Kelly Services, Inc.

Good morning and welcome to Kelly Services second quarter earnings conference call. All parties will be on the listen only mode until question and answer portion of the presentation. Today's call is being recorded at the request of Kelly Services. If anyone has any objections, you may disconnect at this time. A second quarter webcast presentation is also available on Kelly's website for this morning's call. I would now like to turn the meeting over to your host, Mr. Peter Quigley, President and CEO. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Art. Hello, everyone, and welcome to Kelly Services' second quarter conference call. With me today is Olivier Thiraud, our Chief Financial Officer, who will walk you through our Safe Harbor language, which can be found in our presentation materials. Thank you, Peter, and good morning, everyone.

As a reminder, any comments made during this call, including a Q&A, may include forward-looking statements about our expectations for future performance. Actual results could differ materially from those suggested by our comments. We have no obligation to update the statements made on this call. Please refer to our SEC filings for a description of the risk factors that could influence the company's actual future performance. In addition, during the call, certain data will be discussed and reported and on an adjusted basis. Discussion of items on an adjusted basis are non-GAAP financial measures designed to give insight in certain trends in our operations. References to organic growth in our discussion today exclude the results of our 2022 acquisitions of Rocket Power and Pediatric Therapeutic Services, or PTS. Rocket Power is included in our consolidated results of operations for the full quarter. And PTS, since the May 2nd acquisition date, in Q2, we did pass the April 2021 anniversary of our acquisition of Softworld, and the results of Softworld are included in our organic growth metrics beginning in Q2 2022. Finally, the slide deck that we are using on today's call is available on our website. And now back to you, Peter.

Thanks, Olivier. As our second quarter came to a close, it marked the second anniversary of Kelly's optimized operating model, a design that has proven to be a powerful enabler of our specialty strategy. We created five reporting segments arranged by specialty, each laser-focused on growth and each staffed with market-leading experts who are identifying and executing new opportunities for high-margin growth. We've become more aggressive about redeploying capital to fund these specialty investments over the past two years. Selling our staffing operations in Brazil, monetizing non-core real estate holdings, unwinding our cross-ownership with Persol, and reducing our JV ownership in APAC. and effectively putting that capital to work within our specialty-focused operating model. In SET, we made Kelly's largest-ever acquisition with the purchase of Softworld in the fast-growing technology space. In our education specialty, we acquired Greenwood Asher to expand into executive search. We designed and launched new products in K-12 tutoring, paraeducation, and higher education. and acquired Pediatric Therapeutic Services, PTS, to capture rapid growth in this K-12 adjacency. And in OCG, we launched new and enhanced technology solutions in our fast-growing MSP and RPO practices and acquired Rocket Power to add scale and breadth to our high-margin RPO business. It has been an exceptional two years of focus and strategic execution, all while facing a global pandemic, historic disruptions in the labor market, supply chain shortages, Russia's war in Ukraine, and an extended period of economic uncertainty. And we don't intend to slow down the pace we've set over these past two years. Even after our two most recent acquisitions, we carry no debt and have more than $400 million in available capital to deploy in pursuit of higher margin specialty growth and other critical investments for the future. Turning to our second quarter results, we see further confirmation that our intentional pursuit of specialization is paying off as our mix shifts towards higher margin business. We said we would pursue higher margin specialties to drive profitable growth, and we executed against that strategy in Q2. Despite economic uncertainty caused by inflationary pressures, interest rate hikes, supply chain disruptions, and a more guarded approach to hiring in some industries, demand for Kelly's specialties remains solid. And importantly, we are successfully translating revenue into excellent GP growth. Our overall organic Q2 GP rate was significantly higher than last year, and it is bolstered by our specialty acquisitions. Our GP rate improved in each of our five segments, and organic gross margin dollars also improved in each segment, reflecting the continued positive shift in business mix toward higher margin products and specialties, continuing a positive trend we saw in Q1. In SET, our technology specialty, which includes Softworld, continued to deliver double digit growth in the second quarter. Our education segment delivered strong year-over-year growth, and Greenwood-Asher drove a substantial increase in executive search fees. Our OCG segment, which now includes Rocket Power, delivered robust growth in RPO and continued to deliver impressive growth in our MSP practice. In P&I, notwithstanding decline in revenue, Primarily due to the change in delivery by a large customer that we discussed on our last two calls, P&I continued its gross profit growth trajectory. And in international, EMEA delivered revenue growth and higher permanent placement fees. One final note regarding our international segment. We shared last quarter that we were considering options for Kelly's Russian operations. In July, we completed a transaction to transfer our Russian business to a Russian company. As a result, Kelly is no longer operating in Russia. Olivier will provide additional details regarding the impact of our exit. I'll now turn it over to him for a closer look at the details of Kelly's Q2 results. Thank you, Peter.

