We are the safety, quality and performance engineering testing and consulting company you want working with your team to determine product compliance needs before they become issues. Established in 1988, we assist manufacturers, product developers and designers in obtaining worldwide product approvals and certification.

 

I speak with a lot of lighting manufacturer execs under pressure to do more each year with limited resources. This is true across product development / engineering, marketing, business development, and recruiting for important internal positions. When skills aren't in-house or when internal capabilities get over-whelmed, it is time to decide whether to hire or utilize contracted help.

Here are five simple questions and answers to consider:

  1. Do you need a full-time level of effort? If so, it will likely be more cost effective to add a new full-time employee. If you don't need a full-time level of effort, contracted solutions may be more cost-effective in avoiding the costs of full time employee benefits, overhead, and taxes.
  2. Do you need help with a discreet project that may only take months, rather than years? It's not easy to hire for very short-term projects. Contracting will usually be a better solution, and no employees have to be fired.
  3. Do you need a flexible solution where the level of effort can scale up and down over time, based on changing needs? If so, contracted solutions are usually more flexible and cost-effective, until you need a full-time level of effort.
  4. Does your company have internal expertise in an area, but insufficient bandwidth? This is one of the best situations to use contracted solutions. Your internal subject matter expert can manage the contractor, knowledgeably. This expands the bandwidth of the department and keeps all execution responsibility with your internal expert, while giving them the contracted support to succeed and increase the department's productivity. When someone with no subject matter expertise manages a contractor, the client will often bring so many misconceptions about the subject that they make poor decisions managing the contractor / consultant.
  5. Is the work 'core' or 'not core' to the company? Most tier 2 or 3 lighting manufacturers won't hire an in-house accountant, attorney, printer, recruiter, nor caterer, as employees. Why? Because these functions typically aren't core competency that requires in-house staff. These are very familiar examples of smart outsourcing of functions. Areas that are more gray include: graphic design, PR, software engineer (in the age of IoT lighting), marketing content creation, or utility rebate implementation. In these areas, it's generally better to go with contracted solutions, until you need a full-time level of effort.

Article courtesy by David Shiller.

Having Trouble getting your project across the Finish Line at your  NRTL?

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Client A had been working with a NRTL for 15 months. Staff from the USA and Europe had also visited them at their facility multiple times only to be sent construction letter after construction letter. Once they heard from the engineer that the project was in for final review but nope, only to be sent another construction review letter outlining brand new items that would not be accepted.

With the frustration mounting, they Google “Help with NRTL” and found Product Safety Consulting Inc.!

We reviewed the latest two construction letters, went online and ordered a Certified Wiring Harness and various components, contacted the NRTL and presented the changes and reached agreement, flew to Europe and updated the construction, help modify the NRTL draft report, submitted the revised report, photos and illustrations to NRTL and 7 days later we were scheduling the IPI inspection for this brand new client for this NRTL. Total work time was 15 business days.

Give us a Jingle and let us see if we can help you start, continue or better yet Finish that NRTL project!