The City of Plant City is hoping to expedite its hiring process by entering a contract with Ad-Vance Talent Solutions, Inc.
For years all hirings at the city were handled by the internal Human Resources Department. With a limited staff, City Manager Bill McDaniel said it would often taken far longer than necessary to find the perfect fit for the openings as the HR team would have to drop everything they normally handle to fill the position.
“It’s very time intensive and labor intensive,” McDaniel said. “By hiring Ad-Vance we get to offload it. They have experts in recruitment and hiring management on their team that I’m confident will be able to find exceptional applicants for our positions.”
City Commissioners unanimously agreed Monday evening to enter the contract with the company. The city will be “piggy backing” a contract with the Polk County Board of County Commissioners. With the vote Monday evening the city will authorize a one year contract with Ad-Vance Personnel Services, Inc. dba Ad-Vance Talent Solutions, Inc., that comes with three one year renewal options available upon approval from the city manager.
The contract will allow the city to have either temporary to permanent employees or direct hires. If it’s the prior, the hires remain temporary for up to 18 months with “a markup cost between 25 percent and 38 percent depending on the position.” Direct hires with assistance from Ad-Vance in the recruitment process come at a fixed cost of $890 per recruitment.
The city will use funds that are currently available in the personnel section of the funds for whatever department will utilize the service.
McDaniel said there haven’t been as many applicants as he knows there could be for the job openings the city has had recently. Without a dedicated staff on hand to go to job fairs, heavily broadcast the opening and thoroughly comb through each and every applicant, it’s hard to ensure the city is gaining the best suited employees.
Ad-Vance will advertise locally, regionally and nationally, if required, and will handle online applications and the onboarding process as well as tackle video interviewing and electronic timekeeping.
“There are a lot of positive benefits for the city,” McDaniel said. “It could take quite a while before to get any position filled when we had to allocate our HR team to handling the openings. Hiring a recruitment agency just makes sense. It makes the process more efficient, effective and shortens the timeline.”