FUNDAMENTALLY
DIFFERENT:
COMPETENCIES
FOR MANAGING
CONTINGENT
TALENT
DAVID J. CLOSS
SRIRAM NARAYANAN
HAKAN YILDIZ
MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY
FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT:
COMPETENCIES FOR MANAGING
CONTINGENT TALENT
FOREWORD:
Talent Supply Chain
A
Management is a proactive
talent to achieve enterprise growth and profit goals. To remain competitive
management approach to
and achieve quantifiable results, organizations must have a disciplined
securing and optimizing talent
approach to simplifying, accelerating, and innovating their talent strategies
supply and services through
across a broad spectrum of labor—including full-time employees, contingent
all input channels to meet
workers, independent contractors, alumni, and more. We believe this can
the human capital needs of
be accomplished by applying talent supply chain management principles to
companies, enabling them to
evaluate and manage talent strategies holistically.
WIKIPEDIA® DEFINITION:
better produce, distribute,
and deliver their goods
and services and meet their
strategic objectives.
>
s companies are faced with an increasingly unpredictable and unforgiving
environment for talent, executive focus remains on ensuring access to
The application of workforce analytics is one of the keys to understanding
and maximizing the return of your talent supply chain. Kelly Outsourcing
and Consulting Group (KellyOCG®) is proud to collaborate with Michigan
State University – Eli Broad College of Business and their market-leading
department of Supply Chain Management to provide insights on how you can
use the power of data to increase the effectiveness of your contingent talent
management strategies.
JOHN HEALY, vice president
and managing director, Global Talent
Supply Chain, KellyOCG
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>
W
hile most supply chain management research focuses on movement
of physical goods through a distribution channel, many firms are
beginning to realize that supply chain principles can also be applied for talent
management. Like materials and capacity, talent is a critical resource for
achieving and maintaining a competitive advantage. Like physical products,
talent must be hired or acquired and then be developed through training and
experience. This is particularly true when contingent labor accounts for 30
percent or more of the extended workforce of most companies.
Today’s workforce is a combination of full-time, flex-time, part-time, and
contingent labor. While contingent labor is sometimes confused only
with office temporaries, the contingent labor workforce includes office
professionals ranging from professional administrators to research and
technical specialists, right through to operational executives, service
providers, and outsourcing partners.
As firms deal with these diverse sources of staffing, it is critical that they
respond to the needs of staffing appropriately. In some cases, staffing needs
to be responsive and quick—call it a responsive talent supply chain. Yet, in
others, staffing needs to be cost-efficient—call this an efficient talent supply
chain. For example, when evaluating traditional product-based supply chain
operations and performance, researchers often review the order cycle, which
tracks the activities from order placement until receipt of the product by the
customer. The order cycle includes the business activities from the time one
places an online order with Amazon® until the customer receives the shipment.
Analysis of the order cycle activities allows a firm to document the resources
and the delays required for order fulfillment. Critical evaluation of the flows
and resources can help a firm to document the best practices related to these
processes and identify the competencies that firms can use to manage them.
Further, the analysis can provide insights into the key elements, metrics, and
outputs at different stages of the talent supply chain process. A visual overview
of the talent supply chain management framework is provided in Figure 1.
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FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT:
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In executing the talent supply chain, our research finds that firms need to
possess key competencies. This document intends to present the competencies
from the perspective of a centralized talent supply chain program office—
either internally managed or outsourced. Further, the focus of the paper is to
demonstrate the specific challenges of talent supply chains, particularly under
the rubric of studying professional services. The issues that will be discussed are
the following: 1) rationale for the analysis; 2) data analysis; 3) observations; and
4) management recommendations.
