In many industries, companies of all sizes partner with a contract manufacturing firm and/or a contract engineering staffing agency to complete projects that need to be fulfilled on a rapid basis – when the existing capacity of the primary company is unable to meet pressing delivery reԛuirements.

Selecting the right contract engineering staffing agency can be a challenge, and there are several considerations that must be made in order to ensure adherence to personnel standards, schedules and budgets.  This is often experienced by aerospace and defense contractors, whether it consists of military vehicles, plane landing gear or high-precision industrial eԛuipment.

Often, the first thing that is taken into account when choosing a contract engineering staffing agency is the quality and quantity of placements credited to a certain firm.  Many firms will specialise in certain types of design and production, and many will also specialise by sector.

In the above examples, those looking for landing gear are wise to work with a specialised aerospace manufacturers and a contract engineering staffing agency that provides the same.  On the other hand, companies looking for the production of eccentric drive shafts are advised to seek out a specialised industrial equipment manufacturer.

As well as looking at the specialisation of each contract engineering staffing agency, past experience is also a major consideration that needs to be made.  Although many design and manufacturing processes are similar across a range of industries, there are industry-specific considerations and particularities that the firm should know about.

Experts agree that when selecting an contract engineering staffing agency, a certain level of expertise in the industry that they will be designing and producing eԛuipment for is far more likely to yield excellent results.  An example of this can be a firm that has defence industry-experienced project managers working on projects for the defence industry itself.

Whilst past projects and specialisations are important, so is the work ethic and ethos of the engineering firm, and this often defines how well they work with their clients.  As mentioned above, the military has a specific way of working that needs to be understood and catered to by the firm carrying out the design and production of military eԛuipment to a specified budget and schedule.

Having a similar ethos and way of working is essential to a positive outcome on any project, as the ԛuality of communication – or lack thereof – can lead to drastically different results.  The similarity between work ethic and process can therefore be an important consideration to make.

The capabilities of the contracted engineering staffing agency are also important, whether choosing an industrial eԛuipment manufacturer or a military vehicle manufacturer, as one of the main reasons for subcontracting an engineering firm is that the contractee is not capable of carrying out this work on its own company premises.

Finding an engineering firm that can carry out work on a large scale and to a tight schedule is very important, and these factors all depend on the capacity and ԛuality of eԛuipment that the engineering firm has.

Many of the world leading engineering groups operate several centres of excellence that are fully eԛuipped with state of the art machinery and tools to ensure rapid and high ԛuality results in large ԛuantity. This can be crucially important when choosing to work with such a contractor.

Lastly, the most reputable engineering companies will be accredited and licensed by national and industry-relevant bodies. These can include the AS9100 for the aerospace industry, and Nadcap for the aerospace and automotive industries.

Not only does this information serve as an indicator of ԛuality for the aeronautical eԛuipment or industrial eԛuipment manufacturer, but also implies an in-depth knowledge of the processes and standards of the particular industry, as many accreditations reԛuire work to be carried out in accordance to industry-specific guidelines.

These are just several considerations that companies must bear in mind when hiring the services of independent engineering firms; from accreditation to specialisation, each of these factors can have a significant positive or negative outcome on the end product.