Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO), in which a company outsources parts or all of its recruitment activities, has been growing rapidly in recent years. In particular, the growth in recruitment automation and complexity in processes resulted in companies increasingly using RPOs as part of their recruitment strategy. In addition, a new generation of recruitment KPIs is on the way, such as hiring budget, hiring velocity and net hiring score, which CEO Geert-Jan Waasdorp and others will provide a
masterclass on June 10, 2021. This new set of KPIs is evidently causing the demand for RPO services to rise.
'The great rehire'
Apart from all the general developments in the market, the corona crisis, as we know, has also had a huge impact on the labor market.
Forbes talks about a large-scale hiring initiative for companies in the United States in the coming months. Now that the end of the pandemic is hopefully in sight, unemployment rates in the United States are falling at a rapid pace and the labor market is preparing for the "great rehire”. It has probably not escaped anyone's attention that the unemployment figures in the
Netherlands and
Europe are not lagging behind either and are heading back towards the pre-corona level. This indicates that Dutch companies also have to get ready for the post-corona labor market situation. RPOs could therefore grow even faster than ever in the coming months or years since using RPO services is an effective way to increase the value of an organization in terms of recruitment.
Forbes lists five ways to do this:
- Scalability: most RPO services can be scaled up or down depending on the needs;
- Adaptability: the recruitment process is often customized to the specific requirements;
- Cost-effectiveness: companies that choose RPO as part of their recruitment strategy benefit through a decrease in costs;
- Technology: RPOs often possess advanced recruitment technology, such as AI-based recruitment platforms that small-scale companies often do not;
- Support: naturally, RPO can also provide support to the Talent Acquisition team, for instance, by taking certain tasks away from them;
The value of RPO in Europe
The above-mentioned developments and benefits are contributing greatly to the continuous growth in the RPO industry. Intelligence Group, in collaboration with
ToTalent and Djaja Ottenhof, has also conducted research on the RPO industry in Europe. The research report answers the following four questions:
- Does the actual data of RPO businesses in Europe match the rhetoric?
- What countries within Europe are leading, and which are the laggards?
- What is the future of the RPO model in Europe?
- How do developments in talent acquisition itself influence RPO?
Among other things, the study shows that countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany are doing much better in terms of RPO activity than, for instance, in Southern Europe (Spain, Italy and Greece). On the other hand, it shows that Europe as a whole, especially in terms of revenue of these RPOs, does not even come close to the results that RPOs from the United Kingdom or the United States achieve. Furthermore, the study also looks at insights from both inside and outside the industry, in which market leaders, TA leaders and external experts were interviewed about their view of TA and the future of RPO. In these interviews, we are provided with the view and insights of companies such as Kelly Services, Hays Talent Solutions, Cielo, IBM, Aegon and Randstad Sourceright.
Are you interested and do you want to know more about the study? Download the report here.
Go to the download