For the second quarter of 2022, revenue totaled $1.3 billion. up 0.7% from the prior year, including 200 basis points of unfavorable currency impact. So revenues for the quarter were up 2.7% in constant currency. Included in that increase are 150 basis points favorable impact from our acquisitions of Rocket Power and PTS, as well as 250 basis points unfavorable impact resulting from market changes in Mexico from the Q3 2021 staffing market legislation and revenue declines in Russia. As we look at second quarter revenue by segment, revenue in our professional industrial segment declined 11% year-over-year in the quarter. The segment's outcome-based business continues to be impacted by a contraction in year-over-year demand from our call center specialty. Outcome-based revenue was down 2.7% as growth in our other outcome-based specialties partially offset the decline in call center volume. Revenue from our staffing product declined 14% on lower hours volume, which has been partially offset by higher bill rates, resulting from the upward pressure on wages in the current talent market. About 60% of the staffing revenue decline comes from the shift of a large staffing account to a direct hire model, which Peter mentioned, and which we discussed as part of our outlook in our make-all. And finally, perm fees in P&I were up 45%, as our customers' demand for direct hire services has continued. Moving to the set segment, revenue was up 9%. We have continued to see a strong recovery in demand in telecommunications, demand for outcome-based solutions remained solid, and our technology specialty, which includes soft world, continued with double-digit growth. Set permanent placement fees growth also continued, up 40% year-over-year. In our education segment, year-over-year growth continues to be strong, up 47% on a reported basis. The reported results include the May acquisition of PTS So revenue growth was 40% on an organic basis year over year. Revenue growth trends in our education business reflect the comparable 2021 period that was still impacted by COVID-related disruptions, as well as robust demand and new customer wins in 2022. Steps taken earlier in the year to broaden the supply of talent have continued to pay off, and we are seeing meaningful improvement in our fill rate. Permanent placement fees, primary higher education executive search with Greenwood Asher were up 70% year-over-year. Our OCG segment continued to deliver year-over-year revenue growth, with revenues up 16% on a reported basis. The results of Rocket Power are included in the OCG results beginning in Q2. Organic constant currency growth was 7% in the quarter. In addition to Rocket Power, OCG delivered very strong organic growth in RPO, reflecting customer demand for this product, as well as double-digit growth in our MSP product, partially offset by declines in PPO as a result of some customer exits in early 2022. Revenue in our international segment declined 12% on a nominal currency basis and was down 4% on a constant currency basis. The year-over-year revenue growth trend was negatively impacted by results in Mexico due to the impact of the legislation enacted in Q3 of 2021. Revenue growth in the EMEA region was positive, up 4% in concerned currency. As Peter noted, we have completed a transaction in July that resulted in the sale of our operations in Russia in early Q3. Constant currency revenue growth in the MEA, excluding Russia, was up 9% year-over-year for the quarter. And finally, permanent placement fees in the international segment grew by 13% year-over-year in constant currency. Overall gross profit was up 13.6% on a reported basis of 15.6% in constant currency. Excluding Rocket Power and PTS, GP increased 12.5% on an organic constant currency basis. Our strong gross profit growth was a result of an improving gross profit rate, 20.7 for the quarter, compared to 18.4% in the second quarter of last year, a 230 basis point improvement. Our acquisition strategy continues to contribute to our improving GP rate. The acquisitions of Rocket Power and PTS added 30 basis points in total. In addition, our GP rate has improved 200 basis points organically. Favorable business mix continues to drive GP rate improvement by 80 basis points and was combined with the impact of 50 basis points coming from higher-perm fees, as well as 70 basis points resulting from lower employee-related costs. And when we look across the business units, gross profit rate improved in each segment and organic constant currency gross margin dollars improved in each segment as well, reflecting the continued shift in business mix towards higher margin products and specialties. SGN expenses were up 10.6% year-over-year on the reported basis and 12.3% on the constant currency basis. Expenses for the second quarter of 2022 include the intangible amortization and other operating expenses of Rocket Power and PTS, which added 240 basis points to our year-over-year expense growth rate. So, on an organic consent currency basis, expenses grew 9.9% year-over-year. Consistent with Q1, the majority of the increase in SG&A reflects higher compensation-related expenses for our full-time talents. We have continued to add headcount in line with revenue growth and provided commensurate performance-based incentive conversation for our client-facing teams, as well as smaller adjustments to base pay. These increases reflect the impact of inflationary pressure and the need to attract and retain talent in the current environment. Even with increases in the cost of doing business, we produced additional operating leverage as GP growth exceeded expense growth for the quarter. continuing a trend from prior periods. Also reflected in our earnings from operations in Q2 are a gain on sale of assets of 4.4 million and 18.5 million impairment charge related to our Russian operations, which were held for sale at the end of the quarter. The gain on sale of assets relates relates to underutilized real property and is part of our continued efforts to monetize non-core assets to redeploy towards growth. The impairment chart related to Russia follows our decision to transition our Russian operations. The chart reflects the difference between the carrying value of our Russian subsidiaries and the fair value of such assets. In July, we completed the transaction to transfer our Russian business to a firm in Russia and are no longer operating there. Our reported earnings from operations for the second quarter were 8.2 million, excluding the gain on asset sales, and the impairment charge adjusted earnings from operations were 22.3 million, compared to the 13.7 million earned in Q2 of 2021, up more than 60%, and reflecting an incremental conversion rate of 27%, consistent with Q1 of 2022. Included in our Q2 results are the operating earnings of Rocket Power and PTS of 2 million, inclusive of intangible asset amortization. And just a reminder that we monetize our investment in personal holdings and most of the personal APAC transaction in the first quarter of 2022. So there will be no further P&L impact from those investments, although the comparable prior periods will include gains and losses related to those investments until we anniversary these transactions. Income tax expense for the second quarter was $4.9 million compared with our 2021 income tax benefit of $2.6 million. Our effective tax rate for the quarter was 68.8%. Adjusted for the Russia impairment charge and the gain on sale of assets, our effective tax rate was 17.9%. And finally, reported earnings per share for the second quarter of 2022 was $0.06 per share compared to earnings of $0.60 per share in 2021. The decrease in earnings per share resulted primarily from the impact of the impairment charge related to our assets in Russia, and the 2021 gain on personal shares, all net of tax. Adjusting for those transactions, as well as the gain on sale of assets, Q2 2022 EPS was $0.45 compared to adjusted EPS of $0.49 per share in Q2 2021. Although adjusted pre-tax income is higher in 2022, adjusted the EPS decline on higher 2022 tax expense compared to the same period of 2021. Our 2021 tax benefit was due primarily to the benefit of a tax rate change in the UK. Now moving to the balance sheet as of the end of the second quarter. Our balance sheet reflects five significant transactions so far this year that demonstrate our commitment to monetizing non-core assets and relocating capital to advance our specialty strategy. First in February, we completed the sales the sale of most of our investment in the Persol Kelly APAC John Venture, the sale of our investment in the common shares of Persol Holding, and the repurchase of Class A and B common shares to conclude the cross-shareholding arrangement with Persol. And then we acquired Rocket Power in March and PTS in May. At the end of Q2, cash totaled $134 million compared to $64 million a year ago. we had no debt consistent with debt at nearly zero at the end of the second quarter of 2021. With our $300 million in available capacity on our credit facilities, we continue to have ample capital available to deploy. At the end of Q2, accounts receivable was $1.5 billion, an increase 10% year-over-year, reflecting our year-over-year increase in revenue as well as an increase in DSO. Global DSO was 63 days. an increase of three days over the year in 2021 and the second quarter of 2021. Global DSO increase primary as a result of an increase in the mix of MSP and other customers with extended payment terms and to a lesser extent to the timing of customer payments. Accounts payable and accrued liabilities also increased as a result of an increase in MSP supplier payables partially mitigating the impact of higher DSO on free cash flows. Through the second quarter of 2022, we used $111 million of free cash flow, reflecting increasing investment in working capital. Free cash flow in 2022 also includes the use of approximately $50 million to pay income taxes resulting from the sale of personal holdings common stock, as well as the use of approximately $29 million to repay federal payroll tax balances, which were deferred in 2020 under the CARES Act. And now back to you, Peter.

