Iris Edmonds
Marketing Apprentice
14 December 2023
A 5-step guide to hiring interim/contract HSEQ staff
It’s hard to realise as an employer when you may need contract/interim staff, as there are a few circumstances a temporary hire may be necessary for your business. It is understandable as an employer to not to be clued up on hiring contract/interim staff. Especially as just 5% of all working age people in 2022 were employed on a temporary basis.
It’s hard to realise as an employer when you may need contract/interim staff, as there are a few circumstances a temporary hire may be necessary for your business. It is understandable as an employer to not to be clued up on hiring contract/interim staff. Especially as just 5% of all working age people in 2022 were employed on a temporary basis.
You may need contract/interim employees when looking for someone to fill a permanent role and need the position to be filled urgently. Therefore, cannot wait for the time it takes to employ a permanent member of the company. Another reason could be due to maternity or sick leave, where you may be under resourced and need a short-term employee to cover their time away from work.
As well as these it could be for construction or objective based employment, where you look for an interim/contractor to fulfil a demand for your business; resulting in their contract ending when the task given has been completed. Due to a niche hiring market, it is crucial to act fast once you have identified the need for a temporary worker, as there are under 1.62 million temporary workers in the UK.
Let’s jump into our recruitment process!
Stage 1: Identifying the need
In the initial stage of our recruitment process, it’s important for us to understand your needs and requirements. Factors can include: your budget, role brief and duration of employment expected from one of our 40,000 qualified candidates. Before you contact someone in our team, it is essential you know exactly what you need from a candidate and how quickly you need them to start to ensure there are no delays in the recruitment process.
Stage 2: In or out of IR35
During this stage, you identify whether the role you are wishing to fill is inside or outside IR35. If there is a circumstance where you do not know, please contact Max, Elliott, or Waldo who are part of our interim/contract team, to further discuss the regulations of IR35.
Stage 3: Contact us
Once you have an understanding of what you are looking for, contact one of our consultants to register your role or submit a contact form. This will then be passed onto one of our recruiters in our contract and interim team, who will then book an initial discussion with you.
Stage 4: Discovery meeting
For us, we work best when we have as much information about you, the role and requirements as possible. From the candidate specification, interview stages, and start date all the way to timescale and budget. Our goal is to ensure we dig deep into your requirements so that we can match the best candidate to your specification - on time and within budget.
Stage 5: Receive your list of candidates
After your consultant has searched for suitable candidates, you will receive a shortlist of CVs within 24 to 48 hours. This is where you will choose which candidates you’d like to interview and get to know better. During this process you will be contacted by your consultant to ensure you are happy with the interviews and have selected a successful candidate. Finally, we will then complete our compliance checks for the candidate you have chosen, ready for their previously discussed start date.
In summary:
Hiring interim/contract staff can be a tricky process, especially if you’re new to it. However, it doesn’t have to be. Why not leverage the experience of an agency who are market leaders within this space? Here at Principal People we pride ourselves on supporting business and job seekers at all stages within their journey, whether that be securing their first HSEQ job, or employing their first hire.
Not only does using an experienced agency save you both time and money, it can also help in sticky situations. Take a look at how we helped a bustling Logistics and Distribution hub source a new Health and Safety Manager on an extremely tight deadline.
Case study
Helping a logistics business recruit a Health and Safety Manager within a tight deadline.
Take a look