FIGURE 1: UNDERSTANDING THE FULL
SCALE OF YOUR TALENT SUPPLY CHAIN
CORPORATE
STRATEGIC PLAN
TALENT
SUPPLY CHAIN
MANAGEMENT
TEMPORARY
STAFF
INDEPENDENT
CONTRACTORS/
FREELANCERS
OPERATIONS
WORKFORCE
ANALYTICS
SERVICE
PROVIDERS
(SOW)
STRATEGIC
WORKFORCE
PLANNING
HUMAN RESOURCES
ALUMNI,
RETIREES
AND INTERNS
FULL TIME
EMPLOYEES
PROCUREMENT
© 2014 – 2015 Kelly Services, Inc.
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ANALYSIS
RATIONALE
>
T
he expanded scope of the contingent workforce population, including
the context of the entire talent base working for a company, requires
that firms reassess hiring and labor management decisions. The assessment
needs to consider the requirements of the firm, the labor environment, and
the matching process in an environment where organizations have a choice
between using full-time internal labor, temporary labor, or outsourced project
services. Traditional methods of contracting for temporary workers without
defined outcomes are becoming more problematic due to the conflicts
between the internal and external policies that must be complied with, and
the strategic objectives of each organization involved. A significant amount of
this conflict is due to the fact that the majority of outsourcing contracts are still
time- and material-based rather than outcome-based. Overall, these policies
can result in inefficient use of the workforce, which in turn can significantly
impact the firm’s operations.
In order to identify possible best practices in managing contingent labor, the
research team decided to use physical supply chain management principles to
help understand the talent supply chain. Physical supply chains are responsible
for moving physical products from suppliers to manufacturers to distributors
to retailers. In effect, it uses physical processes and resources to add value to
physical products. In the talent supply chain, the talent is the product—while
the processes and resources are the activities completed by the internal and
external parties engaged in the contingent labor processes.
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FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT:
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CONTINGENT TALENT
DATA
ANALYSIS
>
T
o develop insights regarding the challenges, constraints, and
opportunities of contingent labor management, Michigan State University
faculty completed a set of interviews spanning all stakeholders in the talent
supply chain: suppliers, KellyOCG vertical heads, and clients. The transcripts
of these interviews were carefully analyzed by the faculty. Moreover, the faculty
performed a summary and statistical analysis of more than 60,000 job orders
from more than 50 KellyOCG clients. The job orders included those that were
filled and unfilled—representing all KellyOCG lines of business, a range of
specializations, and job orders that were submitted to limited suppliers as well
as those submitted to many suppliers.
The analysis provided a number of observations that suggested capabilities
that can enhance the talent supply chain performance for contingent labor
firms. Figure 2 illustrates these capabilities, including: 1) co-creation; 2)
contracting and collaboration; 3) managing the supply base; 4) managing
variation; and 5) continuous improvement. All of these capabilities, which
are a blend of strategic, tactical, and operational initiatives, can improve the
contingent labor outcome.
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FIGURE 2: ENHANCING CONTINGENT
LABOR SUPPLY CHAIN PERFORMANCE
TACTICAL/
OPERATIONS
AC
TIN
G A N D COL L
AB
OR
AT
N
2)
O
R
NT
OUTCOME
IO
C
STRATEGIC
3) MANAGING
SUPPLY BASE
1) CO-CREATION
PERFORMANCE
4) MANAGING
VARIATION
5)
CO
NT
INU
O U S I M P ROV
EM
EN
T
RISK MANAGEMENT
MEASUREMENT
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MANAGEMENT
RECOMMENDATIONS
>
A
s noted earlier, the extensive analysis of the job orders suggested a
number of strategic, tactical, and operational capabilities that can
enhance the performance of the talent supply chain. The five capabilities are
described below with specific examples included. Additionally, the role of the
program office is outlined.
1) CO-CREATION
While customers of talent typically know what kind of talent they want, this does
not always reflect what is available, or the best way to address their needs. Thus,
the program office needs to have internal knowledge to lead the customer
through the competencies and allow the customer to make different “choices,”
and consequently decide on the supply chain strategy. Co-creation is a form of
business strategy that emphasizes the generation and ongoing realization of
mutual firm-customer value. One requirement is to understand the difference
between a solution and a transaction. The ability to co-create requires an
organization to determine how to create a talent solution rather than just fill
an open requisition. Understanding the business strategy allows the program
office to better define both what the solution and transactional needs are, thus
providing more value. Co-creation also presumes that the service provider can
work with the client to achieve clarity regarding specific requirements.
