6 Benefits of Augmenting Your L&D Team with Temporary Staffing Solutions

How Does Staff Augmentation Support Your Business?

One of the major changes we have noticed in the L&D industry is the speed of operations. With technology automating and streamlining a large number of processes, a task such as developing a training module that could take a few days is now expected to be completed in hours, if not minutes. As a result, L&D teams are finding themselves increasingly overworked, as their members are stretched thin over too many tasks at a time. If bringing new members on board requires more time and money than you’d like to invest, temporary staffing solutions are an ideal option. In this article, we learn what temporary staffing is and explore the main benefits that have caused it to gain traction in the field of L&D.

What Is A Temporary Staffing Solution?

Temporary staffing, or staff augmentation, refers to an outsourcing strategy that gives businesses access to on-demand employees so that they can easily manage their fluctuating workloads. Anyone who has been a part of a business project, such as the development and implementation of an employee training program, knows that many moving parts are involved in the process and that the demand for specialization and the number of employees continuously change. Temporary staffing removes many of the strings attached to traditional recruitment while making a wide pool of talented candidates instantly available. In addition to these advantages, there are many more that make temporary staffing solutions desirable to businesses. Let’s explore a few of them in the next section.

6 Benefits Of Leveraging Temporary Staffing

1. Agility

Working in a rapidly evolving industry, L&D teams often find themselves switching strategies and implementing new business goals. These adjustments might require a number of specialized employees that are not currently available internally. There are usually two solutions when this issue arises: businesses either hire and train new employees or keep their departments fully staffed, even when business is slow. Seeing as both alternatives use up more resources than necessary, temporary staffing solutions can truly save the day. With the help of the right agency, businesses can easily augment their staff according to their current needs and achieve their goals with speed and efficiency.

2. Flexibility

Regardless if your needs for staff augmentation vary greatly throughout the year, temporary staffing agencies can give you the flexibility you need. Therefore, you are free to bring on extra hands either for a few days or a few weeks. Apart from controlling the duration of your collaboration with a staff augmentation agency or platform, you can also ask for the specific skills you deem necessary at any given time. Providers give you access to a large variety of skills and competencies so that you can have the best experience possible at every stage of your project.

3. Expertise

Speaking of expertise, the talent gap in the job market has become increasingly clear in recent years. This means that businesses are having a harder time finding people with the right skillsets. Temporary staffing agencies, however, have the resources to seek out talented and specialized individuals whose skills are considered valuable in the L&D industry. In other cases, even when you find what you need, hiring a highly specialized employee full-time when you know you won’t be needing their services all year round can be unnecessarily costly. Agencies give you access to professionals you wouldn’t be able to afford on a long-term basis, thus vastly increasing the talent pool available to your organization.

4. Cost-Effectiveness

To overcome skill gaps within your organization, you will have to invest a significant amount of time and money to train your employees. The costs increase even further when it comes to new hires who have to go through an entire onboarding process as well. Temporary staffing solutions, on the other hand, come to your organization already possessing the skills you need. In other words, there is no need for additional training, except perhaps for the basics of the project they will be working on. This way, you avoid costs associated with training and are able to immediately utilize your extra staff to advance organizational goals.

5. Operational Efficiency

In the previous point, we discussed how temporary staffing can reduce the cost of training. However, this is not the only—let alone the main—cost that businesses need to worry about. Operational costs, such as infrastructure costs, salaries, benefits, social security, and more, are the primary burden for organizations, especially smaller ones. The flexible working conditions that staff augmentation makes possible significantly reduce such expenses and meaningfully support operational efficiency. Additional resources are saved from the increase in project visibility, as temporary staff come equipped with managing, planning, and reporting skills that guarantee timely deliverables with minimal mistakes.

6. Retaining Control Of Operations

Although you’ll be collaborating with external partners to accomplish your goals, that doesn’t mean you will be handing over your managing rights. Unlike outsourcing partners that take on a project and only send updates every few months without leaving parent companies much room for input, staff augmentation leaves you in charge of operations every step of the way. You will be aware of all facets of development and able to intervene whenever the results are veering from your original goals. The external talent agency will work with you to fully accommodate your vision, whether that means providing you with more developers or learning experience specialists.

Overcome Risks With Smart Staffing

The current needs of the Learning and Development industry have made finding the right talent more essential yet more difficult than ever. Often, the right skillset doesn’t exist or is extremely difficult to attract. As a result, the quest for the right candidate usually comes with many risks for businesses. Thankfully, temporary staffing can be the solution not only to the talent scarcity problem but also to many more. It can make your business more efficient, helping it easily overcome changes in the industry and quickly adapt to the varying needs of your learning projects. Finally, staff augmentation allows you to work with the best professionals in the industry without breaking the bank or compromising alignment with your vision and mission.