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Cover Story Since partnering with Advantage xPO in February 2009, the workforce solutions engagement has delivered on its promise, cutting recruitment costs, increasing the quality of internal hires, and producing a 22 percent cost savings in the first year. Both parties are now pursuing an extension for another five years. The problem was managing the more than 100 recruitment providers that submitted resumes for consideration each time a need for contingent labor arose. Since this employment ranged from highly skilled project managers to less skilled, clerical positions, the pay rates ran the gamut. Then, an encounter between Aldrich and Karen Browne, president of workforce solutions provider Advantage xPO, charted a way out of the morass. "I met Karen, we talked, and I soon realized that her firm could handle all those different providers for us," Aldrich says. "But, what sealed the deal was the unique way in which they would do this work." The singular value proposition of Advantage xPO is to put its people inside the four walls of its clients. To the outside eye, they would appear to be actual employees of the companies they service. "Karen told me they would work right here in Swindon as part of our (recruitment) team, get to know the culture and special needs of our organization, and provide a much higher level of efficiency and cost-effectiveness," says Aldrich. "Right from the outset, she said they would consolidate our spend on contingent workers and centralize [12] HRO TODAY MAGAZINE | SEPTEMBER 2013 the supplier relationships, driving down the cost of recruitment while improving service levels and innovation," he adds. "I was sold." Although Nationwide subsequently went through the usual process of sending RFPs to providers, Advantage xPO had an advantage from the start—its on-the-ground managed services. As Browne puts it, "To be successful as a solutions provider, you have to absolutely position yourself as a seamless extension of the customer. We've taken this to mean literally operating within their HR structure. Our people perform work as Nationwide, not Advantage xPO—we are a true extension of their internal team." Bodies in Motion The five-year partnership between the organizations is financially substantial, the parties contend, with industry scuttlebutt estimating significant cost savings for Nationwide. "It's a pretty sizable deal for us," Aldrich acknowledges. "And we're a pretty sizable building society." Founded in 1846 as the Provident Union Building Society, the firm has grown through more than 100 mergers into the world's largest building society as well as a major provider of credit cards, and tallies a membership of 15 million people or one in four U.K. households. It is owned and run for the benefit of these members, much like a mutual insurance company in the United States. From an administrative standpoint, Nationwide is equally outsized, with more than 18,000 permanent and contingent workers serving its huge customer base, one fifth of them constantly in flux. Since partnering with Advantage xPO in February 2009, the workforce solutions engagement has delivered on its promise, cutting recruitment costs, increasing the quality of internal hires, and producing a 22 percent cost savings in the first year. Both parties are now pursuing an extension for another five years. The key to the partnership, Aldrich maintains, is having Advantage xPO support staff right outside his office door. "They understand and share our values, which ensures that we sell the organization in a consistently positive way [to job candidates]," he explains. "What marks this out is the closeness of the relationship. I've got 15 people from their team within a shout, in addition to 350 of my HR colleagues—all right here. They've all gotten to know each