Tips for Bringing on Temporary Employees

Posted By: M. Martin

Bringing great flexibility to your workforce and offering a huge competitive advantage is something temporary employees can offer you business. In some cases however it can take a while for your internal team to adapt.

These are some suggestions that can help with improving the working relationship between temporary and direct employees and help you achieve even better staffing results:

 * Make temporary employees feel welcome. It may be a fact that temporaries are a separate part of your workforce (and must be treated differently because of co-employment laws), you and your staff can still make them feel welcome in your organization. By encouraging social interaction (e.g., formal or informal introductions) among all workers, you can foster social ties that are essential to a cohesive workforce.

 * Educate your direct staff. Take the time to clearly explain the role and value of temporary workers. The better your direct employees understand the benefits temporary help provides, the more likely they'll be to work productively with them.

 * Take advantage of training. If you use large numbers of temporaries, many staffing services will develop customized orientation and training programs for specific positions. This shifts the time-consuming burden of getting new temporary employees up-to-speed off your direct employees' shoulders.

Bottom line, there are a number of steps you can take keep relations between temporary and direct employees positive. And the more positive their working relationship, the better the results will be for everyone.