I love reading these types of stories. "More employers turn to temporary staffing to meet needs in unstable economy."
By Tyrone Richardson Of The Morning Call. 11:13 p.m. EDT, July 16, 2011. After losing her job at an athletic goods factory in
Alabama in 2008, Donna Mims came to the Lehigh Valley in search of new opportunities. Three years later, she still hasn't found a permanent position.
Mims, 55, of Fountain Hill has been making do with temporary jobs at some local plants, such as
Crayola, hoping to eventually get hired full time. "It's been jobs here at one place for a few weeks and some at another for a few months, and I've been doing this for about a year," Mims said Tuesday outside the ISS staffing agency office in Upper
Macungie Township. "It's been good because it allows you to experience a place and see if you would want to work there, but it's a temporary job, and I'm really hoping to get temporary-to-permanent." Though Mims and thousands of others working short-term jobs are frustrated, labor experts see an uptick in temporary hires as a sign of better times ahead.
Workforce recovery starts with employers offering overtime to their employees, then advances to openings for temporary workers, said Bethlehem economist Kamran Afshar. When employers feel confident enough to make those temporary workers permanent, the workforce grows and the economy strengthens. "As you have uncertainty, employers will be a lot more inclined to do with temporary help than permanent," Afshar said. "Temporary workers are an exact cost for employers, and in a market of uncertainty, that type of certainty helps."
The practice also saves companies money, Afshar said. Because personnel typically is the biggest expense in a company's budget, tapping temporary over full-time staffers creates a savings because the contract workers generally earn less and the employer isn't burdened to provide benefits, he said.
Companies that hire temp workers also are spared the rigors of recruiting, screening and testing employees, because those chores fall to the temp agencies that provide the workers, said Richard Wahlquist, president and CEO of the American Staffing Association, a trade group that represents temp agencies.
No longer used merely to fill the gap left by the vacationing secretary or the warehouse worker who had surgery, temp workers are sometimes a key part of a business' plan.
"We're seeing that more employers are making temporary workers a part of their overall work strategy," said Becky Sokolowski, regional director of local operations for staffing agency Manpower.
That strategy has given birth to a number of temp agencies in the Lehigh Valley. Those agencies employed workers who filled 9,300 jobs in May, 100 more than in April and 1,700 more than a year ago, according to the state Department of Labor and Industry, which defines the Lehigh Valley as Carbon, Lehigh and Northampton counties and Warren County, N.J.
Temporary jobs accounted for nearly 3 percent of overall employment in the Lehigh Valley in May, up slightly from a year ago, according to the state data.
U.S. staffing agencies created 401,000 jobs in 2010, second only to the 428,000 created in 1994, according to the American Staffing Association. On an average business day in 2010, staffing companies employed 2.6 million workers, about 18 percent more than in 2009.
So far, those numbers haven't triggered an increase in permanent employment. The region's unemployment rate increased to 8.4 percent in May from 8.2 percent in April, showing that employers remain skittish about the economy.
Employers would prefer to be in a position to hire full-time staff, said Thomas J. Hyclak, an economics professor at
Lehigh University.
"I think most firms would say that they need to have a skilled workforce with training and with the knowledge to do their job effectively," he said. "Most firms would prefer to have full-time regular employees as the bulk of their workforce."
Locally, Amazon is making the shift from temp workers to permanent positions with benefits at its
Breinigsville distribution center. While the center turned to temp agencies to fill Christmas shopping orders, it recently announced plans to add hundreds of employees.
International Battery, an industrial battery maker in Upper Macungie, also is moving in that direction. When the company recently added 16 workers, it filled only six of the positions with temporary staff, said spokesman Vance Grosso. And some workers who had been short-term moved into the permanent ranks based on their performance as temps.
"Several production folks are brought in on that basis as a proving ground," Grosso said. "They come in as temps and are given full-time when they are available."
That's all Allen Eichman, 45, of Upper Macungie is looking for -- a chance to prove himself. The former landscaper stopped at the ISS staffing agency last week, seeking a temp job.
"I just hope to get my foot in the door and that can lead to a permanent position," he said.
Labor experts say that's a good strategy. Temporary work offers an opportunity to sample a job and to learn new skills. And it provides a back door for workers who have been looking for a way in to an established company.
"This gives them a chance to make a first impression and get a job," said Manpower's Sokolowski. "This gives them a chance to get into a business they may not have been able to get in the past."
Temporary work offers no guarantees of being hired, and benefits such as medical and dental fall on the staffing agency. But for the many hopefuls who have been lining up at the ISS staffing agency, which has been charged with helping Amazon fill its ranks, it can be a bridge to security.
Rodney Heintzelman, 40, of
Slatington is pinning his hopes on a temp job. After losing a job with a beer distributor in Slatington, he was filling out an application at ISS last week.
"I've been looking for a job that is more suitable for me. I hope something temporary will lead to being hired," he said. "I'm looking for more of a career at this point."
tyrone.richardson@mcall.com
610-820-677
