Holistic Sourcing
Scott Golas, Managing Consultant, PA Consulting

OneQ: What is the single biggest mistake organizations make in trying to fix a broken sourcing program, and how do they fix it?

“They think too narrowly. Rather than looking at the problem holistically, they go at it in chunks and create problems for themselves.”

As an example, Scott points to the fact that “Company X” is having problems handling all of the different pieces associated with the recruiting process. As a result, Company X has decided to pursue an alternative delivery model for its candidate background investigations. Company X simply puts out an RFP to organizations that do background checks. Instead, he says, Company X should be looking at the entire recruiting process system to determine where all of the difficulties lie, and then fix the entire system, rather than just one piece at a time.

“They try to solve the problem piecemeal, and that’s how we end up with things like $750 toilet seats at the Pentagon.”

Most HR and recruiting managers know what’s actually broken in the system according to Scott, but time and resources to fix the real source of the problems are often lacking. The solution, he says, is to go back to the beginning and ask for help from an outside source.

“Go to an advisor or a consultant and say, ‘my staffing process is broken, what can I do to fix it?’ Let the vendors and consultants provide solutions to the whole problem.

“Vendors and consultants hate RFPs, because they rarely demand what the client actually needs. But because it’s an RFP, the vendor can only respond to that, rather than helping the client fix the larger issues. It’s about solving the actual problem and not just the symptoms.”

As a consultant, Scott relishes the challenge of bringing a comprehensive solution to a staffing organization.

“It’s far more interesting getting to the real issue, and it saves the company time and money in the long run. Instead of just fixing a system piece by piece – which may never actually ‘fix’ it – you fix the whole thing. When that happens, it’s satisfying.”