How Contractors Can Drive Long-Term Business Success

When faced with tight deadlines, fast-moving digital developments and internal knowledge gaps, contractors fulfil an essential role for many businesses. They provide flexibility and specialist skillsets, while taking less time to hire and onboard than a permanent hire. They offer businesses the chance to scale up fast, integrate advanced technical solutions and drive innovation. 

Too often, however, contractors are seen as a solution to fill a short-term gap, to provide necessary knowledge and skills that are otherwise lacking. Then, when contractors come to the end of their term and move on, the business loses not only a valuable member of the team, but all the technical know-how as well. 

Rather than treating contract hires as a quick-fix solution to an immediate problem, think about creating blended tech teams as a long-term talent acquisition strategy to fuel growth and ongoing innovation, retaining the value of contractors within your business model and fostering strong retention rates. 

Add value with contractors 

Recognising the value of working with contractors as a long-term strategy, rather than a short-term resource, can have great benefits for your business and existing team. Contractors are qualified professionals with vast experience, often having worked across a wide range of industries, teams, tools and challenges. This means they bring new insights and creative solutions to the table. They may also have inherited good working practices and ideas from previous placements that can give a new perspective on everything from workflows to industry standards. 

Contractors contribute specialist knowledge of emerging tech or advanced solutions that can accelerate your projects. If you encourage a culture of knowledge sharing and mentorship, your internal teams stand to benefit from this wealth of expertise. Contractors are more likely to consider project extensions in roles where their contribution is valued.

The most successful businesses blend both in-house permanent team members with contract talent strategically. Through collaboration, communication and knowledge sharing, a blended team that works well together offers the best of both worlds. The permeant team ensures continuity and stability, essential to business longevity, while contractors add specialist depth to a team, as well as adaptability. 

Contractor and knowledge retention 

Retention should form the backbone of a good contract talent strategy within a business. The right contractor becomes invaluable, meaning you should have a proactive approach to holding on to talent. Ensure contractors are treated with respect, acknowledging the specific skillset and job they’ve been brought in to do.

Clear communication about contracts is also appreciated – businesses and contractors alike require stability. This means transparency around the possibility of renewing contracts, extending terms or discussing other projects that might be a good fit. Good talent will be snapped up by other companies once back on the market, so retention gives you a competitive advantage. 

Working with a specialist recruitment company to source contractors can help with retention. Having a wide pool of talent to tap into means more chance of securing a placement that’s the perfect fit for your business. Spectrum IT has worked with numerous top businesses to help build blended teams that work seamlessly, where 7 out of 10 contracts negotiated through Spectrum IT got extended. 

When the time comes to part ways, leave a clear and open pathway for future collaborations – re-hiring a trusted contractor who understands the business saves time, effort and cost on recruitment later on. However, their knowledge doesn’t have to go with them; retaining their contributions to your business creates lasting value from the relationship. 

Knowledge retention helps to strengthen your internal team’s collective expertise, it can speed up onboarding for future hires, and it can help ensure continuous improvement and innovation. Approaching contract hires in this way means that every time you engage with a contractor, you’re compounding your knowledge base.

What does this look like in practice? 

Collaborative tools – Have good centralised, collaborative systems to document project information and internal workflows. This helps with continuity across blended teams, streamlines the onboarding process and makes it easier for others to pick up on work after a contractor has moved on. 

Handover procedure – A robust contractor handover procedure is essential. Create documentation or a checklist that needs to be completed as part of the project closure process. 

Cross-pollination – Blend ideas, knowledge and expertise between contractors and internal teams. This may include sessions to coach or mentor existing team members built into contracts to encourage continuous learning in the workplace. 

Knowledge sharing – This works both ways, so consider setting up specific sessions between permanent and contract hires to discuss and share information related to different parts of the project. Encourage all team members to present on learnings or expertise. 

Track metrics – Set up a system to track basic metrics for your contract hires. For example, you may want to keep track of the amount of knowledge work documented by contractors, the number of knowledge-sharing sessions completed or the percentage of repeat contractor hires. This data enables you to learn what works to form your ongoing talent acquisition strategy. 

Gather contractor feedback – At the end of a project, ask your contractors about their experience, including what worked and what didn’t. This builds trust and understanding with your contractors, so they know their opinion is valued. It also helps you to improve contractor experience. 

Contractors shouldn’t be seen as a quick fix or temporary solution to a problem. They’re a powerful specialist resource, bringing fresh perspective, innovation and collaboration to your business. With the right approach, and by prioritising both knowledge and talent retention, contractors can add value to your teams.

At Spectrum IT, we help businesses build high-performing blended tech teams. We can help source both permanent and contract talent, as well as advise on knowledge handovers, retention strategies and attracting top contractors. Contact us today to find out more.