RELX Group's High-Value External Workforce Program

RELX Group is a world-leading provider of information About this case study

solutions for professional RELX has steadily grown its customers that operates in four external workforce program and market segments: scientific, today manages more than $100 million in U.S. and U.K. contingent technical and medical, risk and business information, legal, and labor and independent contractor exhibitions. RELX manages the acquisition of its non-employee spend through SAP Fieldglass. labor through a program called REflex (Reed Elsevier Flexible The program is driven by a focus on visibility, risk mitigation and Labour Exchange), using SAP Fieldglass as its Vendor Management cost savings. System (VMS). Since 2006 RELX’s Global Procurement Organization has steadily grown REflex across the U.S. to manage its external labor and independent contractors, and in 2011, the company expanded the program to the U.K. Today the program About SAP Fieldglass accounts for more than $100 million in annual labor spend. SAP Fieldglass, a longstanding leader in external talent management and RELX realized that it was utilizing a significant external workforce services procurement, is used by with very little consolidation, sourcing involvement or spend organizations around the world to find, engage and manage all types of flexible management. It was also doing so resources. Our cloud-based, open within the framework of a decentralized platform has been deployed in corporate organization, with multiple more than 180 countries and helps companies transform how work gets divisions and business units operating done, increase operational agility and autonomously. Before implementing accelerate business outcomes in a solution, the company identified the digital economy. Backed by the resources of SAP, our customers several challenges it hoped to address, benefit from a roadmap driven by a including: continuous investment in innovation.

• Poor visibility into its flexible worker base and a lack of data to evaluate its effectiveness • Inconsistent processes for supplier vetting and engagement • Paying a premium for resources

Visibility

First and foremost, RELX envisioned the program as a means to capture total workforce data through the SAP Fieldglass VMS. Doing so would provide the business with insight into resource allocation and budget numbers, and help it to subsequently plan for future needs. In the U.K., external workforce visibility with a focus on tenure was also increasingly important in light of the October 2011 Agency Worker Regulations.

Compliance and risk mitigation

Creating the REflex program would provide a standard and repeatable process that would greatly reduce the risk of non-compliance. Demonstrating this benefit would be an important part of the business case for growing the program globally and expanding to additional areas of labor spend.

Cost savings

Because of the size of RELX’s flexible workforce, cost containment was a top program driver. Beyond traditional rate reduction, the company looked to drive future savings through efficiency, consolidation and expansion.

RELX evaluated a variety of management tools and suppliers when designing its program. Today it utilizes three best-of-breed providers to assist the company in the management and operation of REflex. In addition to partnering with SAP Fieldglass, RELX chose to engage with Allegis Group Services as its Managed Service Provider (MSP) and MBO Partners for independent contractor engagement.

By leveraging the expertise of its providers, RELX has been able to reach many of its initial goals to establish a strategic, high-performing program. While each organization has its own unique workforce challenges, the attributes below make up a high-value program and illustrate what RELX has been able to achieve with REflex:

Centralized, Competitive bidding Automated processes Risk mitigation standardized labor to drive costs to for improved speed to ensured by management to drive market rates resource productivity repeatable processes visibility and control and partner expertise

Learn more

The world of work is changing, and SAP Fieldglass is leading the way with innovative solutions that harness the power of the external workforce in driving the digital economy. Explore additional resources on www.fieldglass.com/resources to learn more about the external workforce and the way work gets done.

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