Managing Recruitment Spend Is Key To Managing Overall Budget Spend

Cost control at local government level hit the headlines this week with news of a £43 million overspend at Northamptonshire County Council. The size of the financial challenge facing the council is so severe that a section 114 notice, banning all new expenditure has been served, the first in 20 years. With a third of local authorities spending more on services last year than they intended to, the need to demonstrate a tighter grip on costs has become an urgent priority for all councils.

Even the most fiscally prudent authorities are being asked to deliver more services with less money and after seven years of Government cuts there is no fat left to trim. Instead local authorities are being asked to make difficult decisions on where to prioritise spend. No matter how well a local authority manages their budget the fact remains, with money so tight, all councils need to constantly evaluate spend to check it aligns with changes to service demand.

Recruitment forms a major component in controlling council spend, with the average council spending a significant percentage of their total annual budget on workforce hire. And since a local authority has to respond flexibly to issues as they arise, the solution to the problem can’t simply be to reduce the number of contingent workers it hires. Managing recruitment spend is key to managing overall budget spend, so how can a council get a tighter grip on recruitment?

Hi-Vis Data

The first step to greater control of recruitment costs is to get full visibility of spend. Until a council can say, where money on recruitment is spent, how much, by whom, for what reason, and for how long, it will find it impossible to control people costs. Neither will it have the data to inform 'difficult discussions' around financial priorities. 

To achieve full visibility of spend a local authority needs to gather consistent data at regular intervals across its entire supply change. 

This is no mean feat since most councils have thousands of hiring managers that recruit from hundreds of agencies. 

The approach a council takes to hiring staff will either hinder or assist this challenge. Only councils that buy recruitment through a neutral vendor, with the technology to gather and report data, across the entire supply chain have the capability to achieve full visibility.

With full exposure to sunlight there’s nowhere for costs to hide, enabling councils to cut any unnecessary agency fees.

To find out more about how to get greater control of recruitment spend click here to download our report: Public Sector Recruitment: How To Get Full Visibility Of Spend And Tighter Control Of Costs

Chris Grimes, Sales Director, Matrix SCM