Why Do People "Temp"?
Anyone watching Aquent over the last few years would see that we've shifted the emphasis in our marketing from "the world's largest talent agency for creative, web, and tech," back in 2001, to "a professional services firm that specializes in helping companies all over the world, across a variety of industries, make use of people, processes, and technology" with a "marketing and creative services group" that included a consulting and a technology offering in addition to staffing, to the current positioning of "staffing for marketing organizations" (which is fudged a little in the title of the homepage which reads "marketing and creative staffing at Aquent.com").
These shifts in emphasis have been driven by our desire to grow beyond our origins in desktop publishing and graphic design (both print and web). Truth be told, we still place a lot of folks in these so-called "creative" roles and probably have not yet exhausted the business potential of this space. Nevertheless, the organizational fact of the matter is that creative folk are generally working for marketing folk and creative services departments are frequently nestled within or otherwise adjoined to marketing departments. Given this arrangement, it seemed a natural extension of our business to expand beyond the edges of creative into the broader world of marketing proper and that is just what we've done.
There has been one interesting problem that we have encountered, however. Whereas freelancing (to use a word other than "temping" that means the same thing) is commonplace in the creative realm (you could say that freelancers constitute our main competition here as well as making up a large part of our talent pool), it is less so in the marketing realm. In fact, when we recently surveyed marketing execs, we found that they were leery of hiring "temps," as opposed to permanent employees. Aside from associating temporary staffing with admin and secretarial positions, the question they had about potential temporary employees was, "If they're any good, why don't they already have jobs?"
There are at least two misconceptions to clear up here. First of all, organizations employee a wide range of people on a "temporary" basis; it just happens that, depending on their skill level, they maybe called freelancers, contractors, or consultants, instead of temps. On another level, we are all "temps," but I'll return to that topic in another post.
The second misconception is that people only temp because they can't find a permanent job. On the one hand, this borders on the illogical because, frankly, if people didn't have the skills or experience to land a permanent job in a field that requires skill and experience, like marketing or design, then they wouldn't be able to land a temp job in that field either. On the other hand, it assumes that everyone wants a permanent job when in fact some of the people we work with, either because they have other interests or because their family situation requires a certain amount of flexibility, don't.
But on the third hand, and this is the hand that employers should pay attention to, some people temp AS A WAY OF LOOKING FOR A JOB. If you are new to a particular area, or curious about exploring your career options, working with a connected and respected staffing company can be a great way to try out different roles and corporate cultures.
Think about it. Taking a permanent job and deciding after six weeks that it's not for you can be awkward and a hassle for both the employee and the company; taking a permanent job after working somewhere for six or more weeks almost guarantees that the match is good and that the employee plans on sticking around for a while. In many ways, it makes more sense to hire people as "temps" first, seeing how things go, and then making an offer, rather than hiring them "permanently" and hoping for the be.
Wouldn't it be weird if "temping" became the norm and people said, "Well, Joe just took a perm job because he couldn't find a good temp one"?
Image Courtesy of Domenic's pics.
Comments
Maybe I'm stating the obvious, but there are a lot of practical reasons people temp (or freelance) in addition to what you mentioned in your article.
I've temp'ed off and on in my lifetime, here are some of my past reasons:
1- I'm deaf (well back then I was hard of hearing) and employers are afraid to hire a person with a disability so it let them try me out.
2- I'm easily bored when doing repetitious work, and temping let me change jobs easily.
3- one that you mentioned-- I temp'ed to get my foot in the door and was eventually hired full time.
My current reasons are different:
4- "I have a book in me" and I need the time to write and design and layout the book.
5- I'm a great worker, but a "bad employee." I'm a night owl and all my jobs have been in the daytime. It's hard to change your bodyclock, and in jobs I needed to be at in the morning, I was always late. With "normal" supervisors, that was seen as demoralizing to the rest of the staff, even though I worked harder and longer hours and produced more work.
6- I'm currently the caretaker of my partner who had mini-strokes that affect her memory and cognition. I don't want to be away from her and want to work at home; or if needed at the work site, work late at night. It's okay if I'm sleeping in the mornings, she can wake me up if she needs me. It's important that I'm physically there when she's awake.
That's six specific reasons just for me! I'm sure having young children at home springs to mind for everyone, and there are probably many more.
I've also had "permanent" jobs, one for seven years and another for 11 years, and I've learned that things change! Life, priorities, perceptions, both mine and my employers. Your point that we are all temps is well stated.
Posted by: Nancy Creighton @ Jan 11, 2008