Should I Hire Temporary or Permanent Staff?
When you’re hiring for business support roles, it’s not always easy to decide whether to bring in temporary or permanent staff.
When debating the choice of temporary or permanent staff, each route has its strengths. The right choice depends on your timelines, the role’s responsibilities, your existing team capacity, and how critical the position is to your long-term plans.
Below, we’ve outlined when temporary hiring works well, where it might fall short, and when permanent is the smarter route.
When temporary staff can be the right solution
Temporary workers are incredibly useful in the right context. Here are some examples of where they really shine:
- Maternity or fixed-term cover
If you know a team member will be away for a defined period due to maternity leave, sabbatical, or long-term sickness, temporary staff are the natural fit. You can match the role’s requirements to a short-term contract and maintain business continuity without long-term commitment.
- Bridging the gap during recruitment
Hiring the right permanent person can take time. In the meantime, workloads build and teams can become stretched. Bringing in temporary support during that window can take the pressure off. Temps are particularly effective at handling the lower-level admin tasks that eat up time, allowing permanent staff to focus on higher-value work.
- Seasonal or Project-based work
Businesses with predictable busy periods such as finance teams at year-end, or customer service teams over peak seasons, benefit hugely from short-term hires. Similarly, if you have a one-off project with tight deadlines, temporary staff can offer quick support without adding long-term costs.
The advantages of hiring temporarily
Speed and efficiency
Temp hiring processes are often faster, focusing on availability and capability rather than long-term alignment.
Flexibility
Temporary contracts allow you to scale your team up or down as needed. You’re not tied into a long-term arrangement if business needs change.
Focussed support
Temps are ideal for stepping into clearly defined roles. They often work best supporting the team with routine or foundational tasks, freeing up your permanent staff to handle more strategic or specialised responsibilities.
But there are limits to temporary hiring
One important consideration is the size and scope of the temporary talent pool.
When hiring temporary staff, you’re limited to candidates who are immediately available and that excludes a large portion of the workforce who are in permanent roles and unlikely to leave them for short-term contracts.
This becomes especially relevant when:
- You need a very specific or specialist skill set
- You’re filling a key position with long-term responsibilities
- You want someone who will grow with the team or business
If that’s the case, going straight to permanent gives you access to a much broader talent pool.
When permanent hiring is the better choice
If you have a permanent role available, it makes sense to hire permanently from the start, rather than going down the “temp-to-perm” route.
Recruiting for a temporary contract when the real need is permanent can seriously limit your access to the best talent. Many highly skilled, experienced professionals who are settled in permanent roles won’t leave for a temporary position.
By advertising a role as permanent, you open the door to a much larger candidate pool, giving you a better chance of finding someone who genuinely fits the role, the team, and the business long term.
While temporary staff are excellent for short-term support, if your need is ongoing, it’s far more effective to recruit permanently and invest in the right person from the beginning.
Final Thoughts
Both temporary and permanent hires have their place in a well-balanced hiring strategy.
- Temporary recruitment offers flexibility, speed, and great support during periods of change or increased demand.
- Permanent recruitment gives you access to a wider talent pool and is better suited to specialised or strategic roles with long-term importance
The key is knowing what you need most: immediate help and flexibility, or long-term value and growth potential.
At Synergy Recruitment we can help you with both permanent and temporary recruitment for your Business Support, Accounts, HR & Marketing roles, so get in touch if you need any support!
