WDI researchers interview an Impact Sourcing worker
Any business knows that hiring employees is one of the most important things a business can do. A good employee can make a new business soar, while a bad employee can send it on a quick downward spiral.
Impact Sourcing Service Providers (ISSPs) are tasked with finding and training workers in some of the most remote areas of the world. Since businesses tend to choose to send lower-level tasks overseas, ISSPs are able to select candidates with high school-level educations. Many traditional outsourcing firms require on-site workers to have a college-level educations or better.
Local Partnerships
The Rockefeller Foundation and The William Davidson Institute’s report, Impact Sourcing: Assessing the Opportunity for Building a Thriving Industry, suggests forming local partnerships can help ISSPs locate workers. By working with Community Service Organizations (CSOs) and larger, more established non-governmental organizations (NGOs), ISSPs can better reach out to the community in order to attract a larger pool of talent. Another report looks at Impact Sourcing hiring practices in even greater detail.
During the interview process, ISSPs should look at a candidate’s propensity toward developing the soft skills businesses need. Effective communication, self-motivation, and the ability to learn quickly are all great traits in a new outsourcing service provider. Hard skills can be learned through intensive training, but these soft traits are built into a person’s character.
Testing Skills
One of the best ways to ensure a candidate has the skills necessary to complete tasks successfully is through testing. As the Rockefeller Foundation report points out, each ISSP hires differently, depending on their own preferences, but worker tests often contain many of the same elements. Potential workers are quizzed on their logical reasoning, problem solving, and analytical skills.
Comprehensive testing can help locate the best possible workers for an ISSP’s clientele, ensuring deadlines are met and the business is able to achieve its goals. Forging local partnerships can take ISSPs directly to highly-skilled individuals in the area who are most likely to become reliable, talented employees.
By utilizing local resources, ISSPs can help locate and train the best workers to meet BPO needs. These workers can then begin gaining the experience they need to progress to the next level in their careers. To read about future job opportunities available to outsourcing workers, check out our next installment in the series.