13 Sep 2022
This article is the continuation of our series dedicated to the trends that are Impacting the freelance market. If you haven’t yet read the previous articles in this series, we highly encourage you to do so: Part 1 – The pros and cons of the freelance market and Part 2 – The hottest trends on the freelance market: Industry 4.0. So far, we’ve spoken about the full potential of the freelance market and its pros and cons, as well as developing an awareness for Industry 4.0. In this article, we will talk a little bit more about some other trends, especially the Future of Work Movement.
The Future of Work: a story about leaving the traditional model of work behind… for good
There is nothing completely new with the idea that our work life is changing for good. In the past, we had gotten used to working within a specific and more rigid timeframe: the classic 9 to 5 model for which our presence in the office was required every day. Then the COVID-19 pandemic happened and we all felt the hard-hitting consequences of our over-attachment to the traditional model of work. Suddenly, we had to learn from scratch how to manage remote work, how to exchange data in a safe way and how to build digital trust. (You can find more about that last one in the EonD Experts Talks Podcast – listen to it here.)
Suddenly, it became obvious that remote work was as not bad as we thought. But the real winners of the digital revolution were those who were working remotely long before the pandemic: the freelancers. When the time came for us to go back to our beloved offices, nearly 9 out of 10 (87%) of survey respondents (Forbes’ survey from March 2022) said that they no longer wanted to work from the office in a full-time capacity. Nearly half (45%) of them would be happy never to set foot in an office again, while 42% indicated that they preferred a hybrid model that split time between home and office. One shocking stat showed that 71% of respondents stated that they would choose the ability to work from anywhere over a job promotion or a compensation increase. It truly looks like we have not only changed our preferred model of work but also our mindsets. This in turn implies that the white-collar talent market is set to become more globalized than ever before.
Be ready for the change
As well as the transformation of the remote work environment, another major change currently happening is the development of the futureproof skill set. Many job categories will soon become obsolete or will be completely transformed in the coming years. As such, it makes little economic sense for companies to invest in employees’ upskilling courses without being sure of the outcome and of the future of these workers within said companies. This is why, now more than ever, we see that outsourcing and hiring professionals for specific projects is becoming inevitable. This striving for increased flexibility and specific skill sets means that a lot of people who were hired in a more traditional manner are at risk of losing their jobs.
When compared to the existing hiring structures, the freelance economy is characterized by higher flexibility and higher expertise in a given field. It has an element of antifragility embedded into its core values. Freelancers are the masters of their own careers and fit perfectly into the new enterprise development models. Gone are the days of endless in-house training courses for permanent, or rarely-changing work teams. Now it is all about finding exactly the right person, with an exact skillset to work on a specific project or projects. We could summarize all of the information above into this into one sentence: all roads now lead to freelancing!
EonD is exactly that: a future-of-work platform ensuring great career-development opportunities, as well as plenty of personal benefits such as network monetization, referral programs, profile boosting and charity engagements. We are open to working with old freelancing cats as well as with all you newcomers who only recently decided to change career paths. The future of work is here and you can now be a part of it!
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