Gig Economy: Unlocking New Opportunities for Small Businesses

Gig Economy consists of independent workers aka freelancers, contract workers, consultants, and outsourced workers. It has a diverse pool of professionals working in a multitude of fields.

So why should any of this matter? Well, even though the Gig economy has been here for a long time, recently It has been growing rapidly and is predicted to grow even more. It would do well for businesses to capitalize on this resource, especially for small and medium businesses, hence the need for this article.

Now that you know the gist of the Gig Economy, let us cut to the chase. Here is how your business can benefit from the Gig economy.

Access to a First-Class Talent pool

With the rapid expansion of the Gig Economy, there are plenty of youngsters in the market with both experience and potential. You can easily analyze portfolios and pick skilled workers for your projects. The best part is that you don’t have to provide them with the extra benefits that you will have to provide to your regular employees, this makes the whole process much more cost-effective. You could also scout employees in this process, and gain contacts for future projects.

Reduce Your Employees' Workload

You can reduce both your employees and your workload with the help of the Gig Economy. Whenever you are in need of a new skill for your project, instead of burdening employees by making them learn different skills other than their core skills, you could utilize the Gig Economy. This will not only prevent stress for your employees but will also improve the quality of work since you will be hiring a person specialized for that particular role.

On-Demand Workforce

With Gig Economy you will be able to build a team of freelancers for special projects, or for busy months when you need more hands on the deck. This makes for efficient use of resources as you would only be spending when you really need to.

Ease of Scaling

The Gig Economy makes for easy scaling since you can scale up or down your workforce without having to worry about employee overheads and other restrictions that you would have with traditional employees. Taking into account the budget and time constraints you can easily make a decision to scale up or down with the help of freelancers.

No Overhead = More Savings

Overheads are the additional benefits you would have to provide to your employees like retirement funds, paid leaves, office space, and other benefits. All of this can be avoided when you are utilizing Gig Economy as you would only compensate freelancers for their time. Hence you can save much more if you properly plan and assign tasks.

There you have it, some of the benefits that you can obtain by utilizing the Gig economy to grow your business. Blindly hiring freelancers to cut costs might make things worse for you if you don’t understand the employee and freelancer dynamics. In short, you will have to react depending on your situation aka “Think on your feet.”