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FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT:
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One way of developing this is for the program office to provide customers
different choices that they can visualize and adopt. Understanding customer
strategy is critical to co-creating the services. It minimizes risk and builds a
platform for trust and collaboration. In building the strategy, it is also important
to understand the underlying trade-offs that customers are willing to make.
For example, the cost-quality-speed-compliance trade-off is a key aspect of
customers’ hiring requirements. However, it is also important to consider that
customer needs and priorities can, and do, change under different situations.
One example of a need for co-creation is a KellyOCG client in the life sciences
industry. This client has multiple drugs coming off patent; while at the same
time is focused on developing the next “blockbuster.” Since the firm is trying
simultaneously to manage the cost for the drugs coming off patent and bring
critical research and development to the market, they need to have a bipolar
talent strategy inside the organization. This suggests that the firm needs to
have both an efficient talent supply chain (for the segments trying to minimize
cost) and a responsive talent supply chain (for the segments trying to get
product quickly to market). To achieve this capability, it is important that the
program office be able to work with the client to co-create the value portfolio
and staffing processes necessary to meet the bifurcated value requirements.
Co-creation also allows several other benefits beyond understanding a
customer’s strategy. An important outcome of co-creation is developing
demand visibility. Specifically, it allows the opportunity to work with the
customer to understand demand for both existing and future skills and
competencies. Further, it allows not just sourcing of talent, but a plan for
development of talent that corresponds to the demand. Programs and plans to
develop talent must be cognizant of the lead times necessary to source talent,
which may drive pressure to co-create and the opportunity to alter the sourcing
approach. For example, another KellyOCG client has been contracting for 20
project managers per month for the past year. The client’s belief was that each
group of project managers had unique skill requirements. However, when one
considers this in an aggregate sense, contracting for multiple project managers
on a regular basis suggests that the project manager requirements are not
so unique. In this case, co-creation of customer value can be achieved by
demonstrating this pattern to the client and suggesting a more long-term and
synthesized sourcing approach for project managers.
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FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT:
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Specific practices that demonstrate the co-creation capability include:
•
Develop market intelligence in emerging markets to be able to form a
supply infrastructure to support the needs of customers in these markets.
•
Invest time in understanding customer strategy and building relationships
with customer to enable co-creation. The key is to establish relationships
between multiple entities within the customer (e.g., operations, human
resources, and procurement) as opposed to a single entity and; to
understand how these entities contribute to the broader workforce
strategy of the customer.
•
Understand the key “pain points” for individual units and how these pain
points relate to the way the talent supply chain can be configured for the
customer.
•
Discuss how a supply chain can be created and reconfigured frequently
to meet evolving customer needs. Co-creation is an important capability
for several service firms, but is likely even more important for managed
service providers who engage with their customers over the longer run.
•
Educate the customer on best practices pertaining to the process being
handled.
2) CONTRACTING AND COLLABORATION
When looking across the potential relationships that exist within a company’s
talent supply chain, there is a clear recognition that these relationships
are becoming increasingly complex from an accountability and liability
perspective. This complexity has the potential to increase exponentially as a
client progresses from a series of independent contracts to manage supplier
transaction, into outsourcing and outcome-based relationships. It continues
as agreement scopes extend from a single jurisdiction to global agreements
covering multiple unique jurisdictions; and as organizations look for the agility
needed to effectively adapt contract structures to meet targeted objectives.
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FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT:
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Specific issues arise when time is not taken to ensure that the contract
structure is “fit for purpose” within the respective jurisdiction and aligned with
the specific services being contracted for each vendor type. By clarifying the
specific roles and responsibilities of the parties engaged, including the specific
deliverables, SLAs, and incentives that align to the desired outcomes, many of
the historical contracting models—and their associated value propositions—
are becoming less relevant. As a result, the unintended consequences of a
poor contracting model are rising to the surface.
