It’s in the news almost every day now. Large global organizations wrestling with the issue of defining who is an employee and who is a contractor. The government is not making it easy. President Obama recently issued an executive order that federal contractors were eligible for paid sick days –on.wsj.com/1FRTjCW.
While that may appear on the surface as a positive move, it further muddies the definition of a contractor and an employee. #Uber is facing a similar challenge and is fully immersed in the California courts over whether drivers are contractors or employees. The implication of this outcome is huge. It has the potential to completely change the business model of Uber and many other organizations that rely on flexible contract labor. And it is not just the companies that will be affected. The contractors themselves who desire the flexibility to set their own hours, work for multiple clients and #workfromanywhere will be impacted. This debate will have a long term impact on how the US and global economies define contractors and how they can be engaged by companies.
This industry term for this rapidly growing phenomenon is the “Contingent Workforce” #contingentworkforce. According to #ArdentPartners, contingent/contract/freelance workers currently represent over 30% of the global workforce and is expected to expand to 50% in the years to come. With nearly three billion people in the workforce, that’s a billion contract workers, which is why these debates are so important and the issue should be watched closely.
To learn more about this topic, please join @CXCGlobal and @ArdentPartners for a webinar on Wednesday 23, September at 2pm Eastern. You can register here: http://ow.ly/SogX3
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