Thanks for those details, Olivier. We're encouraged by ongoing growth in demand and new customer wins across our segments. We expect each of our specialty business units to deliver strategic contributions to this year's performance. Our P&I segment, notwithstanding the top-line challenges we explained, showed good SG&A discipline and delivered growth in BPO, which contributed to overall GP improvement in the segment. In late Q2, we deployed technology upgrades we've discussed on prior calls, and as with most enterprise technology deployments, we anticipate a near-term dip in productivity followed by improvements later this year and into the future. In our SET segment, we said we wanted to see meaningful returns on our inorganic and organic investments. Our second quarter met that expectation, including nice growth in our telecommunications specialty, and we expect meaningful contributions from SET for the remainder of 2022 and beyond. In education, we committed to capture K-12 growth this year, improve our fill rates, and further expand our adjacencies. We saw improved fill rates across K-12 districts during the second quarter. We won significant new business that will go live in the second half of the year. And our acquisition of PTS creates yet another high-margin, high-demand specialty within the education segment. In OCG, we said we would invest in our fast-growing RPO business, and our first quarter acquisition of Rocket Power began yielding revenue and GP growth in Q2. Our legacy RPO business also delivered healthy organic growth in the second quarter, and some of the sizable MSP wins from 2021 have begun to produce GP in 2022. And in our international segment, we said we expected continued growth in regional and local specialties, and though it couldn't completely offset the negative impact of Mexico's legislative changes, Our EMEA operations continue to deliver top line growth in the second quarter. These growth strategies in our five business segments, together with our aggressive focus and disciplined use of capital, are designed to drive value for Kelly stakeholders in 2022 and beyond. To share more about what we expect from the year ahead, I'll welcome back Olivier. Thank you, Peter.

