Employment can be lost for many reasons – company restructuring, a weak economy, new technology, and a wide host of other causes. Almost everyone has some experience with finding a new job and unless you’re very lucky, that transition can be a hard one. It takes time to update your resume if you haven’t in a while, parse through job boards and other listing sources, submit your application, wait for callbacks, go through rounds of interviews, and call in for follow-ups. Plus, all these things take coordination if you’re applying for multiple positions at once.

Temporary positions through a creative staffing agency are a great solution to this problem. Since we have many different clients, creative staffing agencies are more likely to have positions open already, and if you do well in one temp position then odds are the agency will place you again quickly.

Not only does working temp jobs through an agency save time and effort, but it also allows you to branch out and get new work experience. This is especially important if you’re trying to move into a new line of work or add more varied work experience to your resume and new samples to your portfolio.

One of the worst things you can have in your job history is long gaps of unemployment. When companies are hiring talent, they typically ask what you were up to during that time. If you say you were sitting back on the couch, they’ll be unimpressed. But if you can show them that you were not only working but successfully holding temp jobs at multiple companies, it will give the impression that you’re a versatile worker who can adjust to new conditions.

There are plenty of networking opportunities when you find temp work through a creative staffing agency as well. It will help you get your foot in the door at a company that you may not have been able to get into on your own. Creative staffing agencies have long-standing relationships with their clients. Some of the biggest companies might not even hire traditionally. Many use staffing agencies to fill all of their positions at the temporary level. The company may also be testing out a new position, so if you’re taken on as a temp you’ll have a great argument for why they should use you to fill that role in a permanent position.

Lots of people have a distorted view of how temp positions work and what finding temp jobs through a staffing agency looks like. We’d like to clear the air for anyone who is contemplating working with a creative staffing agency and give a better idea of the various advantages of taking temp positions when you want to get back to work.

What is Temp Work?

For the uninitiated, temp positions are those used to fill a short-term role at a company. That could be because their normal employee is out on leave or parted ways with the company, because a specific project is going to take a bit more work, or because there’s a seasonal or cyclical uptick in the company’s industry. Companies also use temp positions to determine whether there is a need for a role, so they might be looking to hire you on a permanent, full-time basis if the temp placement is successful.

Many people think temp work is only for unskilled, entry-level workers, but that’s not the case. Hiring talent temporarily is frequently used to assess the structure of an existing department and many top companies are looking for creatives with impressive portfolios and new ideas to help them figure out the best way to continue doing business.

How Businesses Use Temp Workers for Hiring Talent

Understanding temp work from the company’s perspective will help you make the most of your temp positions. Using a creative staffing agency benefits companies in many ways, but the most important is to save time. As they say, time is money, and no one knows that better than businesses who have to spend inordinate amounts of it on creating job ads, slogging through a pile of applications, and conducting several rounds of interviews.

What does this mean for the temp worker? Well, it’s clear a company that hires a creative temp worker is looking for someone who can hit the ground running, who already has the skills and experience to accomplish the assignment. They also want to see someone who cares about what they’re doing. Even if they only need the position filled for a few weeks, they don’t want someone who will just phone it in for the duration of the temporary position.

6 of the Best Advantages of Temp Work

• Flexibility

You may not always want to have a full-time job. Perhaps you have projects on the side that you’d like to be able to complete or you only have seasonal or infrequent availability. Long-term employment isn’t for everybody and temp work is the best alternative.

The added flexibility isn’t just about your work schedule and desire, though. Getting placed through an agency makes you less likely to have to suffer the ebb and flow of a particular business. If they can’t afford or don’t want to keep the temp position open any longer after it’s completed, then you can simply move on to your next assignment with the creative staffing agency.

• Variety
  

If you just want to see what’s out there and get an idea of how different companies tackle their creative work, then temping is a great option. Companies use a wide variety of strategies when it comes to creative work and you can see more varied approaches firsthand if you temp at different places.

For many creatives, new assignments and different roles will keep work exciting and interesting. Rather than learning how to do one position at one company, temping allows you to become well-rounded creative in your field. This is especially helpful if you’re just starting out or if you’re thinking about taking your profession in a different direction. At icreatives, we have many different options to choose from and a wide variety of clients where you can get a complete taste of the industry.

• Experience
  

Filling time between employment with temp jobs is better for your resume and better for your professional knowledge. Applying for jobs is its own area of expertise but it’s better to build up the skills you need to do the creative work you’re passionate about. Since companies might be using temp positions to figure out a new role in the company, you could well be helping to create that role. That’s one of the best ways to build quick-thinking, decision-making, and professionally imaginative skills.

Not only could you demonstrate yourself to be the ideal candidate for the permanent position if you’re the temp in the trial phase, but you could also treat it as a project. If you aren’t necessarily interested in the permanent position, you can still use it as an example of a successful job in future job interviews. Hiring managers will love to hear that you have thought about your role in a wider scope before.

If you join the team at icreatives, you can even take advantage of our educational tools, which are free to all of our creative talent.

