by Veronica Blatt
NPAworldwide will celebrate its 70th anniversary in a couple of years, and I never get tired of telling the story of how we were founded. In the early parts of the 20th century, many parts of the United States were still rural with a heavy emphasis on agriculture. People who lived in cities used local employment agencies to connect with potential employers. Relocation for a job was fairly rare. And then came World War II which meant that huge portions of potential employees were instead diverted to military service. Women, for the first time, entered the labor force in large numbers to fill the need for employees, especially in the factories that created munitions and other defense-related products.
This all helped lead to the development of Silicon Valley as a tech hub in the United States due to the strong military presence and other factors. But remember, people were still not relocating for work in large numbers. After the war, many employees returned, but the shift away from an agriculture-based economy to a manufacturing-based economy was well underway, and that meant companies in emerging areas like Silicon Valley needed people to move to those areas. This was also when franchised staffing agencies were founded – which gave them a way to move people around via the franchise network. As you can imagine, independent employment agencies and recruitment firms were negatively impacted by this new competition because the independents did not have easy ways to connect with far-away potential employees and relocate them.
And that’s when the seeds of an idea that eventually became NPAworldwide were planted. At a meeting of the trade association that is now NAPS (National Association of Personnel Services), a handful of independent recruitment firm owners met to discuss the competition from the franchises and how to address it. A couple of forward-looking visionaries thought they could pool their resources to share job opportunities and candidate resumes without buying a franchise or otherwise giving up their autonomy, and we were founded shortly after that organizational meeting, in 1956. The earliest members decided how to share candidate and job details, how to share the fees, and other founding principles and guidelines. Our member-owners continue to be independently owned recruitment firms, primarily small to medium-sized.
We have expanded to a global membership base with locations in 40+ countries. Volunteer leaders traveled worldwide to introduce the concept of split placements in markets where cooperation between competing firms is unheard of. Successful members shared how split placements led to increased business opportunities, broader geographic fees, additional revenue, and more. Personal relationships based on trust, mutual respect, and similar business philosophies lead to successful split placements and the vibrant, multinational organization that is now in its eighth decade.