As we reflect on the second quarter results and look ahead, We expect that even with growing economic uncertainty, there will be a steady demand for our services while we deal with continuing challenges in finding talent to meet that demand. We expect that inflation and the upward pressure on wages at all skill levels will continue, although they are signs of a more gradual pace of wage growth in the second half of the year. And increasing interest rates may put pressure on certain industries as consumers and businesses react to higher rates. Specific to Kelly, there are two unusual events that impact our full year outlook. First is the early Q3 transaction to sell our Russian operations. This will reduce 2022 revenues in our international segment and overall for Kelly by approximately 200 basis points. Second is a change in one of our large customers' labor strategy that we mentioned today and on earlier calls. A large staffing customer decided to address today's talent challenges and work with Kelly differently by changing its heavy use of contingent labor to one that instead will rely on hiring talent directly as full-time employees. Even with a number of large onsite transitions from competition expected in the second half of this year, there will not be enough to fully offset the top-line impact of this change in this one customer's business. In addition, the strengthening of the US dollar against several currencies, including the euro, means that we now expect a more significant negative impact from FX on our reported revenue growth rate. So with those headwinds, we expect revenue to be up 3.5% to 4% on a full-year basis in nominal currencies. Included in that outlook is about 150 base point of inorganic revenue growth from Rocket Power and PTS and favorable 250 basis point impact from the sale of our Russian business and the legislative changes in Mexico, as well as a 150 base point of unfavorable currency impact. So on a constant currency basis, we are moderating our revenue growth outlook for the full year by 100 to 150 basis points based on current conditions. Our outlook assumes no material change in COVID-19 related impacts or significant deterioration in macroeconomic conditions. While we aren't providing quarterly guidance, we expect usually organic revenue growth rate may be slightly lower than our full year expectation driven by the factors we have mentioned, with improving revenue growth rate in the fourth quarter. We expect that our fourth quarter growth rate will benefit from a full quarter of revenue growth from our education segment, as schools will be in session for the entire quarter, as well as a traditional seasonal peak in P&I. We expect our GPA rate to be around 20.7%. a 200 basis point improvement from the 18.7% we reported for 2021 on a full year basis and includes 20 basis points from our recent 2022 acquisitions. This is a 70 basis point of improvement of our GP rate outlook based on our continued structural improvement in GP rate. These expectations reflect sustained growth in our fee-based business, a continued shift in mix to higher margin specialties, and a more gradual pace of growth in our lower margin specialties. Given our revenue and GP rate outlook, we expect that our GP dollar growth for the full year will be 15%. We continue to expect increasing SG&E expenses up 8% to 9% on an adjusted organic basis, reflecting growing inflationary pressure in the current environment, as well as increases in performance-based incentive compensation expenses. To address the need to attract and retain talent, we are focused on a variety of initiatives. Part of the equation is ensuring that we remain competitive on compensation for our full-time talent. In addition, we continue to focus on technology initiatives that enhance the experience of talent we place on assignment. We remain committed to improving productivity across all of our business units and ensuring that the investment in our talent produce the workforce necessary for future growth. We also expect that our two recent acquisitions, Rocket Power and PTS, will add approximately 200 basis points of SG&E expense growth including the impact of intangible amortization expense. As we execute our organic and inorganic strategies, we are utilizing adjusted EBDA and adjusted EBDA margin as additional measures of our progress in delivering profitable growth. Based on our outlook for 2022, we expect adjusted EBDA margin to improve to between 2.4% to 2.6%, a 70 to 90 basis point from the 1.7% adjusted EBDA margin delivered in 2021. And finally, we expect an adjusted effective income tax rate in the low to mid-20s range, which includes the impact of the Work Opportunity Tax Credit, which has been extended through 2025. Our higher expected effective tax rate reflects that the impairment chart related to our Russian assets is largely non-deductible.

