The freelance outsourcing economy
DATE: Feb 22nd, 2010
- The economy is gone solo & global and it is no where more evident than the freelance work which people perform all over the world sitting in their homes, coffee shops and even regular full time job locations! Working on their mobiles, laptops, computers connected to the never asleep internet world. It is truly a 24X7X365 economy. Some have willingly moved to the freelance workforce, and others have been forced to go freelance to manage and survive in the economic crisis. Some others have chosen to sell and market their unique skill set to a marketplace which was never available for them earlier before the internet. Elance, a website which connects freelance workers with projects recently posted a summary of how the global marketplace works and it shows how geographically vast and diverse it is. Compared to the overall organized outsourcing marketplace , the freelance marketplace is still miniscule ($245 million) but amazing to see how incredibly diverse and global it is.
For buyers of freelance work, maybe an individual setting up his own personal website, or a small business looking to get things done in a budget, freelance individuals offers an opportunity to get things done virtually at price points which did not exist earlier.Some interesting facts from the elance report ( LINK):
- Around 310K project posted in the last 12 months
- Total of around 100K providers on the website
- Earnings from these projects on Elance – $245 million
- Mobile application growth by 180%
- India the leading provider for IT related work (Programming, Website)
- US leading for Creative work ( article writing, Graphic Design)
- US based freelancers leading for marketing related work (Internet marketing, SEO, lead generation)
- If you can write well you can make a living as a freelancer. One of the highest sought after skills
- In IT development – PHP, HTML, MySQL lead the skills desired.
- California, New York and Texas have the largest number of states doing freelance work
The reality of this also reflects the signs of time. The growth of the Permanent Temporary worker ( Business Week Jan 25th, 2010). Freelancing offers an opportunity for people to sell their services, competitively to people across the globe.
One thing which the facts don’t mention and will be interesting to see will be the origin of the projects. That is are the project mostly from the companies in the west ( Which I bet will be true). So technically this is still outsourcing and like any structured outsourcing initiatives, things which are closer to clients – creative, marketing, sales are kept closer to home ( More US based providers). The technical aspect of development are easier to outsource to location independent , but cheapest providers ( Programming, Website development etc.)
The study also showcases trends in technology changes ( Mobile growth of 180% is evidence of this, Growth of Android as a development platform).
For the right firms and individuals this virtual workforce presents an incredible lab to startup ventures cost effectively. Managing and defining remote work is though not without it’s challenges and small or large, global teams will have similar challenges on communications, expectations. IP based work, copyright infringement and structure to go after a provider if something goes wrong is incredibily hard in smaller projects.
Never the less this freelance outsourcing economy presents an incredible in sight into the globalization at grass roots in the service industry. Plus if you have the skills which you can package and offer, an opportunity to get additional source of income.
Would like to hear from firms and primarily individuals, who can leverage this as the sole source of income though.
Mohit Sharma is the CEO of Corrystone Global Partners. Corrystone is a specialized globalization firm providing advisory, education and staffing services to firms in US and India. We work with firms in the US which are exploring low cost options for IT, Business Process work and looking at ways to further optimize cost and manage operational risk. For firms based in India we help with marketing presence , M&A & client management services in the US. Contact us at info@corrystone.com to learn more about how we could help you.
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