Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO): What is it and do you need it?

The particular challenges of this labor market, where hiring is strong and it’s difficult to find qualified candidates but there are also challenges around inflation and new demands for work-from-home flexibility, we find that employers are increasingly considering “recruitment process outsourcing” as a solid option.

Here at ACCUR Recruiting Services, we offer RPO as a part of our services, which also include retained search and contingency search. Today we wanted to walk you through what RPO is and why you might choose it.

What is Recruitment Process Outsourcing?

Recruitment process outsourcing involves creating an agreement with an external recruitment firm to address talent shortages and craft a recruiting strategy over a specified series of months or years. Instead of focusing on a single position or handful of positions, an RPO agreement allows you to attack a set of openings all at once, and in doing so, craft a solid hiring plan that will set you up for success.

RPO agreements allow your company to have a very targeted and specialized approach to recruiting, to tap into a full staff of experts at a recruitment firm and adapt as your recruitment needs change, in a nutshell.

How Does RPO Differ From Traditional Recruitment Agreements

RPO tends to come into play when an employer has a number of roles to fill or wants to enlist the larger resources of a recruitment firm to craft a roadmap or talent acquisition strategy. When an employer only has one or a handful of positions, they might elect to use retained search or contingency search instead.

How Does RPO Differ From Hiring an Internal Recruiter

RPO can be a useful alternative to an internal staff member who handles recruitment, or can be a useful augmentation to an existing HR department when circumstances demand it. In general the advantages of an RPO agreement is flexibility; allowing you to adapt it to your company’s needs as your hiring needs change.

Why companies are increasingly choosing Recruitment Process Outsourcing

The extremely tight labor market is causing companies to turn to RPO for the following reasons:

Flexibility: these agreements can be tailored to your needs and changed when the labor market changes
Access to resources: our RPO clients can take advantage of a staff of specialists who are dedicated to fulfilling their needs
Can be cost-effective: compared to increasing internal headcount with an internal recruiter

How the RPO Process Can Help You

You may consider RPO if any of the following are true of your hiring situation:

You have a lot of openings you need filled with a qualified candidate quickly
You want the flexibility to scale up or scale down an agreement as needed
You would like assistance in crafting an overall recruiting plan for the next year or several years