Now back to you, Peter. Thanks, Olivier. The first half of 2022 followed a continuing pattern of talent shortages coupled with strong demand for our services and solutions. We signaled that this would be a year of bold progress for Kelly, and we remain undeterred by the now familiar short-term headwinds and economic uncertainty. We are a more nimble, proactive company that is willing and able to adapt quickly to market changes, guided by a seasoned leadership team wholly committed to Kelly's success. We're confident in our well-defined and well-capitalized specialization strategy, which continues to improve our business mix, GP, and net margin, and we continue to benefit from our optimized operating model, which focuses our attention firmly on growth. Our actions have created unprecedented capital to deploy to support that growth, and the effectiveness with which we are putting our capital to work signals a Kelly that will take decisive action to drive shareholder value. We have chosen our specialties wisely. We are pursuing high-margin growth where we know we can win, and we are delivering on that growth from acquisitions and organic investments alike. driving significant improvement in GP while investing in the talent and technology needed to bring Kelly's specialty strategy to life. As we continue to execute our strategy in the second half of the year, Kelly is creating value for all of our stakeholders, talent, clients, suppliers, and shareholders. Art, you can now open the call to questions.

Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please press 1 then 0 on your telephone keypad. You may withdraw your question at any time by repeating the 1, 0 command. If you're using the speakerphone, please pick up the handset before pressing the numbers. Once again, if you have questions, you may press 1, then 0 at this time. And for our first question, we'll go to, one moment, Kartik Mata with North Coast Research. You're open.

Peter, just a question on wage inflation. I know Olivier had talked about maybe the second half you're anticipating a little bit less wage inflation. I'm wondering if you've seen any changes in wage inflation today compared to maybe what it was in the first quarter, even maybe in June or July.

Yeah, good morning, Kartik. I'll let Olivier provide some support, but we're seeing, I would say, a tempering of wage inflation. It's still considerably higher than normal, but it has moderated somewhat from the beginning of the year.

