The employer brand of an organization is how well the employees of that company communicate with the company’s values, culture and personality in order to develop their perceptions. Recruitment process outsourcing services operate under the organization’s brand name and thereby have the capability to effectively communicate those desired attributes to the employees.
This is a core responsibility because the employer branding tends to affect every touch point the candidate has with the company, beginning with the recruitment, all the way through the on boarding as well as off boarding. For an RPO provider it is imperative to drill to the candidate the understanding of the organization’s value without which they would be unable to sell the candidate on what makes the prospective company any different from their current employer, where they exactly fit and whether their perceptions about the organization actually align with their requirements. Staffing agencies on the other hand are only concerned with filling up positions with the nearest possible match without much ado about the employer branding.
Now coming to the second most important variable – the pricing models. This is quite different between staffing agencies and RPO firms. RPO’s usually comprised of a cost-plus based pricing model and charge a combination of a monthly management plus a transaction fee. The monthly management fee could be anywhere between 20%-80% of the entire recruiting cost whereas the variable fee could be the launch fee, success fee or open and closed fee that applies to each job based on the job volume and difficulty levels. The staffing pricing model is solely based on position-filled volume.
Finally, Recruitment process Outsourcing is a collaboration or a partnership for talent acquisition solution. It has to partner with the HR leadership and support for the success of the RPO relationship. Staffing services on the other hand undertake sole responsibility without any internal HR intervention.