While the client firm can maintain the responsibility for managing the
contracting in these multi-party relationships, it is difficult to develop and
maintain the legal skills in a global legal environment. Specifically, the client
firm must consider the implications of these multi-party agreements in multiple
geographies and talent markets. The program office must become a “trusted
advisor” for both the internal customers and the supplier community, not
simply a process administrator or information provider. This includes providing
customer visibility into the evolving labor, legal, and regulatory environment,
and helping the client to make the appropriate choices. A trusted advisor
cares about the “service,” first by offering multiple collaboration choices to the
customer, and then allowing them to determine the best one to manage their
risk, and to best align with their desired strategic outcomes. The advising role
also includes providing visibility into the supply base.
In your talent supply chain, the program office does not just need to learn
how to collaborate, but needs to be a facilitator for collaboration within the
client organization. Collaboration and conflict resolution also need to happen
within the client organization. Examples include: 1) conflict of interest situation
regarding how to prioritize America, Europe, and Asia; 2) relative focus on
speed to value (e.g., U.S. has the greatest spend actively managed, but
European operations represent the greatest opportunity to unlock tangible
value and could benefit from changes sooner); and 3) desire for a global
solution, even when it may not be clear whether there is an authority to deploy
a global solution.
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FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT:
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Finally, the program office must make sure the “co-created” talent supply chain
configuration meets the cost-quality-speed-compliance trade-offs that the
client initially requested.
Specific practices that demonstrate the contracting and collaboration
capability include:
•
Develop and present a framework that allows the client to understand
the risk dimensions of multi-party relationships in different industries and
geographies.
•
Develop and offer insight regarding the trade-offs associated with
efficient versus responsive talent supply chains.
•
Work to establish a clear governance model to guide talent
management processes.
•
Ensure that the execution of the engagement model remains true to the
co-created solution and articulates the trade-offs that were established
early on within the engagement.
3) MANAGING SUPPLY BASE
Historically, many firms chose to enhance their competitive position in the
supply chain by using many material providers. This has also been true for
talent providers. In effect, the belief was that the firm value proposition could
be optimized by leveraging the number rather than the capabilities of their
supply base. This historical value proposition has changed as firms are now
trying to optimize their supply base by determining which suppliers should
be managed on volume and which on capability. The same assessment needs
to be done for firms involved in the talent supply chain. The issue is more
critical than traditional supply chain environments where one prefers a narrow
supply base—but in the talent supply chain world, the supply base can often
be dependent on the industry, geography, or particular skill set. For example,
in life sciences, the supply base can be much larger depending on the skill
set demand.
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FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT:
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The analysis of the job orders indicated a tremendously skewed level
of success. The following points indicate the degree of skewness within
individual sub-segments analyzed:
•
90% of the suppliers submit fewer than two candidates per year.
•
79% of the suppliers have a hiring success rate of less than 10 percent.
•
80% of shortlisted candidates come from 1.6% of suppliers.
•
80% of the hired candidates are submitted by 1.1% of suppliers.
The skewness of the supply base and relative hiring success suggests that the
characteristics of each segment need to be considered. The review indicates
that there are clearly three different types of suppliers; 1) hyper-active; 2)
balanced suppliers; and 3) hyper-productive. Hyper-active talent suppliers
provide many submissions, but relatively few end up being hired. Balanced
suppliers are those that have an average hiring rate to postings of 20 percent.
Hyper-productive talent suppliers provide relatively few submissions, but a
high percentage of them are hired.
While one conclusion might be to focus on the hyper-productive suppliers, it
is important to remember that the supplier types are often typical of specific
industries and job categories. For example, hyper-active talent suppliers tend
to be in “hot” industries such as life sciences, while hyper-productive talent
suppliers tend to be for job categories such as creative. Accordingly, the
program office needs capabilities to effectively manage the different types
of clients and talent suppliers. They must also understand how to be efficient
for suppliers that are hyper-active and how to take advantage of the hyperproductive talent suppliers.
