Flexi staffing companies face internal branding problems

Venkatachari Jagannathan
05 July 2007

Chennai: Even as flexi staffing companies are trying to solve the issue of twin identity of their consultants who, though on its rolls are working elsewhere, their consulting staff have found a simple solution — identifying themselves with the client company and not with the staffing company that is their primary employer.

However, this has thrown up new challenge of building internal brand equity for flexi staffing companies.

According to an employee of a flexi staffing company "outsourced" to a Chennai-based software solutions company, "When asked by my relatives and friends, I say that I am working in the software company where I have been assigned. Unless somebody specifically asks whether I am a direct or outsourced employee I will not reveal the name of the staffing company on whose rolls I am."

According to her, for all practical purposes her daily interactions are with the officials of the software company and contact with her original employer has been minimal, there was no need to bring in the staffing company''s name to confuse matters.

Often temporary staff or "temps", as they are called, prefer not to display their identity cards, which usually have a different colour scheme than the cards of permanent employees of the client company.

Very few reveal that they are posted at a particular company but employed by a staffing company. "This may be due to the stipulation laid by the companies who employ temps to avoid future problems," says an HR executive of a leading software company.