Workforce solutions company Kelly Services will focus more on high-end talent supply management in India.

“We have stopped being a payroll provider as low-end business is not profitable for us,” said Mr Dhirendra Shantilal, Senior Vice-President, Asia Pac, Kelly Services.

Temp (contract) staffing companies in India providing talent across the spectrum have anywhere between 20,000 and 100,000 people on their rolls. TeamLease, Manpower, Adecco and Ma Foi are some well-known players in the five lakh plus staffing industry in India.

Kelly Services has been in India for over a decade and currently has 7,000 people on its rolls. It has now decided to narrow its services to recruitment, technical and professional outsourcing, recruitment process outsourcing and executive search.

The company is upbeat about its professional outsourcing services where mid-level temporary staff in auto, engineering, pharma R&D and FMCG is provided to global companies. The rationale is that even during a downturn, companies continue to hire mid-managers, scientists and technical professionals, Mr Shantilal said.

Being a global talent supply chain management company, Kelly Services has a database of more than 6,000 scientists in the US ready to work on a project basis anywhere in the world. “We have similar databases for free agents in other sectors like auto and engineering,” says Mr Shantilal.

Kelly Services has also started vertical-based talent search for functions such as HR, legal and finance.

>anjali@thehindu.co.in