Yeah, when you look at P&I education and set, clearly when you look at our average wage inflation, Q1 moving to Q2, In P&I, we see a deceleration from 12% to 8%. So some start of, you know, moving a little bit lower. But I would say 8% is still quite elevated. For education, we don't see any change. I mean, it is still around 13% to 14%. So no real change. And for SETS or our STEM business, still staying around 8% to 9%. So where we see a little bit of a change is really in P&I. And again, it's a change, but it's more like slowing down than any radical change in trend.

And then just looking at your permanent placement business, in the past when there's been an economic slowdown, how quickly has that business started to deteriorate, or how quickly have companies kind of pulled the desire to hire employees? Just trying to get a sense of how good of an indicator you think that might be.

Yeah, companies usually will begin to pull back on permanent hiring when they have a lack of confidence in the future. Notwithstanding the sort of unique situation of the inflationary pressures that we see and rising interest rates, we still consider see strong permanent placements across our businesses. So we haven't begun to see the fall-off in that area of our business that would indicate a lack of business confidence.

Yeah, and of course, you know, in Q2, when you look at versus last year, our fee business is up 38%. We're up 68% or almost 69% in Q1. but you need to think about the fact that it's basically also on higher last year costs, right? When you look at the absolute dollar of fees, I would say it's still moving up a little bit, but flattening, but still very, very elevated, meaning not really, you know, declining at all.

Thank you very much. I really appreciate it.

And next we have a line of Miltra Rangopal. with Sadati. You're open.

Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking the questions. I was just curious in terms of the challenges you're seeing on talent supply, if you're having success with the initiatives you introduced earlier this year and your outlook based on the current environment over the remainder of the year and into next.

Well, I think the exemplar would be education where we took steps early in the year to increase our fill rates and As I indicated, we're seeing improvement in K-12 districts in Q2, and we expect to continue to see fill rate improvements through the remainder of the year as schools reopen. So those efforts are well underway and proving to be successful. I think in our other businesses, we continue to face unprecedented talent shortages that we are deploying a number of methods to try to combat, including working with our customers to ensure good wages and good working conditions. But that's going to be an ongoing process as long as we have this historic low participation rate and a low unemployment rate.

Okay, thanks. And then given the rising interest rate environment, how much of a factor is that in terms of as you look at inorganic opportunities? Are you seeing a change in valuations? Are they becoming more attractive given the increased cost of capital for some?

Yeah, we think there is going to be a likely downward pressure on valuations and multiples. I can't say that we've seen it yet, but it's likely to have somewhat of a lag. But based on our conversations with bankers and other investment professionals, they're signaling that there is less of an appetite to leverage in this period of higher interest rates.

Yeah, just probably on our side, first of all, you know that we still have a positive cash position despite the multiple acquisitions we are discussing, including today. We have our full capacity to leverage available. And you know that part of our line of credit is basically what we call something that is linked to our assets, our receivables, our securitization. So basically, although we see some interest rate increase impacting us, I would say the fact that we have this securitization program is helping us to basically get still interest costs that are I would say completely acceptable for us to continue to move forward on our acquisition strategy.

Okay, thanks. And then finally, as it relates to investments, whether it's in personnel and technology, if you can give us a sense as to how comfortable you are on that front or how much more you think you really need to do over the end of this year and also in the next.

Well, it is a period of wage inflation, not only for our customers, but for our industry. And we need to remain competitive. We need to attract and retain the critical talent we need to deliver our services and solutions. So we're keeping a close eye on ensuring that we have the investment dollars that we need to achieve that objective. I think technology, we've increased our technology investments, but we need to continue to look for ways to improve the efficiency of our operations as well as bring additional and new value to our customers with the solutions we're providing.

Okay. Thanks again for taking the questions. Thank you. Thank you.

Next, we have Joe Gomez with Noble Capital. You're open.

Good morning, and thanks for taking the questions.

Morning, Joe.

So just was looking through the release and, you know, when you start looking at revenues by country, obviously Mexico's down. We know the reasons for that. And over in Europe, although, you know, EMEA itself, ex-Russia was up, France was down about 12.4%. Just wondering what might be going on in France. Is that kind of temporary or is there something else going there to drive that?

