Supplier Consolidation and Mangement Solution

A large multinational pharmaceutical company was using over 65 temporary help suppliers, with over 25 different suppliers just for scientific staffing in their research areas. The prices for temporary chemists and research associates were anywhere between 55% and 85% markup on the pay rate to the employee. Each location had a dedicated person or persons in their HR department to track all of the paperwork just for ordering, but managers were still calling multiple suppliers on their own and then having to weed through and respond to all of the resumes that came across the fax machine from the various suppliers.

Kelly Services was contracted to consolidate all of the company’s temporary help, including and especially the large number of temporary scientific staffing through Kelly’s Scientific Resource division. Once the contract was awarded, Kelly’s implementation team from Kelly Corporate became involved to develop a smooth and quality oriented implementation plan. Kick off meetings were scheduled, needs analysis conducted, secondary supplier contracts created, all held together by a very solid project timeline.

The implementation from multiple suppliers to Kelly was very smooth. Managers retained all of their existing temporary employees through the implementation process. In fact, Kelly established secondary supplier contracts with 18 of the incumbent suppliers, to ensure that the temporary employees stayed on their current assignment and there was no disruption to the workplace.

Because of Kelly’s innovative secondary supplier timecard process, the company’s facilities receive a single invoice for all of their temporary positions, regardless if employees work for the secondary suppliers. The customer also receives a single usage report, which shows all of their temporary help spend by department, and can be used for budgeting and audit purposes.

The company also receives, on any given day, a complete list of all temporary employees currently working on assignment at a location, including what department they are assigned to. This consolidated list of temporary employees is used for security/badge purposes, mailroom, switchboard, IT, and to coordinate safety training for newly assigned temporary employees.

In the end, the company recognized significant hard dollar cost savings in year one following the implementation. Most of these savings came from the difference in markup that the many suppliers were charging, compared to Kelly’s volume discount pricing as a single supplier. In addition, process (soft) savings came from reducing the number of invoices (typically one invoice per week per temporary employee) to a single, consolidated invoice. Through Kelly’s simplified and centralized ordering process, managers no longer had to waste time calling multiple suppliers and could focus more on their core responsibilities.

The company is now approaching year 3 of the relationship. Scientific temporaries make up almost half of the temporary employees requested by this corporation. National Account Business Review meetings are held quarterly to review Kelly’s performance to the contract and expectations, and the customer satisfaction ratings continue to be consistently above average.