With the debut of on-demand models, automation, artificial intelligence, and a whole host of other new technological marvels, recruiters may be worrying that they could soon be out of a job. Or they could be wondering, "Great. Now I have access to all this technology...but now what even is my job? How do I fit into all this?" Let's clear the air right away. Recruiters will still have jobs in on-demand staffing for the foreseeable future, so no need to panic. However, if recruiters think that their role in on-demand staffing is the same as in regular staffing, they are gravely mistaken. The worst thing recruiters can do in an on-demand staffing company is continue performing their job as if they were in a regular staffing company. On-demand is fundamentally different than traditional staffing and recruiters' roles should reflect that. Recruiters will be out of a job, but not because they were replaced by a machine. Rather, because they were bad at their job. Recruiters must revise their role in on-demand staffing and we're going to look at exactly what that entails here.

Recruiters in Traditional Staffing

First, let's take a look at how recruiters generally work in traditional staffing.

As the above diagram shows, in traditional staffing, clients contact recruiters (or account managers) and the recruiters then put this information into their ATS system and begin looking at job seekers. Once they've found qualified candidates, they will then connect them to the client.

This model is as old as the staffing industry itself. What makes on-demand staffing so revolutionary is how it turns this model on its head. Let's take a gander at what that looks like.

Recruiters in On-Demand Staffing

You'll notice that the recruiter has actually been taken out of the process and in their place is the on-demand staffing platform. Now it is the platform itself rather than recruiters who are connecting clients with job seekers. This is what allows clients to receive staff at a moment's notice (i.e. on-demand) since it no longer depends on a human reacting to or even receiving the client's request. The platform is self-service and can connect staff with clients at a moment's notice all on its own.

Have no fear recruiters, there is still an important job for you in all this. What might that be? As you can see in the diagram, recruiters play a role outside of the actual process of pairing candidates with clients. A recruiter's role in an on-demand staffing platform is twofold (if you have a big enough of a team, we recommend splitting these two roles amongst your recruiters and not having overlap).

1. Screening/Vetting Job Seekers and adding the qualified ones to the Workforce within the on-demand staffing platform. The platform draws from this workforce when making assignments, so it's vital to ensure that all workers placed into your platform's workforce are qualified

2. Helping the platform refine its understanding. When an on-demand staffing platform begins, especially ones that use complex algorithms and artificial intelligence, they are going to need some help developing an understanding of which candidates are the best fit for jobs. Recruiters are the best option for helping refine the platform's understanding until it can consistently assign the best fit available candidate without any human intervention.

Now how are recruiters able to help on-demand platforms learn this? Since they can't exactly sit the platform down in a classroom to go over the differences between a forklift operator and a plant manager. This comes to standard job types. To get the full picture, first, let's return to how things are done in traditional staffing.

Jobs in Traditional Staffing

The process in traditional staffing is generally the client realizes they need staff and then they create a job description for the specific staff they are looking for. That description is then sent to the recruiter which they use to evaluate job seekers.

As can be expected, On-Demand Staffing drastically changes this.

Jobs in On-Demand Staffing

Here from the moment the platform is set-up, it is configured with standard job types. This means that, whenever clients go to the platform, instead of providing their own job description for the staff they are looking for, they select from pre-set job types. It is these standard job types that allow the platform to quickly evaluate and assign staff. It is also the primary way that recruiters are able to teach the platform how to evaluate staff. Standard job types provide concrete metrics for the platform to use when evaluating staff and an easy way of segmenting your Workforce into hierarchies. At From Wolf, for example, our on-demand staffing platform allows recruiters and admins to rate every member of their workforce for each specific job type they have. The platform then uses these ratings and job types to develop an understanding of what types of jobs a certain worker may be best for and ranks them.

Typically on-demand staffing platforms will be constantly learning from who is assigned to specific job types and looking for overarching traits amongst staff assigned to a job type. Eventually, it will develop the understanding that "The best type of staff for a teacher are..." for example and rank each candidate in your workforce for each job type based on these criteria. This allows the platform to create a hierarchy and prioritize hiring higher ranked staff based on a specific job type.

Recruiters and On-Demand Staffing

Recruiters can rest easy knowing that their days are not numbered. The role of a recruiter in traditional staffing however, does have its days numbered. On-demand staffing is drastically changing the role of recruiters. In order for an on-demand staffing company to flourish, their recruiters must be open to their new role. Recruiters' primary duties now are vetting and evaluating job seekers to join the platform's workforce (rather than for a specific job) and helping the platform as it develops a robust understanding of what makes some staff better than others.

By following this model, On-Demand staffing companies will ensure that they are truly making the most of the technology they have access to. Trying to fit a traditional recruiter role into an on-demand staffing company will just gum up the process and create more problems than solutions. Change can be complicated and there is always a learning curve. But only by changing will recruiters really bring about the on-demand staffing revolution.