With unemployment staying consistently lower, employment agencies are facing challenges finding workers

Whether searching for a job or looking to fill positions, the job market is not what it used to be.

Sifting through multiple online job listings posted on numerous sites, submitting lengthy electronic applications, and crafting resumes and cover letters can be a daunting task for many prospective workers.

Even more, the frustration that can follow when applicants receive the standard response that typically begins with the dreaded “thank you for applying,” or worse yet, never receive any type of reply at all, can take its toll on those struggling to find work.

On the hiring side, the process can be equally challenging for employers. Sorting through applications in search of qualified, skilled workers, who at first glance may appear on paper to best fit a vacant role, can also be a monumental task.

That is where staffing and temporary job agencies come into play by helping both job seekers and those needing to fill vacancies. By providing an array of personnel services, these specialized agencies can serve as a human resources lifeline or the link between candidates and employers.

Often mistaken for one another, both agencies work to place workers within the area job market. However, one subtle difference is that a temp agency focuses on filling positions classified as part-time, seasonal or even temporary work.

Staffing agencies take a more specialized approach to the employment process, with an emphasis on finding the most qualified candidates looking for long-term outcomes who can grow within a company, as well as trying to fill some temporary placements.

According to the American Staffing Association (ASA), Idaho is home to nearly 200 staffing agency offices statewide. One such outfit is Express Employment Professionals, now in its 40th year serving businesses and prospective employees throughout the Treasure Valley.

CEO Doug Haneborg, who oversees the Boise office, as well as two additional company sites located in Caldwell and Fruitland, said the ultimate goal of his agency is to secure the top talent in the marketplace.

“At the end of the day, our goal is to find the best people for whatever kind of opening a client has,” Haneborg said. “And that can be anything from a forklift driver to a doctor or anything in between.”

And no matter the job requirements, types of jobs, or the level of positions to be filled, there are currently more jobs than workers locally, thanks in part to Idaho’s 3.3% unemployment rate. As of February of this year, the Idaho Department of Labor reported the state’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate to be slightly lower, and unchanged from January, than the national jobless average of 3.8%. Overall, more than 969,000 Idahoans make up the state’s workforce.

For Haneborg, it’s a daily hustle to place workers and to keep his firm’s numbers moving up, which he said are already nearly 5% higher than last year, or what he deemed a record year in 2023.

“The hardest part is the low unemployment rate in Idaho,” he said. “That’s been the biggest challenge, finding enough workers.”

Conversely, job placement figures recently released by the ASA indicate staffing employment nationwide decreased every quarter in 2023. During that entire calendar year, staffing companies hired or placed roughly 12.7 million workers, a 12.5% drop from 2022, when employment agencies helped place 14.6 million new workers.

The report also indicates that annual sales for temporary and contract staffing, which registered at about $142.4 billion in 2023, also declined by about 10.5%. Nationally, sales figures the previous year reached $159.1 billion for contract and temporary staffing positions.

While some agencies focus on placing temporary workers, Gem State Staffing, with offices in Boise, Nampa, Caldwell and a new office in Payette, provides service for both long-term and temporary job seekers. District Manager Jeremiah Hollingsworth said the skilled labor market is the most difficult in which to find qualified workers.

“Right now the hardest positions to fill are in the construction industry or with concrete workers,” Hollingsworth said. “But we’re also doing well with all entry level work, such as seasonal and landscaping.”

Just as his counterpart Hollingsworth noted, Haneborg said finding workers who can skillfully handle a trade position remains a top concern for filling such vacancies in the Boise labor market.

“For us, the challenge has been finding welders, electricians, forklift operators and machinists,” he said. “It’s difficult finding those qualified skill sets.”

Another commonality shared by those whose job it is to fill jobs was the impact of COVID on the entire area workforce. Like a COVID test, results varied from agency to agency.

Volt Workforce Solutions, once a longtime and highly recognizable staffing agency within the Boise market, closed its doors locally last August. Roberto Diaz, an area delivery manager for Volt who is based out of San Diego, said the COVID crisis led to a lot of positions becoming remote throughout the Treasure Valley, a shift which did not fit well with his group’s operations.

According to Diaz, remote work impacted Volt’s ability to remain competitive in the market, which played a big  factor in the agency’s decision to shutter its Boise location.

“Our company is considered a staffing agency, one that does direct placement, contingent staffing and project-based on-site programs for larger customers carrying more than 100 employees,” he said.

The pandemic, he added, created a lot of changes on each side of the job market equation, for both employers with job opportunities and those seeking employment.

“It pushed us into an era where technology became the main driver,” Diaz said. “For those trying to find work, if you were not able to adapt to technology, then you probably were not going to be a good fit for the company.”

For Hollingsworth, who has spent nearly two decades working in the staffing sector of the Boise market, he believes the industry has recovered quite well since the pandemic.

“In some ways, it has helped a lot of industries to benefit their employees, whether that be increased communication skills through electronic means,” he said. “Companies in many ways became more available, so to speak, to both their employee base and the applicant base.”

Nationally, Express Employment Professionals operates almost 900 offices across all 50 states. Here in the Treasure Valley, the pandemic, Haneborg said, felt “strange at first” because most agencies took what he called “a big dip initially,” though it didn’t last long.

Plus, with the market moving to a larger remote workforce brought about by the pandemic, Haneborg said his company did not experience the impact other staffing outfits may have endured.

“During the first three to four months, the situation especially affected non-essential businesses,” he said. “But our particular company really benefited from the medical needs of the local workforce community.”

In fact, the pandemic created an unexpected category of workers needed to help the public deal with the global health issue.

“Clinics and hospitals were looking for contract workers,” he said. “With all the restrictions and regulations regarding masks and temperature checks, these facilities needed short-term workers.”

With social distancing and masks now a thing of the past, Hollingsworth said his company still relies on the old-school approach of meeting prospective workers face-to-face, no matter how much technology evolves.

“We’ll shake your hand, look you straight in the eye. We want to know who we are doing business with,” he said. “And it helps with retention, for both our employees and our customers.”

And while other agencies may have made adjustments to spend more time vetting job seekers electronically through Zoom meetings and TEAMS sessions since the COVID saga, Hollingsworth said his firm will remain firm when it comes to taking the time to personally meet candidates.

“We have people come see us and we do actual interviews,” he said. “We don’t hire off paper.  We like to hire off the person sitting in front of us.”

In the end, and no matter the method, staffing and temporary employment agencies play a vital role when it comes to getting people back on the job and working in Idaho. Diaz said he compares what his staff does to serving as the recruiting arm for numerous HR departments.

“Recruiting, screening, interviewing, background checks, we do it all,” he said. “The average cost to place a worker is about $3,800.”

All in all, getting someone hired is a time consuming process Haneborg said.

“We have a very thorough process and it takes about 36 hours of invested time to screen and hire one person,” he said. “Employers want to know what they’re getting on the front end.”

Or, as Hollingsworth said, it’s a lot like shopping for a new vehicle.

“If you could drive a car for three months before buying it and making it your own, you’d feel a lot more comfortable making the purchase,” he said.