extension of your team, as individual contributors or as a team leader, staff augmentation can offer a seamless solution that affords you the opportunity to maintain productivity, while eliminating the costly overhead. Companies can easily ramp up or down to meet changing demands without the cost and liability of additional full-time employees.

Look outside

If your company or organization is likely to remain short-staffed for a while, consider staff augmentation. You may be surprised to learn that the kinds of workers available to fill project-based or short-term positions are not limited to administrative staff. Many professionals, including CEOs, CFOs, IT specialists, accountants and project managers can be found to assist on an interim basis, either as independent contractors or via employment agencies. Companies that provide interim management services often can fill the need with a qualified individual in a very short period of time, some in as little as 48 hours.

Interim leadership positions are typically a tough transition, as job vacancies may be sudden and finding a replacement can be a long and costly process. Here are some of the benefits of interim leadership and why it works.

Immediate Impact. Interim C-Suite executives typically have a wealth of knowledge with diverse experience, usually with a greater breadth and depth than the permanent recruit.

Cost Effective. The typical monthly cost of an interim executive can largely compare to the expenses incurred by a permanent executive, especially when looking at the cost of benefits, relocation and additional incentive compensation. An interim can also provide a powerful return on investment because he or she can begin focusing on critical initiatives immediately.

Unbiased Leadership. An interim executive can assess operational and cost-prohibitive drains on the organization and, with approval, can adjust or remove “revered” products and services. Others in the position prior are commonly protective and invested in the services they helped cultivate.

Vital Analysis. The interim executive can launch a critical examination of supply contracts, revenue cycle, manpower expenses and cash flow. He or she can then manage the plans to fix contrasting findings.

Different Perspective. Oftentimes boards will look to save money and promote from within to support their other C-Suite executives and fill the interim role. However, bringing in a fresh perspective to oversee the situation at hand will often provide a more productive outcome.

Removing Distractions. Most C-level executives are understandably overcome with their internal and external responsibilities. An interim executive has the ability to look past a large amount of those responsibilities due the temporary nature of his or her work. This allows the interim executive the rare opportunity to prioritize and focus on critical initiatives.

Provisional Employment. Consider that companies who provide staff augmentation almost always put provisions in their contracts for hiring the temporary labor. Before committing to a full-time offer, the employer can field-test whether a candidate is the right fit in terms of talent and personality. If the temporary employee is a good fit for your organization, you may want to consider paying the finder’s fee to the company and hiring that person fill-time.

Project Outsourcing. Another alternative to consider is project outsourcing, which allows a company to execute entire projects using the resources of another firm. The project outsourcing approach allows companies the benefits of external expertise, cost management and risk mitigation so they can concentrate existing resources on their core operations.

Staff augmentation may be an appropriate solution if you have work that must get done, but you cannot make a long-term financial commitment. You can gain a competitive advantage by turning over these tasks to an interim manager, enabling you to continue to concentrate on growing your business. 

For more information about our staff augmentation and project outsourcing services, please contact Yeo & Yeo. With our expertise and the personalized solutions available from our partner, ProNexus, we can find a solution to best fit your needs and budget. Learn more.