Quiet Hiring: Do It Smart, and Everyone’s Going to Win
5 minutes
March 14, 2023
With the economic downturn, staff budget reduction, hiring freeze, talent shortages, and many more challenges — it looks like it’s time to be creative about your hiring strategies. Try quiet hiring!
What is quiet hiring?
According to Gartner, a technological research and consulting firm, quiet hiring is an HR strategy to acquire new skills and capabilities without adding new full-time employees.
Quiet hiring is considered one of the nine hiring trends of 2023 by the technical consulting and research company Gartner. It can be a helpful strategy, especially during a hiring freeze, allowing companies to fill critical positions without violating them.
Quiet hiring involves hiring part-time, contract, or freelance workers to fill company workforce gaps. By doing so, a company can access the skills and expertise it needs to grow and develop without making long-term commitments to full-time staff.
Types of quiet hiring
Internal quiet hiring
Within internal quiet hiring, you can shift your employees between different positions and departments or give them promotion — provide them with new opportunities for upskilling and promotion.
Opportunities and risks of internal quiet hiring
Opportunities
- Finding internal talent that was previously hiding under the radars — give people with the unfulfilled potential to show their full potential.
- Offering long-deserved promotions and provide more career opportunities to your employees.
- Giving people a chance to explore new areas they haven’t had to work with before.
- Focusing on employees’ professional development, work, and the tech environment can boost your company’s productivity and innovativeness.
Risks
If your team is already at full capacity, you risk overloading them with work, inevitably leading to burnout.
If you don’t have a budget to cover the additional workload internally, it will result in burnout and low morale.
Remember — quiet hiring doesn’t mean a “free workforce.” If you expect your coworkers to acquire new skills, they may take a while to fill their new shoes.
External quiet hiring
Unless you still want to hire during a hiring freeze and have a substantial lack of specific expertise but limited time and resources — go for the external quiet hiring. Following this strategy will allow you to hire contractors to fill in the skills gaps to keep your business running.
Forms of external quiet hiring
Depend on the business goals you pursue:
For small or short-term tasks
You can hire freelancers, consultants, and individual contractors.
Freelancers are usually hired through freelance platforms, such as Upwork, Fiverr, and Freelancer, that connect companies with freelance workers who can provide short-term or project-based services.
For finding consultants and individual contractors, companies can reach out to industry contacts or attend networking events to find qualified candidates for short-term or project-based work.
For strategic staffing
You should hire staff augmentation companies that let you hire teams 100% integrated with your in-house ones but will allow you to cut costs and limit liabilities.
If you decide to go this path, here is our list of 5 staff augmentation companies worth your attention:
You can find out more about each of them and how to choose the right one for you in our special article.
For projects that have a set scope
Hire software development companies for custom solutions, or consider investing in a ready solution if applicable.
Remember some steps to follow when looking for a software development company to find the best safe contractor that meets your needs.
When is it time to quit quiet hiring?
Quiet hiring is a trend we see at the beginning of 2023 due to hiring freezes in the tech industry and a series of massive layoffs in tech. Opinions vary, but many experts think hiring freezes are likely to be a short-term trend that will end by the end of summer 2023.
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