This capability is referred to as supply base optimization. Such a capability
allows the program office to configure the talent supply chain to meet specific
demands of the customer, whether it is efficiency or responsiveness. In addition,
managing the supply base requires the program office to consider dramatic
changes to the talent supply base due to client mergers and acquisitions. At
times, these may require working closely with the customer to understand their
needs from the supply base and the requirement to configure (or reconfigure)
the new supply base to the overall customer strategy. Finally, standardizing the
supplier management practices is a key to ensuring that time of the program
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office is devoted more to rationalizing and creating the supply base, rather than
“transacting” with suppliers on specific issues. Thus, managing the supplier
processes is an integral part of managing the supply base.
Specific practices that demonstrate the capability to manage the supply
base include:
•
Apply supply base segmentation practices to differentiate between active
and productive suppliers.
•
Plan internal operations and collaborate with customers for major
changes to supply base that may be experienced due to customer
merger and acquisition (M&A) activities, regulatory changes, geographic
trends, and lifestyle changes. In these situations, the co-creation aspect
can also include the management of supply base, leading to the creation
of a customized supply chain.
•
Move toward more standardized supplier processes, such as for
postings, on-boarding, certifying, and renewing candidates. Possessing a
standardized set of supplier processes across geographies/business units
can be helpful. For example, a firm might run several small programs, each
with its own suppliers. Having a varied range of programs can impede
the firm from developing standardized processes for managing similar
issues. Thus, possessing the standardized processes can help in effectively
communicating to the supplier, establishing common measures for
developing supplier scorecards, etc. These can also help the organization
streamline supplier evaluation and selection, overcoming the temptation
that smaller suppliers might need a different evaluation process.
•
Develop visibility at the program office of the evolving supply market
for client skill demands. For example, the demand for skills (and
consequently suppliers) determines the activity of the suppliers at the
industry level.
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4) MANAGING VARIATION
In traditional supply chains, there is often uncertainty in process times between
the firm and its suppliers and customers. This process uncertainty or variation
results in the need to have extra capacity, buffer stock, and service failures. In
a talent supply chain, however, variation results from these as well as several
sources due to the involvement of more relationships and entities.
Talent supply chain variation may be due to a number of different sources,
including the candidates, hiring managers, supplier managers, intermediaries’
processes, and the client firms. Specifically, each source may have their
individual processes and needs that may or may not be compatible with
the goals of the specific talent supply chain; creating non-value added
complexities for the program office. While variation is often said to be bad
for the supply chain in the physical world; in the talent supply chain, some
variation can also be a source of value. For example, mergers of customers
with certain other firms might change the structure of talent supply chain,
and impose a significant degree of variation in demand for the program
office. However, such a variation can often add value to the program office by
creating new opportunities for engaging with clients, but like a physical supply
chain, variation in routine processes within the talent supply chain needs to
be controlled since it reduces efficiencies. An example of this variation is the
variation of cycle time of candidates placed.
Table 1 illustrates the average and standard deviation of process times by
job category for each process owner (client, talent supplier, and KellyOCG).
The table illustrates the variation in process time by job category and owner.
The results indicate that there is some difference in time by job category, but
that the relative time is about the same for each process owner—with the
client accounting for 48.1 percent of the time, the supplier for 45.5 percent
of the time, and the KellyOCG program office for the remaining 6.4 percent.
However, the more interesting facts are the standard deviations associated
with the means. For the client, the standard deviation ranges from 20 – 50
percent above the mean. In the case of the supplier, the standard deviation
ranges from 74 – 154 percent above the mean. This range of ratios of
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FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT:
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standard deviations to means (often called “coefficient of variations”) indicates
that there is wide process variation and that it may even be somewhat out
of control. There are likely a number of causes for these wide variations:
geographies, suppliers, customer, regulations, and contracting models.
There is significant cost incurred by the client, the supplier, and KellyOCG
when processes have to accommodate this much variation. It also results in
significant service failures.
