Where Clerical and Administrative Ranks Among ASA’s Five Segments
The American Staffing Association names Office-Clerical & Administrative as one of five formally tracked staffing sector profiles, and its own occupational data places that category second by share of placements: Industrial leads at 36%, Office-Clerical & Administrative follows at 24%, then Professional-Managerial at 21%, Engineering/IT/Scientific at 11%, and Health Care at 8%. Clerical and administrative work is not a niche inside the industry; on ASA’s own numbers, it is the second-largest single category the entire staffing industry places workers into.
Converting a Share Into a Number
ASA publishes the 24% occupational share and its overall industry totals separately, without a direct cross-tabulation connecting the two. Applying that share to ASA’s own reported 2.2 million average weekly temporary and contract employment figure for 2024 implies roughly 528,000 clerical and administrative placements running in a typical week. Applying the same share to ASA’s reported 12.7 million total temporary and contract hires across 2023 implies roughly 3,048,000 clerical and administrative hires over that year. Both figures are VA Horizon’s own calculation built from two of ASA’s own published numbers, not a segment breakdown ASA itself has published.
What Is Not Confirmed About This Segment
Office-clerical and administrative staffing is sometimes described as the segment most squeezed by vendor management systems and managed service providers, on the reasoning that it is the highest-volume, lowest-differentiation category in the industry. No source located for this page independently confirms a segment-by-segment VMS or MSP penetration breakdown that would support ranking clerical and administrative above healthcare, IT, or any other category specifically. What is confirmed is broader: VMS and MSP programs now sit inside 50% to 60% of Fortune 500 companies overall, without a public breakdown by staffing segment.
The Numbers
Office-Clerical & Administrative accounts for 24% of all staffing-industry occupational placements, the second-largest of ASA’s five tracked categories.
Industrial is the largest category at 36% of placements.
Professional-Managerial accounts for 21% of placements; Engineering/IT/Scientific accounts for 11%; Health Care accounts for 8%.
Applying the 24% clerical/administrative share to ASA’s reported 2.2 million average weekly temporary and contract employment figure for 2024 implies an estimated 528,000 clerical and administrative placements in a typical week (VA Horizon calculation).
Applying the same 24% share to ASA’s reported 12.7 million total temporary and contract hires across 2023 implies an estimated 3,048,000 clerical and administrative hires over the year (VA Horizon calculation).
Office-Clerical & Administrative is formally named as one of ASA’s five distinct staffing sector profiles.
VMS and MSP programs sit inside 50% to 60% of Fortune 500 companies overall; no independently confirmed segment-by-segment breakdown exists to support ranking clerical/administrative above other categories specifically.
Sources
The external data in this article draws on the sources below. Figures described in the text as estimates or industry triangulations are directional and are not attributed to a single dataset.
- American Staffing Association, Staffing Industry Statistics
- American Staffing Association, Sector Profiles
- QX Global Group, What Is MSP and VMS in Staffing