Agencies are slow and expensive
Weeks of back-and-forth, CVs that don't match the brief, and a placement fee that lands somewhere north of 20%, for a contractor you may only need for six weeks.
Describe what you need in plain English, get a ranked shortlist from a bench of prequalified specialists, and engage them directly, on a day rate, a fixed term, or a fixed price for the outcome.
A go-live slips. A consultant rolls off. A client signs sooner than planned. The work is there today, but the standard ways of finding people all take weeks you don't have.
Weeks of back-and-forth, CVs that don't match the brief, and a placement fee that lands somewhere north of 20%, for a contractor you may only need for six weeks.
Post a D365 F&O role and you'll get two hundred applications, most of them nowhere near the skill set. Screening is now your problem.
Partners carry consultants between projects to stay responsive. It works, right up until utilisation drops and the bench becomes the biggest line on the P&L.
No job spec templates, no boolean search strings, no waiting on an account manager to call you back.
"Senior F&O finance consultant, UK, available in three weeks, under £650 a day." The AI reads the brief the way a person would and searches the whole bench: skills, project history and CV content, not just keyword matches.
Every card shows the match score, live availability, notice period and fee model up front. Save the ones you like, and save the search itself so you're told when someone new matches it.
Unlock a profile and contact the specialist yourself. There's no account manager in the middle, no gatekeeping, and no percentage riding on the outcome of the conversation.
Agree the terms that suit the work. Everyone you're speaking to stays in your pipeline so nothing gets lost between a first call and a signed contract.
Natural-language search over the entire bench, ranked by genuine fit rather than keyword overlap.
See who is on the market right now, who's free from a date, and who has just updated their status.
Save a brief once. When someone new matches it, the alert finds you.
Every applicant, bid and shortlisted specialist tracked in one view from first contact to hired.
Live supply and demand across the ecosystem: which skills are scarce, and what they're going for.
Share the engagement and take a quote for the outcome, instead of defaulting to a daily rate.
Most Microsoft contracting defaults to a day rate whether or not it suits the work. On the bench you pick the model per engagement.
The familiar one. You agree a daily figure and the specialist bills the days they work. Best when the scope is going to move around, or when you need someone embedded in your team for a while.
You share the engagement: the scope and the result you need. The specialist quotes a fixed fee to deliver it, so you're buying finished work rather than days, and the delivery risk sits with them.
Not everything is contract work. Plenty of the bench is open to full-time and part-time roles, and you never pay a percentage of their first-year salary.
Anything with a clear start, a clear finish and a result you can point at, priced once up front and delivered to a date you both agree.
Private Bench is the internal-use licence. Load your own consultants into a bench only your firm can see, and let your project managers find a niche skill in seconds with the same AI search that runs the open bench. Who has F&O finance and Danish? Who rolls off in November? Ask in plain English.
Every consultant's skills, certifications, current engagement and roll-off date in one place, visible only to your firm. Upload a spreadsheet or add people one at a time.
When you search the open bench, your own available people come up first. Hire outside only once you have checked inside.
Lend idle consultants to vetted partners as "Partner resource via your firm". Enquiries and contracts route through you, never the individual.
Live D365 demand by skill and region, from Copilot to F&O, so you know what to hire and upskill for next.
Bench records never reach the marketplace unless you choose to lend someone.
An employee's own profile is hidden from your firm, and never shown to rivals as a lead.
Non-solicitation of lent resources, and GDPR controller roles set out for both sides.
In exchange for product feedback and a case study. Three steps to go‑live:
You are not paying a percentage of anyone's contract or salary. It's free to use, and you deal with the specialist directly.
Profiles are reviewed before they reach the bench, and CVs are parsed so claimed skills line up with actual project history. The Verified badge goes further: our team has seen the specialist's photo ID, confirmed their Microsoft certifications on their Microsoft Learn transcript, and spoken to them. Certifications without that check are marked "Self-declared". Availability, notice period and fee model are all shown up front, so you have fewer wasted conversations.
No, and that's deliberate. Everyone on the bench works somewhere in the Microsoft ecosystem: Dynamics 365, Power Platform, Azure, Fabric, Copilot and Microsoft 365. A narrow bench matches better than a broad one.
Both. Specialists set what they're open to, whether full-time, part-time, contract, freelance or outcome-based, and you can filter on it.
You contract with the specialist directly, on your paper or theirs. 365 Virtual Bench is free to use right now, so there is nothing to pay us.
Save the search. Every new specialist who joins is matched against it, and you're alerted when someone does fit. That's also how we know which skills are in demand and worth recruiting for.
We're opening access in waves so the bench stays high quality on both sides. Join the list and we'll bring you in with founding-member terms.