Directing Consultants' Effort -A Study of Four Staffing Companies

Abstract

Background and discussion of the problem: In the staffing company business a unique situation exists because of the three part relation between the staffing company, the users of the staffing companies’ services, and the consultants employed by the staffing company. To over bridge the conflicting objectives of the staffing company and the consultant incentive systems are designed. Research question: What effects on the consultants’ effort direction do the staffing managers expect of the formal or informal incentive system? Method: The authors have found that a suitable method for the thesis is a survey study. Four different staffing companies were selected as case-study objects, and hence the empirical chapter is based on interviews with staffing managers at the selected companies. The information gathered from the interviews is analyzed with help from the theoretical framework. Results: The authors found that effort directing difficulties do not exist in the studied companies. The reason for this is that the staffing companies have a recruitment process which determines who fits in the company’s profile or who do not. The authors are also convinced that the reason to why staffing companies do not consider consultants’ effort direction as a problem is that the staffing company, the consultant, and even the client has aligning interests. The consultants will by the staffing company be given the possibility to develop their competences. The client will in that way get more qualified consultants with better skills. Finally, the staffing company will be able to take a higher charge for a more skilled consultant. Another reason to why effort directing difficulties do not exist is frequent connection between the staffing manager, the consultant, and the client company. The close connection makes it possible to correct failures and undesirable behavior of the consultants. Suggestions to further research: The authors would find it interesting if further research would be done within this field, and in that case the number of interviewed companies and/or the number of interviewed people within the same corporation would be larger. Furthermore it would be worthwhile to investigate the consultants’ view on what they think is motivating them to align their effort in a specific direction.