Managing variation requires an organization to have a process mindset.
The process mindset is critical in not just co-creating the solution, but also
important in conceiving the talent as a supply chain. For example, the Supply
Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) model is primarily about seeing the
entire supply chain as a process. To this effect, a professional services firm that
adopts a process mindset is better off than one that does not. Furthermore,
another important extension of the mindset of robust process creation prevails
in the organization. In contrast to processes, the mindset of creating robust
processes requires an organization’s process to operate with efficiency under
a wide array of variations that are imposed on its systems. Some of this might
have to do with explicit recognition of exceptions that are imposed on the
system and have a way to manage the exceptions, in addition to routine
processes. The rationale being that it is likely that with so many sources of
variation, exception processing might be a norm—rather than an exception
within a talent supply chain.
TABLE 1: PROCESS TIME MEAN AND STANDARD DEVIATION BY JOB CATEGORY
Job
Category
Total
Time
Client
Time
Supplier
Time
KellyOCG
Time
Total Std.
Dev.
Client Std.
Dev.
Supplier
Std. Dev.
Kelly Std.
Dev.
Accounting/
Finance
17.28
7.82
7.88
1.61
21.88
9.24
19.31
4.47
Professional
13.91
7.39
5.50
0.98
14.60
8.94
9.60
4.35
Information
Technology
15.54
7.42
7.15
0.98
17.42
9.11
13.83
2.90
Creative
11.62
5.00
4.79
0.83
17.31
7.66
14.70
1.59
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The general benefits of a process mindset are that the organization can reduce
the amount of unstandardized processes and eliminate variability. A high
degree of variability induces “firefighting” behavior in everyday activities. To
counter this, when variability is high, specific processes can be designed for
high-variability environments. For example, hiring managers who contribute
most to variability in picking the talent can be incentivized to make appropriate
decisions, and provided with information that helps minimize this variability.
Here, high variability in pre-selected orders can serve as an example in that the
program office often struggles with the variability in competitive orders.
To reduce variation, firms must focus on their processes and investigate the
sources of the variation. Specifically, the firm must segment the key process,
identify the drivers of variation, and either remove that source or refine the
process to accommodate for the variation.
Specific practices that demonstrate the capability to manage variation
include:
•
Managing variation from candidates through managing personnel shelf
life amidst the variability and fluidity of labor force movement. Better
processes can help manage the uncertainty that happens due to a fluid
pipeline. Specifically, the processes can ensure availability for better
talent on time by changing the types of engagement, such as using an
independent contractor or FTE versus a contingent worker.
•
Managing variation from clients by clearly delineating the responsibilities
of the client versus the program office. Often, factors that drive the
individual responsibility elements are related to the structure of the
client’s internal organization. This structure might fall into:
–
The kind of customer and their beliefs about their operations.
Customers may have diverging beliefs about their operations that
are important for the program office to understand carefully.
–
Customer’s internal workforce environment, that includes the
duration the employees serve, the knowledge they are expected to
possess, and the nature of the value they bring, among others.
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•
Differentiate fulfillment processes based on the customer needs and
strategy. In practice, many customers differentiate order fulfillment based
on availability, demand, and skill level, but the differentiation is not clear
and documented. This results in inappropriate and sub-optimal resource
allocation, which in turn reduces customer satisfaction. To counter that,
the program office needs to create an internal order differentiation
typology (e.g., differentiate based on skill niche, customer importance,
transaction vs. solution, cost-, quality-, speed-, and compliance-based
trade-offs.) Moreover, an approach to creating efficient or responsive
supply chains needs to be developed to convince the customers by
demonstrating data, models, and metrics.
•
Learning to predict exceptions in process design and their sources; and
accounting for these early on to realize their impact on process design
and execution.
5) CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT
Academic work has documented the success of Toyota® in the automotive
industry in their continuous improvement focus. Two examples of improvement
opportunities include material reuse and waste elimination. A related concept
is the application of Lean principles, which focus on removing time and
material not necessary for a process. Firms can achieve significant economies
of scale scope by thinking about ideas of reuse.
