Fractional Work

Fractional Work The Next Small Thing? London, 22 nd October 2003 5 th October 2009 The unit of work is no longer a whole job An opportunity . Not a threat.

What is Fractional Work?
Research. There is none.
Officially it doesn’t exist
Temporary work research only tells part of the story
OECD, ILO
There’s a hidden GDP that is not accounted for anywhere

The Emergence of 21 st Century Labour Models: Fractional Work
The emergence of fractional, ‘on-demand’ models of labour
Why is this important?
Potential for full employment but comprised of multiple fractional sources of work
Competitive with offshore pricing
Big business in on the action
Profound implications for education & training policy
The perfect labour storm
There is a tectonic shift taking place in the structure and nature of work
Government legislation is causing incalculable damage to its widespread adoption
Legislation with unintentional consequences
How to enable and accelerate fractional work

A Perfect Labour Storm
Provenance
Recent US research (cf Prof Alan Binder) estimates 30-40 million ‘high end’ white collar jobs could be lost within the next generation
On that basis the comparable number in the UK could be as much as eight million
Estimates of 16 million PhD students in Asia by 2015
In 2007 Indian IT services company receives 4m job applications in one year
2 billion people internet connected
31% of UK workforce retiring in the next 5 years
In the US one-fifth of the country's large, established companies will lose 40 percent or more of their top level talent in the next five years
Unretirement trends & ‘grey ceilings’
The impact of the credit crisis on pension values
In Japan, 30% of the adult work force is made up of temporary workers
If current government policy prevails only 1 in 2 (yes, one in two) people will be employed in Japan in the year 2050
10 years of ‘steady state economy’ and zero percent interest rates

A Perfect Labour Storm
Provenance
The under-employment of older people is costing the UK 12-30 billion a year
A lot of spare capacity in other UK home worker based networks
Anecdotal evidence to suggest that SMEs are the biggest buyers of offshore labour
Particularly in the creative industries
The OECD reports that, from the collapse of Lehman Brothers last year to the end of 2010, 25 million more people will be unemployed in the developed world
Temporary work on the rise
Short-term work contracts have increased as a proportion of total employment;
From 12.7 to 18.3 percent in the Netherlands,
8.5 to 14 percent in Italy
11 to 12.3 percent OECD-wide over the past decade
UK currently 25%
Fractional Work
An Opportunity. Not a threat.

Sources of Fractional Work 100,000 instant access to 100,000 rated and tested professionals who offer technical, marketing and business expertise Revenues of $200m pa 7,500 distributed home-based agents fastest-growing company (Deloitte & Touche Fast 500) Summer 2009 announced the creation of 500 posts in NY & 100 in Wyoming (Estimated) that more than 1 million people in Canada and the US make at least part of their living buying and selling on Ebay

Sources of Fractional Work

Platforms

More examples

Legislation is ‘arresting’ its development
IR35
A scheme to reclaim NI from freelance contractors
Predicated on full time employee basis
Just made it harder to operate as a freelancer
Recent FOI request: IR35 generated just £1m in 10 years!
Adding insult to injury
2007:The Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed new legislation limiting the ability of contractors to operate through the medium of limited companies and umbrella companies
160,000 contractors
Majority of on low pay scales; security guards, nurses, cleaners, and supply teachers.
Temporary Workers
Aug 2009: The controversial Agency Workers' Directive confirmed by Gordon Brown would be implemented in UK law in the next few months.
The EU-inspired Directive is aimed at protecting vulnerable agency workers by giving them similar rights to employees.
Gives freelancers rights they do not want and which will make them less attractive to the market

Conclusions
The future of work
The unit of work is no longer a whole job and the traditional career, as an institution, is in unavoidable decline.
Unfortunately public policy is still based on the assumption that careers are the most desirable form of employment, and that they can be offered to more and more of us.
Fractional work
Credible alternative to job/no-job – a new Full Time Equivalent?
Is there a hidden GDP that is not accounted for anywhere?
Government action – create an eBay for work
Don’t punish. Enable.
Introduce new legislation that rewards people and companies for this mode of work. Tax it, fairly.
Create ‘new types of workplace/labour exchange’ – aggregate, regulate
Place government (knowledge) work on these platforms
Educate our children for change in the nature of work
Opportunities – doing better with less
Fractional workers have low carbon footprints
Economically active
Off the unemployment register
Make use of spare capacity
Economically inactive (disabled, incapacity benefit claimants)

Contact
Leon Benjamin
Twitter: http://twitter.com/ixtlan
Blog: http://winningbysharing.typepad.com/
Email: leon@winningbysharing.net

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Fractional Work

by Sei Mani on Oct 04, 2009

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Fractional Work — Presentation Transcript