Benefits of Flexible IT Resources - written by Ramy Stuart

There are a number of reasons which necessitate the topping up of your IT resources. A couple of common reasons are seasonal trends and projects. In general, the bigger companies have resources to spare. These additional resources help them successfully handle the situation when the demand increases.

A challenge that many companies commonly face is dealing with unforeseen and sometimes difficult requirements. The right partner however could have innovative solutions to help you in such a state of affairs. Some of the situations in which you will require a flexible resource provider are:

1) If you do not have the capability, or you will lose basic IT support for your business, when you need to manage additional or short term projects.

2) When you need interim and fixed short term back up. This is likely when companies undergo change which maybe planned or unplanned resulting in emergency support requirements during work overloads, specialist skill requirements, or resource requirements to deal with continuity management, change management and skills transfer. Employing contractors directly will be both expensive and complicated.

3) Unexpected staff shortages that spring up during holidays, sickness and urgent projects.

When you use the services of a flexible resource provider who can complement or supplement your permanent staff as required, you will benefit in the following ways:

1. Reduce the need for maintaining bench and underutilised staff
2. Ensure work continues and backlog does not mount providing a unique intermediate solution when faced with a decision between permanent or contracted staff
3. No inflated salaries and resentment or competition between existing staff
4. Improve flexibility and eliminate employee liability
5. Projects, SLA's or backfill requirements will not be put on hold, minimising any downtime
6. Reduce employer liability and the costs associated by the employee being accountable to your partner
7. Ensure that you adhere to the complex European laws
8. Get fiscal reimbursements should the candidate leave or not work out
9. Eliminate any contractor or employment liabilities including IR35
10. Gain talented staff who match your organisation requirements without any of the HR/Payroll or recruitment costs
11. Decrease downtime and risk management with the purchasing of resource credits to provide maintenance when you don't know you'll need it!

You will see that Allied Worldwide's IT Resourcing solutions helped their client to efficiently manage technical resource requirements at their locations across Europe, resulting in a reduction in their overall expenditure by approximately £250,000 per annum. You can read more about how a leading manufacturing firm reduced overall costs using flexible resources.

These bespoke solutions offer the transfer of employee's, taking them on permanently and allowing you to only pay for the time you require whilst maintaining the same long-term employee carrying limited liability. We understand that longer serving employee's (eg. 10+ years) carry a large cost with increased salary increments over the duration of employment, a very common dilemma in the West. This solution provides a happy interim when firms want to retain costly long-serving employees but also want to capitalise on the cost-savings which come with a new employee.

In addition, Allied Worldwide's people are not contractors, neither would they belong to you as permanent direct employees. Instead, they belong to Allied and work in your office. They are a part of the workforce team without the liability, armed with a heavy knowledge on your specific needs.