There are a number of examples regarding how to take advantage of reusing
and reducing waste in personnel redeployment. First, firms increase process
uncertainty by not reusing segments of their service processes, such as by
beginning the on-boarding process from scratch when an individual is being
redeployed in another division of the same firm. For example, when the
candidate’s tenure is completed with a customer, a new process may have to be
initiated to redeploy the same candidate with a new set of documents. Another
example is processing résumés multiple times within a single client firm.
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Second, there are some clients where multiple program offices perform similar
or related tasks in the hiring process. For example, one KellyOCG client—
based on operational nuances—used to have human resources manage part of
the process, procurement for others, and sometimes operations independently.
The result is redundancy of services, which results in wasted resources and
process inconsistency. In a large organization, similar to this client’s, this
inconsistency and redundancy may not be as obvious until there is an effort to
look at the entire talent base in a more integrated fashion. Beyond the role of
reuse, continuous improvement also needs to be a culture of teams and units
of the firm. A culture of continuous improvement across all areas of operations
will aim to reduce waste and non-value added activities. Reuse is an example
of effort minimization for potentially non-value added tasks.
Specific practices that demonstrate the capability for continuous
improvement variation include:
•
Modularize the service processes to help think about reuse.
•
Map client processes, particularly across multiple divisions, to identify
opportunities for potential staff reuse.
•
Identify opportunities for standardizing processes and forms particularly
across divisions of the same firm.
•
Pursue a culture of continuous improvement and Lean Six Sigma®
discipline.
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CONCLUSION
>
I
n a 2004 Harvard Business Review ® classic, Shapiro, Rangan, and Sviorkla
recommended that managers “Staple Yourself to an Order” in order to
understand fulfillment processes, customer perceptions, and bottlenecks. In
a sense, this research followed thousands of orders to identify the processing
characteristics, challenges, and constraints. Based on these findings, the
research team reviewed the best practices in supply chain management to
determine if there are potential applications for talent management supply
chains. The analysis results suggest five capabilities that can be applied for
talent management to improve process performance. As discussed previously,
these capabilities include: 1) co-creation; 2) contracting and collaboration;
3) managing the supply base; 4) managing variation; and 5) continuous
improvement. The combination of these capabilities can improve talent
management processes which will lead to improved revenue, lower cost, and
better asset utilization for clients and suppliers.
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ABOUT THE AUTHORS
DAVID J. CLOSS is the John H. McConnell chair in Business Administration and chairperson of
the department of Supply Chain Management at Michigan State University. He has authored
eight textbooks and more than 100 articles focusing on logistics, information technology, supply
chain strategy, security, talent, and risk management.
SRIRAM NARAYANAN is an associate professor with the department of Supply Chain
Management at Michigan State University. His research and teaching interests lie in product and
service innovation and service supply chains. He has published several articles in leading supply
chain journals and holds editorial positions in many of the leading journals.
HAKAN YILDIZ (PhD Carnegie Mellon University) is an assistant professor in the department of
Supply Chain Management at Michigan State University. His research interests include supply
chain risk management, logistics optimization, and resource management in service operations.
His current projects include reliable supply chain network design, planning for equipment rentals,
demand forecasting in the automotive supply chains, and talent supply chain management.
ABOUT KELLYOCG
KellyOCG is the Outsourcing and Consulting Group of workforce solutions provider, Kelly
Services, Inc. KellyOCG is a global leader in innovative talent management solutions in the
areas of recruitment process outsourcing (RPO), business process outsourcing (BPO), contingent
workforce outsourcing (CWO); including statement of work (SOW) management, independent
contractor solutions; human resources consulting, career transition and executive coaching &
development, and executive search.
KellyOCG was named to the International Association of Outsourcing
Professionals® 2014 Global Outsourcing 100® list, an annual ranking of the
world’s best outsourcing service providers and advisors.
Visit kellyocg.com today for more information.
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