In the role of talent acquisition manager, strategic partnerships, at BASF, Allen Chilson leads the company’s MSP program with KellyOCG, its RPO program with Randstad and a screening assessment program with PSI Services. The BASF program has a strong focus on industrial workers — which comprise nearly 50% of its workforce — as well as laboratory roles and engineers across the US. Prior to the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, the program had grown by more than 15% since Chilson joined BASF in 2017. 

Recently, Chilson rebranded BASF’s contingent workforce program internally as STAR (Strategic Talent / Alternative Resourcing), as part of adding enhanced services to the MSP – including freelancer management services and direct sourcing (BASF Private Talent Communities of Contingent Workers). “I felt the rebranding was essential to showing our managers and leaders that we were bringing innovations to the program to enable BASF to have access to the pools of talent that are choosing alternative methods of finding work,” Chilson says.

Although a large portion of BASF’s contingent workforce is involved with production activities that require them to be on-site, Chilson notes the company has been progressive in allowing workers to be virtual when necessary, and the IS/IT teams were able to mobilize their resources and adapt their processes to support the increase in remote/virtual work during Covid-19.

Looking forward, Chilson expects continued growth in the program, aiming to identify unmet needs and work with strategic partners to create sustainable and cost-effective solutions.