Why You Should Consider Freelance Staff

There is a shift in the workforce from the traditional full-time employee toward a different and diversified income structure that often includes freelancers. For companies, two factors are motivating this change: the shift to more lean organizations and the modern career. Why is this important? Implemented properly this can reduce your costs, increase your competitiveness and add more value added services.

Lean Organizations and the Modern Career

The Lean Organization is driving cost out of the business. In the United States, this includes health and unemployment insurance, pensions, wage increases, overtime, vacation, and parental leave. Another part is allowing staff to work in home offices which is made possible with high speed internet access, smartphones, and home computers. In the Intuit 2020 Report, the authors describe how the “the long-term trend of hiring contingent workers will continue to accelerate with more than 80% of large corporations planning to substantially increase their use of a flexible workforce.”

The younger generations are redefining the Modern Career. Many consider quality of life to be more important than full time employment. They may also consider what the company does and a company’s commitment to social responsibility to be more important than how much they earn. The Intuit report estimates that 40% of the workforce will be freelance by 2020.

Why Are Freelancers Becoming More Important to Printing Companies?

1. Companies are struggling to find staff with the skills they need.

According to a recent Harvard Business Review, about 40% of executives who were asked in a Deloitte survey said “they are barely able”  or “unable” to find the new staff with the skills they need.

2. There is an infrastructure to support freelancers.

There are faster internet speeds, software that allow secure log in from remote sites, workflow software that is web based, and freelance web sites to find the best freelancers. Below is a table of the top websites to find freelancers.

Source: Top 25 Freelance Websites to Find Work in 2018, Dyno, Jan. 30 2018

3. There is a management trend in all business to outsource non-essential skills.

According to Deloitte, 72% of IT services were outsourced in 2016, 63% of legal, 53% of tax, 47% HR, 42% of finance and 41% of procurement services.

4. Freelancing is more attractive to younger people.

Research from Freelance in America 2016 shows that 18-24 year olds are more likely to freelance (47%) than baby boomers (28%).

5. It is a seller’s market or a freelancers’ market.

According to a Freelancer Union study, almost half (46% of full time freelancers) report that they have raised prices in the last year, and more than 54% say they plan to raise them again.

What Are Print Companies Outsourcing to Freelancers?

For years, the printing industry has embraced the concept of on-call help, but on a very limited basis, mostly for hand work such as stuffing envelopes. Today the number of freelancing options has increased dramatically, and more and more printing companies are outsourcing—not only for hand work, but also for unexpected spikes in demand for:

• prepress preflight
• file repair
• delivery
• creative content
• variable data printing
• and more

The obvious advantage is adding more production capacity and value-added services with less risk because demand is low.

If you are considering outsourcing work to freelancers, we recommend starting with some of these tasks mentioned above, but keep in mind that each company has different needs. Find the freelance solutions that work best for you!

Does your company employ freelancers? Why or why not? Share with us by commenting below!