Yeah, I mean, the first thing I would mention is that when you are referring on a negative 12.4, Joe, it's basically nominal currency. And knowing the current, you know, effects and basically the weakness of the euro currency, It's probably better to look at it in constant currency. So in constant currency, we are, I would say, flat. So what we see in the French market is the piece or the large part of the French market that now is growing is basically areas where we are not in with Kelly France, namely manufacturing, automotive, that are really basically growing again after basically a big decline. We are more in specialty areas like life science and others where we see a recovery from the, I would say, economic downturn of 2020, but at a lower pace than you might have seen or you see now in manufacturing, automotive, and so on.

Okay, thanks for that. And then we all know, you guys have discussed it, the challenges on the talent side, both getting talent for your customers and retaining your own talent. But if we put those aside for a second, what else are the kind of challenges that you're facing today and how are you resolving those?

Well, I think on the demand side, Joe, I think You know, our thesis is that with the rising inflation and the interest rate increases, a lot of companies are digesting that as well as the likelihood of future interest rate hikes, and they're doing so for the first time in a long time. In fact, some of the purchasing managers that we deal with have never – experienced an inflationary period. So I think they're taking stock of it without reducing significantly the fact that they need talent. And there is still, as we've discussed, as you mentioned, there's still not enough people in the labor force to satisfy the demand as reflected by, even though the number of job openings has come down, it's still at historic highs, and, you know, unemployment is also ticking down. So it's a unique environment, but we continue to work with our customers to satisfy their current solid demand for talent across our segments.

Okay, thank you. And then just switching gears for a second over on education, you guys talked about some previous wins this year. Just kind of looking at maybe give us a little color on what that kind of the market there looks like today in terms of customer putting out requests and proposals and how you see that maybe playing out for the rest of the year.

Yeah, we're, you know, we've been in the education business. We're celebrating our 25th year this year. We don't know of a year in which there has been stronger demand for our services. The school districts across the country are struggling with finding instructors, retaining instructors, educators, and so we're seeing unusually strong activity in the education space, not only with the wins that we have already accomplished in 2022, but also the number of RFPs and other activity in school districts is unusually strong, and we expect that even this year we will see the benefit of course, from the wins, but also from the ongoing RFP activity as school districts struggle to meet the demands for educators.

Great. Thanks for that. Appreciate it. I'll get back to you.

All right.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if there are any additional questions, please press 1 then 0. Once again, if there are any additional questions, press 1 then 0. And we have Keith Steinke with Barrington Research. You're open.

Hey, good morning. I'm sorry, Kevin.

Good morning, Kevin. Good morning, Kevin. Hi.

Hi. So I wanted to just first off on the guidance, make sure I understood correctly, you know, going from the 6% to 7% revenue growth to the 3.5% to 4%. That's? you're building in 150 basis point headwind from currency that was not there before, and then the 100 to 150 moderation and organic growth, those are the two components of that change.

Yeah, I mean, certainly, I mean, usually we don't mention any assumption on FX, but what we have seen, especially due to getting with a 200 base point in favor of impact, we were thinking that, you know, something we need to mention because, of course, it is a headwind versus our nominal gap revenue growth. And we anticipate this kind of situation to continue in the near future. And that's why we mentioned this 150 base point. Acquisition plus 150 basis points, very consistent with what we have said three months ago. Of course, you have 250 basis points coming from Russia and Mexico, and you will see, especially in Q3, basically the full impact of Russia, as well as in Q4. Mexico, basically, as we are going to anniversary, the change in basically the labor legislation, we are going to see in Q3, but to a more visible extent, less of an impact, you know, end of Q3 and the full Q4. But of course, we are going to continue to see something we have started to see, of course, at the far end of Q2, I mean the impact of Russia.

Okay, yeah, that's helpful. Yeah, I was going to ask about the cadence, you know, third quarter versus fourth quarter that you had mentioned in the prepared comments, and so that's helpful, but, you know, also you mentioned, you know, expected near-term dip in productivity and P&I due to the, you know, recent completion of the technology rollout. I mean, is that something we should think about as being material or, you know, that we should factor in, say, in the third quarter or, you know, just how are you thinking about that?

