McKinsey research shows roughly 90% of business leaders expect meaningful workforce changes over the next three to five years, yet fewer than half feel prepared with workforce planning strategies to manage that volatility. This gap forces talent acquisition leaders to answer a critical question: how do you build recruiting capacity that flexes with demand without locking in fixed costs? Predictable hiring cycles have been replaced by stop-start volatility, making traditional staffing models increasingly inadequate.
Speaking to Lamees Abourahma, host of the RPOA's Talent Leader Council, an interview series featuring insights from top talent acquisition executives, Ted Pierni, head of delivery at Robertson and Company, discussed how recruitment process outsourcing (RPO) transforms recruiting partnerships from transactional to strategic. His analysis revealed something unexpected: the most successful RPO partnerships focus less on filling requisitions and more on redesigning the entire talent operating system. Below appears an edited version of the conversation.
Key Takeaways for Talent Acquisition Leaders
- Volatile hiring cycles expose fixed capacity limits: Organizations need flexible recruiting capacity that scales with demand without the 30 to 90 day lag and fixed costs of corporate recruiters.
- Strategic RPO partnerships move beyond time-to-fill: Leading RPO relationships measure success through quality of hire, retention and candidate net promoter score (NPS), with quarterly business reviews focused on continuous improvement.
- Transformation requires stakeholder-specific value delivery: Effective RPO partners address distinct priorities across CHROs, CFOs, legal and IT, and hiring managers.
The Shift from Predictable Hiring to Stop-Start Volatility
The global RPO market grew from mid-single digits to roughly eight billion USD by 2022, with mid-teens annual growth forecast through 2030. This expansion validates that organizations increasingly need strategic partners who can absorb volatility.
What are the biggest challenges companies face today when it comes to recruiting and workforce planning?
Pierni: The biggest challenge centers on the volatility of demand and stop-start hiring cycles. Markets either accelerate forward or freeze completely, making workforce planning extremely difficult. Organizations struggle to maintain the right recruiters during hiring surges, then face excess capacity when markets freeze.
Hiring has fundamentally shifted from past titles to capability and transferable skills. This skills-first approach requires different assessment frameworks and changes how recruiters evaluate candidates.
How has AI changed recruiting beyond just efficiency gains?
Pierni: The rise of candidate fraud represents an entirely new screening challenge. During the RPOA conference, there was a discussion about company AI agents talking to candidate AI agents, and where it becomes unclear if real people are involved. Recruiters must now validate that candidates are legitimate people and not AI-generated profiles.
Candidates simultaneously want more transparency, faster responses and human connection at scale. While AI enables automation, it raises critical questions about governance and fairness. The focus shifts to how you manage tools to ensure recruiting processes remain human-centered and bias-free.
Why Traditional Recruiting Models Break Under Volatile Demand
Deloitte research indicates that while over two-thirds of organizations have invested in modern talent technologies, only a minority report high adoption in day-to-day workflows. This gap exposes a deeper problem: technology alone cannot solve building elastic talent acquisition capacity.
How do you define RPO today and how does it differ from staffing firms and internal recruiting?
Pierni: I would define RPO as a managed talent operating system. It centers on embedded teams, technology, process and analytics all combined to deliver specific outcomes rather than simply filling positions. RPO scope can range from end to end covering workforce planning through onboarding, or be modular delivering specific talent acquisition pieces.
The key differentiation from staffing firms lies in accountability. Staffing firms work transactionally and can choose whether to work on a requisition. In RPO, we must deliver on every requisition regardless of challenge level. RPO differs from internal recruiting through built-in flexibility, specialized technology and continuous improvement methodologies.
Building Flexible TA Infrastructure Without Fixed Costs
Recent RPO buyer trend reports show TA leaders now prioritize quality of hire, retention and hiring manager satisfaction over traditional metrics like time-to-fill. This shift reflects recognition that elastic talent acquisition capacity requires an operating system that maintains strategic focus during both surges and freezes.
How is RPO evolving from a transactional role into a transformative role?
Pierni: This evolution centers on moving from transactional execution to strategic partnership. Measurement extends beyond time to fill—metrics evolve to quality of hire, retention, internal mobility and candidate NPS. Talent intelligence becomes central through demand forecasting, skills classification and market intelligence.