• Networking
  

When you work a temp job, you’re frequently in the building alongside the permanent staff. That means you’ll have the chance to meet fellow creatives, managers, and others who make the business run smoothly. That can be great for references or job opportunities in the future. You never know when someone you met through a temp job will have a professional opportunity in the future, and if they’ve seen you do well in a position before then they’re much more likely to reach out to you in the future.

Now, you might be thinking that networking is only a benefit if you’re temping in an office. However, if there’s one thing we’ve learned since the coronavirus outbreak, it’s that even when you do remote work, you’re still networking. Even if it’s through messaging systems like email or Slack, Zoom meetings and phone calls, or shared documents in the cloud, you’re still making an impression on the people you work with even if you’re doing remote work from home. You can use social networks like LinkedIn to make the most of these new networking connections.

• Agility
  

Certainly one of the most appealing reasons to work with a creative staffing agency is because they can get you back to work quickly. Whether you just want to keep making a salary and building your work experience while you continue a search for a full-time job or you just want to get back to work as quickly as possible, creative staffing agencies have many open positions for you to fill, depending on your area of expertise.

Working with a temp agency will also allow you to take your time on your job search if you’re still searching for a full-time position on the side. Too frequently, people are forced into a role that’s less than ideal because they need something to pay the bills. If you temp, you can take advantage of all the benefits we’ve already mentioned and have time to properly scope out job openings in your field. Of course, you could also be placed in a temp-to-perm position and wind up with full-time employment from your temp job.

• Simplicity
  

In a traditional job search, you have to submit a new application for each position you find and follow the process on each one. That can often lead to a huge influx of emails, phone calls, and scheduled interviews. Working with a creative staffing agency is much easier on creatives because we only require one application. Once you’ve joined our team, we place you with clients depending on their needs, which means you can get the variety and experience of several jobs without having to submit applications over and over again.

It’s also much easier to know what you have to look forward to. There’s a mutual interest between the creative staffing agency and the talent to make sure the talent is never left without a job to fill. The goal at icreatives is to always have our creatives placed with our clients in positions where they will excel.

Temp Jobs & Remote Work

It’s rarely the case, but some companies have remote work positions available. Naturally, this will depend mostly on the nature of the work that you do, but companies have been creating remote work positions since the COVID-19 outbreak.

Companies that do have options for remote work from home may want you to come to an office once a week or more for meetings with coworkers or to make sure you’re fulfilling your job duties properly. They may also reserve more complicated duties for full-time employees, especially if the job involves remote work. It’s only natural that they would have more trust built-up with someone who has been a full-time employee for years than with someone doing remote work from home to fill a temporary role.

Remote work from home jobs are still a great way to build your skillset. It might take some getting used to, but in today’s gig economy many businesses are creating these types of jobs. Plus, if they’re using temporary positions to fill a sudden urgent need for creative talent, they may not have the physical space available in their offices, in which case remote work from home may be the only option.

Long-Term Temp Work

When hiring talent, many companies are responding to an immediate need. That’s one of the reasons our clients look to icreatives, to find creative talent right when they need it and avoid a drawn-out hiring process. Occasionally, the client will discover at the end of the agreed temp period that the job is still required and they might extend the contract. You could well be a temp worker but do most of your work with the same company. That’s ideal for building a rapport and hopefully finding a permanent full-time place there. While filling a gap in your work history with temp work looks great on a resume, it will look even better if it’s with the same company.

How to Join the Team at a Creative Staffing Agency

The way staffing agencies go about hiring talent is fairly similar to the hiring process at a big company, but you’ll probably find it more agreeable. Since we have more expertise in the creative field, we have more appreciation for what a creative career and resume look like. Too often, a hiring manager with no personal experience in any creative field will be tasked with hiring talent. That’s just one of the many ways a creative staffing agency is better than hiring traditionally.

Creative staffing agencies all have unique processes for joining the team. At icreatives, we start out by requesting a resume. We also look for a minimum of 3 years of practical experience in your field. We also ask for a portfolio or case study so we have some idea what your work looks like.

The vetting process at icreatives is designed to weed out unsuitable candidates, but if your application passes muster then we’ll schedule a pre-interview so we can discuss everything you’ve submitted. We need to give the client a good idea of the kind of person you are and what kind of creative output you have to make sure we place you in a role that’s beneficial to them and enjoyable for you.

Conclusion:

Although some people have broad misconceptions about temp work, there are many creatives who have already discovered how useful it can be to fill gaps in work history, gain new skills, and make new professional connections. It’s the fastest way to get back to work because the best creative staffing agencies have plenty of positions to fill at any given time.

It doesn’t matter if you’ve had a long absence from the workforce or you’ve recently been laid off. If you want to get back to work, temp jobs are a great way to do it. Just like businesses use temps to test out new positions, creatives can also use temp jobs to test-taking their careers in a new direction. We try to make the application process as simple as possible at icreatives.

If you think you have what it takes, apply to join the team at icreatives and find work with some of the best design studios, ad agencies, and Fortune 500 companies.