Well, as Olivier mentioned in his prepared remarks, on the Q3 may be slightly lower than our full year guidance, but probably the biggest factor there is that Q4 has a full quarter of education versus Q3, which does not because schools don't open, you know, they open throughout Q3, but in Q4 we have the full benefit. So while there may be some impact in Q3 as well, on the full year basis, I think the guidance that Olivier provided provides, takes that into account, the technology issue.

And I think you might have noticed that we have upgraded our GP rate by 70 base points. We feel good about that. You have seen the progress. Q1, it was up 230 base points. Q2, 220. So, sorry, 220 in Q1, 230 in Q2. with very similar dynamics, right? And one interesting one is our mix and the fact that the mix and the improvement of our specialty mix did improve the GP rate by 80 basis points. The other point I would like to mention is our progress in net margin, ABDA margin. we continue and we have confirmed that our GP net margin percentage is going to move by 70 to 90 basis points, a large majority of that being organic. And we are on track. When you look at Q1, we're at 2.4, Q2, 2.5, which is a significant improvement, about 100 basis points in Q1. 70 base points in Q2, and this is something that, you know, we believe and we are pleased to see that it's on track, and I think we are going to continue to make progress also on net margin as we have seen now for the first half of the year.

Yes, absolutely. The margin guidance and progress on margin is certainly, you know, been impressive here, so it's great to see that. I, you know, I just wanted to touch on, um, Peter, you mentioned a more guarded approach to hiring in some industries. Are there any industries in particular that you'd call out or, you know, what does it look like from a geographic perspective as well? You know, um, are some geographies a little more guarded than others or, you know, somebody kind of comment on industry and geographic mix there would be helpful.

Yeah, I think it's less geographic than it is industry. So not the demand for professionals that provide technology services, so not your cybersecurity experts and code developers and network systems architects, but the technology sector as a consumer has been impacted, as has widely been shared in the press with Certain companies, particularly in California, either reducing hiring or even some spotty layoffs. So that industry has been impacted, but it probably also reveals itself as companies anticipate supply chain disruption. They're potentially... trying to factor that into their production plans for the future. But it's still a moderating of their plans, not a decline or a lack of demand for talent. People are still looking for workers in all of our segments and In most cases, when they find somebody, they will hire them as indicated by our continuing strength and permanent placement fees.

Okay.

Yeah, that's helpful. And I just thought that actually, you know, on the first quarter call, you increased your organic growth expectations by 200 basis points. And now you've taken it down by 100 to 150. So you're actually still ahead of where you were at the beginning of the year in terms of your organic growth expectations, I guess. Is that the right way to think about it?

That's completely correct. I would say one point to mention back to P&I, we have good traction in terms of pipeline and staffing. but with this position of this customer that we have mentioned for the last couple of quarters, we have the pipeline to really offset this customer, but the time to revenue is a bit taking more time than what we're expecting. So it's more, I would say, a timing issue rather than, I would say, not the capability of offsetting this big customer.

Okay, understood. And then lastly, maybe just talk about next steps for achieving revenue synergies from rocket power and PTS and maybe any investments associated with that, just plans as we think about the rest of the year.

Yeah, we see a lot of synergies in both cases. In the case of rocket power, we had no customer overlap, and we had a complementary geographic presence. So we're pleased, although Rocket Power has joined Kelly only a few months ago, we're very pleased with the progress we've made on joint go-to-market strategies and efforts and the introduction of their competency to our existing customers where we may not have had that same capability. In the case of PTS, it's still a bit early, but we see PTS, there's really strong demand for their services in the geographies that they support, and we're in a lot of other geographies where we currently don't provide therapeutic services like PTS does. So While nothing to report today, we think there's considerable upside in that extremely high margin adjacency to our traditional K-12 business where we're the market leader in the U.S.

All right, great. Thanks for taking the questions.

Yeah, thanks, Kevin. Thank you, Kevin.

And speakers, there are no further questions at this time. Please go ahead with any closing remarks. Art, I think we're good, and you can close the call. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. That does conclude your conference for today. Thank you for your participation, and thank you for using AT&T Event Teleconference. You may now disconnect.