How to make the most out of your contractors

You can call them contractors, temps, or consultants. Sometimes they can be outsourced labor, virtual assistants, or freelancers. Whatever the term or contractual format, they are not considered regular “employees” of your company or organization but temporary, outsourced labor that fulfills a temporal need or is someone who is on trial for a real job position. The reasons to have these temporary workforce personnel can vary from seasonal fluctuations in labor demands, cost savings from removing obligations to pay benefits or taxes, or even retaining the rights to terminate workers without having to go through all the hurdles of government regulations. Whatever the reasons are to hire these people, there are certain things you can do to maximize the output and efficiency of their work.

First and foremost, contractors should never be considered as second-class, inferior, easy-to-replace, workers. Just like everyone else, they are humans but they possess a unique set of skills and experience that make them valuable beyond the positions they are filling. The millennial workforce is trending towards the multiple-job direction as we speak. With the average job lasting three years, its no surprise why contractors are becoming more popular in the US. Whether they are contractors or employees, millennials are jumping form job to job and are crossing industries. They are picking up new information and technical skills and transferring them to their new companies like bees are bring pollen to flowers. It is time to embrace this reality and use it to its fullest potential. Instead of downplaying their accomplishments, how about ggiving them a boost?

At the forefront of this movement are the contractors who are moving faster than anyone else in experiencing new ideas and organizations. In this article we explore ways in which organizations can empower temps and make the most out of their tenure.

1. Invest in your contractors

Contractors and temps are usually expected to do menial, repetitive tasks that can be taught to a fifth-grader. The truth is, they are a lot more talented than you give them credit for. When they start working for your organization, it’s best to introduce them to as many work-related items as practical. They should know their team, managers, executive teams, books, websites, and social media. If there are processes that are going on in a company and there is performing one of the steps of that process chain, it’s best to spend a little time to show them the big picture and show them how their role is affecting other areas. It’s also a good idea to introduce them to other employees and let them learn a little from them.

One of the big reasons to do this is because at any moment, you will need to rely on another person to step up and fulfill a vacant role. Contractors who have been properly introduced to an organization and its methods can effectively fill in for others. Contractors who sit at their desk everyday waiting for the things. to start When the organization has taken some effort to familiarize them with other roles, they become readily available at a moment’s notice to step into someone else’s shoes.

The reasons could be an employee got sick, injured, quit, was fired, or is on maternity leave and they need to replaced immediately. Hiring a new employee in their place would cost a lot of time and money. Contractors, who are already on hand, become a good substitute if they have been trained properly.

2. Delegate responsibilities not tasks

Contractors are usually given tasks. And only tasks. What this means is someone has to manage them and continue to feed them work. The person who manages contractors aren’t necessarily managers themselves. This means, they are taking time out of their day  a to find work for people they are not ready to manage yet. This becomes a disaster for two reasons. 1) They are conrctor

First, it creates stress for employees who are not managers. They have their own things to. They aren’t trained to be managers or are not ready yet to be managers. They are not given the leeway managers have either to spend time planning and executing strategy. This means, they are simultaneously working on their own tasks as well as being expected to manage other people. This stress leads to frustration and fatigue.

Second, it is stressful for contractors who either have too much or too little work to do because of the amount of tasks being delegated to them. They feel no responsibility to take the initiative on any front and are merely checking off to-do-lists. When the list is long they feel overwhelmed. When the list is short or empty, they feel bored and disengaged making their productivity and motivation levels quite low.

Instead of giving them task lists, give them responsibilities. Give them ownership. This not only gives them satisfaction and the ability to generate their on tasks, it also reduces the burden on non-management employees who chosen to oversee them.

3. Don’t make them outsiders

Contractors, by nature, are technically outsiders but they shouldn’t be treated as such. Whatever vision, mission, or methods are used to motivate and direct employees, the same should be used for contractors. They shouldn’t even be called “contractors” as it puts an “us vs them” connotation on them. Spending a couple minutes a day indoctrinating contractors on company philosophy is a small price to pay but can bring a lot of potential productivity to their work efforts.

Just because a contractor is hired for a fixed term, doesn’t mean their work output should be limited to that term. Squeezing out extra productivity should be any manager’s goals. No CEO will say that there isn’t any work to do. There are always things to do to advance a business. There are always deadlines to be met and KPIs to be maximized. How are contractors contributing to the bottom line? If they are productive and their output is exceeding what is intended of them, you better bet performance goals will be met and exceeded. By empowering contractors with the same tools and resources as employees, you are creating an enabled workforce that is geared towards results.

Treat contractors as part of the team. They will then feel like they must contribute as a team member Including them in meetings, office talk, lunches, and work parties is a great way to boost their chances of success,

4. Recruit your contractors

A lot of the reasons to use contractors is to avoid hiring employees. For growing companies, it is always a good idea to hire employees for the long-term. Hiring people from job applicants is a long, tedious, expensive process. To make matters worse, without proper job assessments and job benchmarking there is little chance of success. Contractors are already present and observable. They can be tested for performance for potential long term roles in the company and can be assessed and onboarded as a fully-fledged employee. Time is less of an issue and the barriers are a lot lower for contractors to become full time employees.

Overlooking contractors is a mistake many companies make. While most people are not fit for the roles offered, there is always a chance that someone on the temp team possesses the right behaviors and motivators to be successful. It is also a lot easier and cheaper to evaluate contractors than outside job candidates. Making use of their time should also include internal recruiting efforts.

5. Keep the contractors happy

Contractors sometimes face a difficult, stressful life. They live with uncertainty with their careers, financial outlook, and future. It’s always best to make their work life as comfortable and as encouraging as possible. Keeping them happy and satisfied will not only make their lives easier, but it will also increase the reputation of the company as a great place to work. Reputation among employees is paramount in keeping the company morale up and in promoting the company to new job candidates. The more the contractors there are passing through the front door every year, the more the potential for word to get out about the nature of the company.

Bad reputation is hard to repair. Keeping contractors happy is as easy as following some of the above mentioned advice. Keep them busy. A bored worker is an unhappy worker. Give them responsibility. Part of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is a need for a sense of self-worth. If they are actually contributing to a company’s bottom line and they can see the fruits of their labor, they become fulfilled as a person. Train your contractors. Training them on new skills gives them firepower on their resume. They will be thrilled to boost their skill set. Give them an opportunity. Hiring contractors for full-time employment is the ultimate reward (if the company is good).

6. Learn from contractors

A company or team can often be narrow-minded and self-absorbed. It doesn’t take long for an outside person to identify dysfunction in an organization. The same can’t be said for current employees and managers who are distracted by daily duties and responsibilities. They are so latched onto their own tasks that they fail to realize errors and waste in their team. Outsiders possess a unique, unbiased opportunity to evaluate a company. Evaluation of management is a great opportunity for contractors to participate it.

Also, processes and methods can be assessed by contractors. While one company might have its tool set that everyone is trained on, they might be using outdated methods. New contractors bring with them not only fresh ideas but knowledge on how to use the most cutting edge software and techniques for growing a company. This opportunity should never be thrown out the window.

7. Test new ideas with contractors

Just as contractors can be used to pinpoint current waste and errors within a company, they can also be used to prevent companies deploying new ideas or tools to the workforce without proper testing and measurement. Anytime a new tool replaces a current one, there are high chances of resentment and a steep learning curve. By testing with a group of contractors instead of employees, the contractors will start to feel happy because they now have access to new things before others and the company can prevent itself an embarrassing situation by deploying faulty software.