Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO)

Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO)



RPO is a form of business process outsourcing (BPO) where an employer outsources or transfers all or part of its recruitment activities to an external service provider.

Where Did This Idea Come From?



RPO was first recognized as a function of BPO in the UK. The RPO Alliance, a group of the Human Resources Outsourcing Association (HROA), approved this definition in February 2009: "Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) is a form of business process outsourcing (BPO) where an employer transfers all or part of its recruitment processes to an external service provider. An RPO provider can provide its own or may assume the company's staff, technology, methodologies and reporting.

RPO is NOT the Same as Staffing Agencies or Contingent/Retained Firms





Temporary, contingency and executive search services are more analogous to out-tasking, co-sourcing or just sourcing. In this example, the service provider is "a" source for certain  types of recruitment activity.  The biggest distinction between RPO and other types of staffing is Process.

In RPO, the service provider assumes ownership of the process, while in other types of staffing the service provider is part of a process controlled by the organization buying their services.  



Evolving Recruitment Process Outsourcing



Over time, companies began to examine how they might reduce the growing expenses of recruitment fees while still hiring hard-to-find technical specialists. Toward this end, companies began to examine the various steps in the recruiting process with an eye toward outsourcing only those portions that they had the greatest difficulty with and that added the greatest value to them.



Over time, as business in general embraced the concept of outsourcing more and more, RPO gained favor among Human Resource management: not only did RPO reduce overhead costs from their budgets, but it also helped improve the company's competitive advantage in the labor market. As labor markets became more and more competitive, RPO became more of an acceptable option.



The Value of RPO



There have been fundamental changes in the US labor market that serve to reinforce the use of RPO as well. The labor market has become increasingly dynamic: workers today change employers more often than in previous generations. De-regulated labor markets have also created a shift towards contract and part-time labor and shorter work tenures.



These trends increase recruitment activity and may encourage the use of RPO. It should also be noted that even in slower economic times or higher unemployment, RPO is still considered by companies to assist in an increasing need to screen through a larger candidate pool.



Resource Integration's New Hybrid of RPO



Resource Integration has taken RPO on step further.  We have developed a specialized RPO that focuses on the needs of small and medium sized business owners with cost effective, fully scalable, and customizable solutions.  No matter what your needs, we have your covered.  We recruit across all industries nationally and have Recruiting Specialists for all functions.  Check out what we have to offer:

iRECRUIT, SoloSource, SoloSearch, TalentEdge OnDemand RPO



Source: Wikipedia