Process modernization drives continuous improvement. Clients expect us to redesign processes rather than maintain the status quo. Recruiter upskilling proves essential; we change mindset from order-taking to consultative partnership. This transforms intake conversations to provide market intelligence and strategic guidance on positioning.
What does a transformative RPO relationship look like in practice?
Pierni: We implemented formal transformation initiatives at financial services and property management organizations. We brought in Six Sigma professionals who helped us completely redesign recruitment processes through three-day events with approximately 40 people including hiring managers, business leaders, HR professionals and coordinators. We mapped everything on whiteboards—three full walls representing every step and touchpoint.
We divided into groups analyzing process sections. Each group identified inefficiencies and evaluated impact on efficiency and experience. The outcomes delivered measurable transformation as we redesigned workflows. We conducted three or four events with larger clients, and they were thrilled with the strategic value.
"In RPO, we lack that luxury—we must deliver on every requisition regardless of challenge level. RPO also differs from internal recruiting through built-in flexibility, bringing specialized technology, advanced analytics and continuous improvement methodologies." Ted Pierni, Robertson and Company
How did you maintain momentum and ensure these transformations stuck?
Pierni: The transformation events emerged from our quarterly business reviews. Every quarter we sat with client executives and discussed not just metrics but gaps in recruitment delivery. We spent perhaps five minutes reviewing dashboards and the remaining 55 minutes focused on what we planned to accomplish in the next 90 days.
We maintained constant communication beyond quarterly reviews—daily, often multiple times per day. We implemented dashboards with green-yellow-red indicators tracking service level agreements. Every time an issue emerged, we flagged it immediately through formal escalation processes. This ensured we tracked patterns, addressed root causes and continuously refined our delivery model.
Strategic Workforce Planning With RPO Partners
Global talent surveys find that most companies experiment with skills-based hiring and internal talent marketplaces, but few have scaled these beyond pilots. This gap reveals why transforming to strategic recruiting requires partners who can navigate people, process and technology changes simultaneously.
Why do different stakeholders care about RPO partnerships?
Pierni: Understanding who stakeholders are and what matters to each proves critical to partnership success. TA leaders and CHROs focus on workforce readiness, retention and mobility. CFOs think about productivity, time to value and cost management.
Legal, compliance and IT stakeholders care intensely about data protection. They evaluate AI governance frameworks and data security protocols. Hiring managers want better shortlists and reduced interview burden. Candidates want clarity, speed and human connection—in financial services, we recognize candidates can become future clients, so candidate experience impacts brand perception.
What Talent Leaders Should Consider When Pursuing Strategic RPO Partnerships
SHRM research shows that most large employers now use AI or automation in recruiting, yet many lack formal governance frameworks to address bias and ensure transparency. This gap makes selecting RPO partners based on their AI operating discipline as important as evaluating their technology stack.
What advice do you have for organizations looking to implement transformative recruiting models?
Pierni: Start with business objectives in mind. Define the outcomes you want, retention improvements, internal mobility or quality of hire, and design the process backwards. Build skills-first recruiting capabilities including skills classification and assessment methodologies. Establish AI governance through frameworks for risk assessment and bias monitoring.
Run quarterly business reviews focused on strategic planning rather than reporting. These reviews should spend minimal time on metrics and maximum time on your improvement roadmap. Invest in recruiter upskilling, especially on data literacy and emotional intelligence. We trained recruiters extensively on self-awareness because they work with people and need strong capabilities to partner effectively.
Organizations pursuing strategic RPO partnerships face a fundamental choice about how they build recruiting capacity for an unpredictable future. Traditional models struggle to deliver both the flexibility and strategic depth that volatile markets demand. Strategic RPO partnerships offer a different path: managed talent operating systems that embed specialized teams, modern technology and continuous improvement methodologies while maintaining the flexibility to scale with demand. The most successful partnerships measure impact through quality, retention and stakeholder experience rather than speed alone.
For more insights from other Talent Leader Council contributors, check out our TA Leader Council on the RPO Voice blog, which features interviews with top talent acquisition experts.
