A Q&A Discussion about Staffing in the Commercial Construction Industry
Over the past few weeks, we’ve talked about the benefits a staffing agency partnership can bring to commercial construction firms. From cost savings to the speed of delivery, flexibility, and industry knowledge, the FootBridge Companies provide unending support to our clients and candidates. Over the past 20 years, many of our clients are repeat customers. They have become close personal friends as well. From helping to manage critical project details, including decommissioning work, government construction, energy services, and commercial construction school projects – we’ve done it all.
To sum up our recent series of articles, we’ve formed a Q&A segment to answer our client and candidates’ most pressing questions. Take a look!
Q: What’s the difference between contract hire and direct hire?
A: When you partner with a staffing firm like the FootBridge, we work to find you contract workers who may only work on a project for 3 to 6 months. Sometimes it’s a shorter period and other times it’s longer. The benefit, however, is that your company does not have to cover health insurance, medical leave, vacation, and sick time. That’s what we’re here for. A direct hire is when your company does the hiring and pays a candidate a salary direct from your organization. You find the candidate, and you do the background checks, interviews, and onboarding.
Q: What are some benefits of a contract hire?
A: With contract hires, your company is not committed to paying an annual salary or benefits. Instead, the staffing firm pays the contractor an hourly rate. It assumes responsibility for health benefits, vacation, sick time, and more.
Q: What if we want to make a permanent hire. Can we do so through a staffing company?
A: Yes. While the FootBridge Companies focus is mostly on placing contract employees, some of our clients prefer to hire direct. All this means is that instead of the individual working for FootBridge on assignment with our client, he or she works for the client directly. Rather than making a profit on each hour the person works, we are paid a one-time fee based on a percentage of annual salary for the first year, usually 25%.
Q: Why is contract hiring faster than direct?
A: You can receive hundreds of responses from a single ad for a position. Instead of allocating your own resources on the hiring process, a staffing firm will identify candidates and expedite the interviewing process on your behalf. We can have several viable candidate profiles ready for your review within a few hours of your request. And, most companies we speak to hire people after a short phone interview process.
Q: We heard it’s more expensive to work with a staffing firm, is that true?
A: No. In many cases, it is less expensive to hire contract workers because when you factor in the cost of onboarding and benefits, the pay rate is, in fact, higher. On average it costs 1.25 to 1.4 times a person’s salary to hire them. With contract work, you will pay a markup fee, but the staffing firm is also taking on the burden of the employee’s “cost.”
Q: How do staffing firm recruiters find qualified candidates? Isn’t it just a database search?
A: There’s a lot more than database searches that go into finding the right candidate for a potential job. Recruiters spend the bulk of their time sourcing, pre-screening, interviewing candidates, and investing in the client relationship.
Q: What if my commercial construction firm needs someone on-site the next day, can you make that happen?
A: Yes. Our recruiters can send you several qualified candidate profiles already in that location or one who is ready to go there.
Q: What happens if a candidate shows up at the job site, but doesn’t work to our satisfaction?
A: Just like we can get a contractor on-site the next day, a staffing agency can let someone go as needed too. One phone call to Footbridge is all it takes, and the person won’t be on-site the next day. If someone doesn’t live up to your expectations, we will let them go immediately, with absolutely no cost to you within the first week.
Q: What if a project is located out of state? Can a staffing firm manage still manage the hiring process?
A: Yes. Hiring and recruitment practices can vary by state. A client may have to get set up with a state just to be able to provide employment in the area. This is not the case with the FootBridge Companies, as we are already established to work in all 50 states.
Q: How knowledgeable are staffing firms when it comes to commercial construction? This is a very specified industry.
A: We can’t speak for other staffing firms, but the FootBridge Companies knows construction. Our team routinely visits sites when it’s safe to do so (pending COVID-19). We also understand your space and the technical aspects of client projects. It’s what we do. In addition to commercial and manufacturing, our specialties include energy and industrial chemicals.
