New securities in the flexible labor market
Car insurance, fire insurance or disability insurance, but also less important insurance such as insurance for your photo camera or phone screen; the Dutch are so afraid of risk that they often over-insure themselves.
Risk-avoiding behavior could easily be something Calvinistic and also plays out in the labor market. After all, in today's labor market, fewer and fewer people are guaranteed a permanent job. Especially among 25- to 35-year-olds, the share with a permanent job fell from 77 to 68 percent.
Although due to relaxed dismissal laws, the security of a permanent job is largely a false security, employees with permanent jobs are increasingly staying where they are. Independent professionals are now finding it harder to get a new assignment and are diligently looking for new security. And understandably so, because nothing is more changeable than the labor market at the moment.
Flexibility creates new organizational structures and working relationships, organizations recruit flexible talent through crowd sourcing, talent scouting and online and offline communities, and the boundaries of organizations are increasingly intertwined.
Minimizing uncertainties
These developments create a sense of uncertainty and raise questions. Independent professionals ask themselves: what do I have to meet in order to win a new assignment (competence insecurity), how do I get a new assignment in the first place (assignment insecurity) and when do I get my money when I do find an assignment (payment insecurity)?
In my opinion, minimizing these three uncertainties is a fine task of organizations that bring supply and demand together, or knowledge intermediaries. As intermediaries, they know best the expectations of both the contractor and the client, as well as the mutual interests in order to optimally handle these three uncertainties.
Payment security
The client's payment term to the independent professional of 30 days is long gone. What if you have not been paid for the past two months because the broker or intermediary does not pay your invoice “thus your salary” on time due to the crisis? The financial obligation towards the independent professional performing the assignment should always take precedence over other financial obligations.
Assignment security
In addition, intermediaries have a large pool of assignments that can be viewed 24/7. Affiliated independent professionals have access to a larger pool of clients. Thus, the chance of finding a new assignment is higher, the time between assignments is shorter and thus assignment uncertainty is reduced.
Competence security
Consulting, continuing education and knowledge sharing in the area of hard and soft skills is offered by knowledge brokers so that the independent professional keeps his competencies at the highest level and reduces competence insecurity.
Thus, joining a knowledge broker is now more advisable than ever. Because with these new certainties in their pocket, independent professionals can confidently carry out their assignments without sacrificing independence.
