Consequently, although RPO is a new solution, it’s catching up fast.

Q: What are the cost benefits for a company opting for an RPO model?
Ans: The benefits of engaging an RPO model are that it helps find better talent and is cost-effective in terms of hard-call savings and soft-call savings, and also delivers the right quality talent as and when needed. Additionally, it is more reliable than the conventional hiring process.

One of the most significant things that we do — and what an RPO company should do — is to design an effective process system. For instance, in the traditional model or if you use outside agencies for recruiting, they send resumes and managers spend most of their time scanning these resumes and interviewing people. An RPO firm like us goes through a customised process that maximises a manager’s time so that he doesn’t spend all the time interviewing. A calibration process ensures that the company gets quality people who fit the job better. Managers at companies can meet just three or four people and hire them, and not, say, 50 to hire just one person. This is called soft-call savings.

Q: How much does one save hiring an RPO company like yours?
Ans: To give you a rough idea we save a minimum 10 per cent on a company’s recruitment process.

This is a time when many of your clients may have frozen hiring. What role does your company play in such times?
There are three major things that we do apart from recruiting: employment brand-building, maintaining an “applicant tracking system” as part of the recruitment management process, and this is the hardest part of HR today, and lastly, workforce planning, that is, building a database of quality people. Workforce planning is key to the success of an RPO company. Along with this we do talent acquisition assessment. So in a nutshell, we help companies understand if their recruitment process works.

Q: What are some of the challenges that the RPO model can face in India?
Ans: Employment brand-building is one of the major challenges for our clients here. The employment brand of a company augments its ability to attract talent. There are many companies whose employment brand doesn’t help them and, in fact, it works to their competitor’s advantage. So we help companies look at the market place and competitors, and design a sound employment brand strategy that helps improve the companies’ recruitment brand and attract the sort of talent they need. Additionally, the RPO model is not for everybody. It is more for an enlightened company that is willing to change.

Source: Business Standard