As a Creative Executive you need the best possible talent to meet your clients' needs. In large corporations many times this requires navigating mandated hiring processes for full-time employees and/or contract labor.

While hiring talent is not your full-time role, it is important to fully understand how to navigate the hiring maze for temporary needs and full time hires alike, which can be a complex feat within large corporations. More so, it is a best practice to insert yourself early on into the conversation with Procurement and/or HR to lend your voice to determining what the processes for hiring should be.

If you do not quickly know who to speak to within your organization about procuring temporary talent or to navigate the hire of a full-time employee that needs to be a priority. Most often I have found that Human Resources department manages full-time hiring and Procurement manages the temporary talent acquisition process within large corporations. Of course, there are always exceptions.

Your coworkers in Procurement and/or HR have the same goals as you: to ensure the corporation has access to the best possible talent to achieve its mission. That said, they also have goals that aren't necessarily aligned with yours; just as you have goals they do not share. It is important to gain a seat at the table with procurement and HR to ensure your voice is heard and to advocate for your goals while they advocate for their goals.

Below are some examples of questions to guide conversations with each department:

Procurement:

  • Who in procurement is involved in the 'purchase' of temporary labor?
  • What are the goals, from Procurement's vantage point, that lead to success within temporary labor? Decreased costs? Diverse supplier spend? Compliance?
  • Is there an approved vendor list for staffing support? Can you provide input and help screen vendors that would suit your unique needs? (If not...build your relationship so that you DO!)
  • Does your company work with a centralized contingent labor team? Is that an internal team or does a 3rd party manage this? Does procurement manage the contingent labor team and program? If not, who does? Which vendors in that program support you?
  • Are you able to work with staffing services directly and to execute working agreements with them directly?
  • What does it entail to add a new staffing service to be able to assist you?
  • Do you have the ability to work with freelancers (1099ers)?
  • Who is involved with determining the success of the contingent hiring processes put in place? Can you get a seat at that table?


Human Resources:

  • Does your business unit have an assigned HR business partner? What are his or her goals and how can he/she help you?
  • Does your team have an assigned talent acquisition team?
  • Do you have the ability to engage with outside search firms for full-time hires?
  • What is the process for adding staffing vendors to support your full-time hiring initiatives?
  • Does your company offer a referral program for full-time hires and how is that promoted? (Leverage this with your team to hire in team members!)
  • What are the goals in talent acquisition or HR for new employee hires? Do they wish to increase speed of hires? Increase diversity hiring? Increase retention?


Typically there is a point of contact you can easily be directed to within HR, talent acquisition, a contingent labor program or procurement who can answer the above questions for you and open the door for a conversation about your unique hiring needs and the rules of engagement.

If you have personal relationships with staffing vendors but do not know who to speak with in your contingent labor department, ask your staffing partner who they work with--many times the staffing vendor's main point of contact for temporary placement needs is also your point of contact. In addition, typically your vendor partners will work with a specific segment of your procurement department and those are the same folks you need to know

The bottom line is that you need to have a seat at the table when it comes down to determining how full-time hires are made and how temporary labor is procured within your company. Whether what currently happens is not working or is working well, your voice needs to be heard. Many times, developing a relationship with key players in HR and Procurement is the first step.