The Complete Guide to Contract Talent

When to Use Contract-to-Hire: A Guide for Employers

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Are you tired of traditional recruiting methods that fail to deliver top talent for your business? Look no further than contract-to-hire, an innovative and under-utilised approach to sourcing talent.

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Contract-to-hire is an incredibly effective method for weeding out poor performers and cultural misfits, while consistently sourcing practitioners in the 90th percentile of their field. Not only that, but our contract specialists have shown a remarkable engagement rate and are three times more likely to receive a promotion after converting to permanent employees.

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In this article, we'll explain what contract-to-hire is, how we use it to source specialised talent, and why you should consider incorporating this method into your overall recruitment strategy.

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What is Contract-to-Hire?

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Contract-to-hire recruitment is a lesser known, but effective way for companies to find and hire new and highly specialised talent. Contract-to-hire refers to the process of bringing specialists into your team on an initial contract, working with them for a set period of time, and then converting them to a permanent employee.

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This approach is different from a traditional probation period as companies rarely bring in contractors with the expectation that they will become full-time employees. Instead, managers choose to hire on contract because they have critical project work that must be completed or are looking for a unique and difficult-to-source specialised skillset. Contract-to-Hire is a bonus as your contractors effectively become a talent pool that already exists within your business!

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Despite the benefits it can bring, contract-to-hire is a talent sourcing option that many organisations haven't fully explored.

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At B&F we exclusively provide contract and contract-to-hire recruitment services because we’ve seen its power in attracting only the best talent. By focusing solely on contract and contract-to-hire recruitment, we can source highly-skilled, highly-specialised, and highly-experienced candidates who are natural team players.

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Our unique advantage is our direct experience as career practitioners in product development and agile delivery across a range of industry leading solutions in finance, payments, and digital marketplaces. With a background in building and managing teams in startups, scale-ups, and enterprise organisations, our expertise and knowledge make us the ideal resource consultancy to provide contract and contract-to-hire recruitment services.

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Finding Specialist Talent through Contract-to-Hire

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Not convinced? Our client Kolmeo needed help reinventing a property management platform that had passed its prime. We provided them three contractors, a product manager, a product designer and an agile delivery lead. Of those three contractors, two decided they wanted to convert-to-hire and joined Kolmeo on a permanent basis. We went on to provide them an additional 20 contractors, ranging from payments product managers and BA's experienced in developing marketplace solutions.

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We’ve even successfully used contract-to-hire here at Beaker & Flint. We brought Georgia in on three month contract to help our team with some internal work for a client. We were so blown away by Georgia’s amazing skillset across service design that we extended her contract and utilised her services on other projects. Georgia also happened to be an incredible match for our culture. Needless to say, Georgia decided to convert-to-hire and stayed on for nearly three years.

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The Difference between Contract-to-Hire and Traditional Recruitment

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Traditional Recruitment

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A recruiter helps companies find and hire suitable candidates for open positions. Generally, they will require some exclusivity before engaging in the search process. This can come in the form of a discounted rate depending on how much they need your business. They usually request a portion of the fee upfront to ensure you do not cancel the search process.

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A recruiters primary role includes sourcing, screening, and presenting potential candidates to the hiring manager. They use a variety of tools and methods, such as job boards, social media, networking, and referral programs, to find and attract suitable candidates. Once they have identified potential candidates, the recruiter will typically conduct initial interviews and assessments to determine if the candidate is a good fit for the position and the company.

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If the candidate is deemed suitable, the recruiter will present them to the hiring manager for further consideration and, if necessary, additional interviews. In addition to sourcing and screening candidates, recruiters may also provide support throughout the hiring process, such as negotiating salaries and benefits and assisting with the onboarding process.

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B&F Contract-to-Hire

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B&F Contract-to-Hire is different.

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With our service you can rely on us to have already performed an in-depth screening of candidates before ever introducing you to them. In fact, we’ve previously worked with many of our contractors and their skills and expertise have been personally verified. Because we are ourselves experienced practitioners, most of our contractors come recommended from within network thereby reducing the risk to your organisation.

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With our service, we’ll never ask you to sign an exclusivity contract, or ask you for a portion of the fee upfront before presenting you with contractors. We’re confident in our service and in our industry relationships. We’ll happily tap into our networks for you without any signed agreements.

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We’ll always do our best to place the most qualified person. And if we’re struggling to find a suitable contractor, we wont try to make a square peg fit into a round hole-we’ll tell you.

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If you and our contractor decide you’d like to enter into a permanent employment arrangement, we facilitate a transition agreement. Unlike other resource consultancies, we believe this practise is a win-win for all parties.

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We recommend that our clients utilise both full-service recruitment agencies and our contract-to-hire service. By doing so you'll have complete coverage of all spectrums of the talent market. Additionally, you'll have the assurance that you've covered every corner of the market when you add our no-financial commitment talent sourcing service into your overall recruitment strategy.

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The benefits of Contract-to-Hire

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After conducting a review of our past clients successes with contract-to-hire we’ve noted the following benefits:

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• The overwhelming majority of contractors we onboarded with our clients were reported to be a suitable culture fit.
• The contractors that we onboarded were rated well above average or superior in terms of skillset within their particular field.
• When surveyed, managers rated our contractors as 25% more engaged when compared to their own recruits.
• When our contractors chose to convert-to-hire, we’ve observed that they were three times more likely to be promoted within one year when compared to their counterparts from traditional recruitment agencies.

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When to use B&F Contract-to-Hire rather than hiring permanently

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Contract-to-hire is an alternative way to bring talent into your growing company. Contract-to-hire can supplement your internal hiring efforts and help you to recruit hard-to-find specialist talent. In many cases, you may not choose to convert your contractors to permanent employees, but having the option is always better than not. Our clients choose contract-to-hire for the following reasons.

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1. Keep up with the project hustle and bustle!
2. When sickness strikes and your team needs a superhero.
3. Bring in the big guns for hard-to-find skills.
4. Mix things up and avoid groupthink boredom.
5. Call in the specialists for non-core business needs.
6. Can't find the perfect fit for your team? Time to bring in a temp!
7. Need an extra hand for a trial run? A contractor can help.
8. Keep your A-team focused on their A-game by outsourcing the extras.

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In summary, contract-to-hire recruitment is a lesser-known but effective way for companies to find and hire new talent. Beaker & Flint exclusively provides contract and contract-to-hire recruitment services creating a powerful approach to attracting only the best talent. The primary benefit of contract-to-hire is that it enables managers to hire skilled and experienced candidates for critical project work that must be completed, with the option of converting them to a permanent employee later. We perform an in-depth screening of candidates before introducing them to you, reducing the risk to your organisation. Furthermore, our contract-to-hire service is an alternative way to bring talent into your growing company, supplement internal hiring efforts, and recruit hard-to-find specialist talent.

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Looking to find highly skilled and experienced contractors to augment your team? Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you build a winning team.

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