The Gig Economy, Freelancing or NextGen Work, however you want to call it, it’s huge. In fact, today already more than 90% of people in North America are open to run with alternatives to full time employment. By 2027, based on the current growth rate, freelancers are even expected to become the majority share of the global workforce. Increased automation, more freedom, flexibility and the ability to earn more money are key drivers for Millenials. Employers are in need of workforce solutions that find them the best talent when business models and skills needs are changing faster than ever.
The Gig Economy’s challenges are old shoes
This development has lead to the uprise of enterprises like Uber, Deliveroo and WorkGenius which are transforming today’s workforce. The technology fueled rapid pace of development brings new challenges and problems. Political and legislative hurdles for example have cost Uber more than $60m since 2009. In the world of freelancing however, these challenges aren’t new, they are old shoes. Enterprises have gotten so used to them that despite the rise of freelance marketplaces like UpWork and Fiverr the challenges remain untackled.
Marketplaces may provide faster access to thousands of freelancers, and thus fuelling the Gig Economy sift, but so far it remains a service beneficial only for individuals. The fundamental problems enterprises encounter still haven’t been addressed and continue to become more severe.
Enterprises are burning resources and they are ok with it
Enterprises generally experience the same stepstones when deciding to find external sources to get work done, but due to a lack of options they play along. Setting up larger projects with freelancers is incredibly time consuming. Not integrated external workers require clear guidance and in-depth structured projects are key, yet too often underestimated. Projects need to be broken down into individual tasks with detailed and clear briefings to guarantee that goals are fully understood and results are delivered as expected. Weeks go by before the first actual results are delivered. The next grand challenge is the sourcing of skilled workers. Logically the following step is to take advantage of the talent supply of one of the many freelance marketplaces. Despite their accessibility, the turnaround time to find the right talent stays too long. After crafting time-consuming detailed briefings, it takes days, often weeks to compare the incoming proposals. Pain points that are stretching out this time period are individual portfolio checks for quality, the availability of the right candidate, amount to be spent, amount freelancer wants to earn, mutual compliance, just to list a few.
Resolving talent search pain points often consumes more time than getting the work done itself. Henceforth, many organisations handle larger projects with costly in-house teams with a critical side effect. The limitation to in-house resources narrows down the variation in skills and often leads to employees working longer and outside of their core roles. Working extra hours with unclear guidance results in dissatisfaction at work and a rapid decrease in employer loyalty. This is fuelling the already falling retention rate in the US with a massive impact on Millennials. A Deloitte study shows that 44% of all Millennials are expected to leave their job within the next two years. Thus, enterprises find themselves in an dilemma: either risk losing valuable human capital or burning incredible amount of resources with employing The Gig Economy. The work market is evolving fast and enterprises struggle to keep up with it. They are in need of a solution.
Comparing the traditional approach to freelancing with the Digital Workforce
AI is on the rise
In many other industries the solutions were found in technology. Increasing automation and digitization are on the rise. Artificial Intelligence is still in an early stage, yet already achieved what was long thought impossible. We all remember AI beating the world champion in GO. Uber was founded in 2009 to revolutionize the mobile transportation industry, and since then fueled the Gig Economy with more than seven million drivers. Their service began flawed with errors, but today optimized through AI and machine learning provides an almost seamless and reliable experience for millions of users every day.
Light at the end of the freelancer tunnel
Through artificial intelligence and machine learning it stays unpredictable how the freelance work market will look like in the future. However, already today pioneering companies like Workgenius.com are on the rise to start a revolution. WorkGenius employs the first AI Driven SaaS solution that enables individuals, SMBs and enterprises to engage effortlessly with freelancers. Using technology hand in hand with a dedicated project management service is hitting a sweet spot. Enterprises choose from different service levels that perfectly fit their needs. WorkGenius’ dedicated project management team covers full processes from structuring projects, to briefing creation and job posting. Their unique AI solution matches posted jobs on average in under 28 minutes to the right expert of their “The Digital Workforce”. The algorithm scans through thousands of possible candidates and analyses skills based on verified data. A human would need weeks to to scan the talent pool of their more than 250,000 registered international individuals. All experts need to proof their skills through recruiting tests and are continuously vetted by ongoing assessment centers. The mix of human oversight along with AI driven computing power cuts down weeks of unnecessary work into hours. But the AI Solution goes even further and allows WorkGenius to guarantee high quality results. The algorithm matches a submitted deliverable to a second expert who verifies the quality and applies edits if necessary. “The Digital Workforce” is trusted by over 5,000 enterprise clients worldwide including global leaders such as Amazon, Unilever and eBay.
Staying ahead of the curve
The unpredictable development of the global work market leaves a lot of room for development. WorkGenius is working on enabling their AI SaaS solution to solve other work market problems. Together with their largest enterprise clients and partners like Indeed.com, they aim to development a solution for company internal talent matching.The algorithm will be able to instantaneously form perfectly harmonizing project teams based on skills, availability and several other factors.
“AI is the future. Today it’s enabling freelancing, soon it will form teams within organisations, and eventually our technology will solve problems themselves and deliver results in minutes” – Marlon Litz-Rosenzweig, CEO of WorkGenius
WorkGenius is a revolutionary new freelancing marketplace where businesses of all sizes can get work done across categories with the help of AI. You are looking to get projects done while staying compliant? Get in touch with us.
