Flexible Staffing
Posted on Thu, Apr 01, 2010
By Frank Wyckoff
The last several years of unbridled consumption, creative & secondary financing, fancy bookkeeping and unlimited M&A activity morphing Financial institutions into too-big-to-fail behemoths and the great awakening that came from the bottom falling out of our economy has brought many of us to a new discipline. As Wall Street and the engine of commerce driving it demonstrates, that while sales revenues continue to sag, profits 
grow to reflect the cost management strategies managers embraced as they learned to live within their means. At kitchen tables and in living rooms all over America people reworked budgets and remembered core values taught us by the Greatest Generation as wallets closed and mcmansions sat empty. Business managers & leaders continue to refine their lessons learned as we prepare for the much anticipated and overdue upturn.
Many companies have strategically positioned themselves for the recovery by taking advantage of the employment market and upgraded key leadership positions as they changed their company labor rolls from armies to SWAT teams. Now, not wanting to repeat mistakes of yesterday that made life difficult for them financially when the turbulent economy and lack of consumer confidence shrunk their sales revenues straining their banking relationships, they're beginning to realize they no longer have the luxury of over-specializing their company employees. Instead of ramping up their employee numbers with people specializing in niche functions and disciplines, hiring managers are instead searching for people who bring the ability to perform multiple functions and assume a broad range of responsibilities. This flexible staffing approach to rebuild your team allows you to get more work done with fewer people. This is one of the key lessons learned from recent, challenging economic times. Flexible Staffing will help drive profitability as our economic ship rights itself. So, put an oar in the water and as you begin to rebuild, hire people who can play more than one position for your team. It'll help you control your costs; build a broader base of talent from whom to choose your future leaders and prevent crippling or hardship from employee turnover.
Now if only we could get our government to learn some of this stuff and find the benefit of doing more with less and oh yeah, living within our means.