There are some new kids on the staffing block: Elance, oDesk, and dozens of others. If you haven’t been paying attention to online staffing, you’d better start. The numbers show that Elance had more than 650,000 job postings in 2011 and had cumulative revenue of $500 million since it started. Its competitor, oDesk, had more than a million job postings in 2011 and its contractors earned more than $25 million through it in February 2012 alone (annualized, that would be $300 million). There are other sites like Guru, Vworker and Freelancer.com that are in a similar vein.

But preliminary findings from our recent buyer survey show that online staffing is just barely penetrating the contingent market. Imagine a world where you can get the worker of your choice via a website with minimal effort, no obligation and zero legal hassle (most online staffing companies handle the compliance issues, 1099s, year-end tax reporting, etc.). No more grappling with high mark-ups, onboarding hassles, corporate culture misfits, supplier mismanagement, etc. Wouldn’t that make your life easier? That is what online staffing in bringing to the table.

Read the article at: http://www.staffingindustry.com/Research-Publications/Blogs/Subadhra-Sriram-s-Blog/Embrace-Online-Staffing-or-Be-Flattened