Strategies for managing workers within the gig economy
Since the advent of online platforms (Kenney and Zysman, 2019) and the emergence of the
Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, there has been a widespread increase in gig workers across the
globe and specifically in the United Kingdom. Gig workers are increasingly contributing to the
United Kingdom economy. As it is today, the United Kingdom gig economy is estimated at 7.25
million which is approximately 22.1% of the total United Kingdom workforce (Office for
National Statistics, 2023).
The gig economy has gradually pushed aside the normal employment relationship between
employee and employer (Lee, Kusbit, Metsky and Dabbish, 2015). Most gig workers are not part
of the organisation (De Stefano, 2016) but they are temporal staff employed to perform certain
functions or services. The fact that organisations do not have formal authority over gig workers
makes it difficult to manage them effectively. Managers will need a few strategies to manage
workers within a gig economy. In this article, you will come across a series of strategies that
managers can employ to manage a gig workforce.
i. Provide a performance-based compensation
In its simplest form, performance-based compensation presupposes an additional compensation
usually paid out to employees that have performed beyond their job requirements at an extremely
high quality. Managers can adopt a performance-based compensation strategy to boost gig
workers morale so that they can perform their jobs diligently. It is a general belief that gig
workers are independent employees who are not entitled for many standard employment benefits
(Williams and Lebsock, 2019). This perception must be changed if managers seek to effectively
manage a gig economy workforce. This is because compensation can help to improve the
performance of gig workers in the future (Cook, Diamond, John and Oyer, 2019) and also induce
desired behaviours (Lieman, 2018). There is no standard of compensation as it can be in form of
prize money or hourly pay.
ii. Create a good job design
Job design can also be used by managers to manage a gig economic workforce. Managers must
take conscious efforts to organise tasks and duties of gig workers as this strategy will eliminate
unnecessary job tasks. Gig workers get fed up when do not know the responsibilities and duties
they are expected to carry out. A poorly designed job can set gig workers to fail and do the
wrong thing. This may create a recipe for frustration and a lead to lack of engagement (Kuhn,
2016). In essence, job design provides gig works with the possibility work whenever they want
(Stanford, 2017). Also, most gig workers work remotely because of its flexibility which a good
job design can provide. They prefer working with organisation that has a good design task that
can be completed in time and with minimal failure.
iii. Provide necessary trainings
If you want gig workers to do a great job, do not see them as contractors who are not part of
organisation. Just like normal employees, they also need to be trained. One of the reasons why it
is difficult to manage gig workers is that most organisations see gig worker’s training and
development as solely their own responsibility (McKeown, 2016). It must be noted that gig
workers often need personal development to remain current in terms of skills and knowledge
(Peel and Inkson, 2004). Organisations can employ the services of online intermediaries to offer
pre-employment training for gig workers prior to recruitment. Also, you can utilise a few remote
training tools such as eduMe to make your gig workers learn new skills and knowledge.
iv. Ensure effective communication
Communication has remained one of the most useful human resource strategies that managers
often use to effectively manage their employees. It is a glaring fact that managing people
effectively, motivating them and handling their situations are communication bound (Mitashree,
2018). A continuous flow of communication must be provided in order to instill a sense of
alignment in a gig worker. You can create a company newsfeed that will help remote workers
stay up-to-date on the business. Gig workers may not be happy when they are not given formal
performance reviews at the end of each assignment. It is through effective communication and
feedbacks that gig workers feel recognised.
v. Create an employee Database
Gig workers, just like your permanent employees, have some essential information that need to
be tracked. Creating an employee database for gig workers will enable you to keep track of their
emails, addresses, phone numbers and other relevant information. An employee database
connotes a digital filling cabinet that you can use to store critical employee data, including name,
job position, address and so on. Such employee database will give you a clue of where a gig
worker resides and how jobs are to be allocated to him or her in terms of location. Allocating
jobs with long distance may be hectic for an individual gig worker.
References
Cook, C. R., Diamond, J. H., John, A. L, and Oyer, P. (2018). The Gender Earnings Gap in the
Gig Economy: Evidence from over a Million Rideshare Drivers. Working Paper 24732. National
Bureau of Economic Research. [Link]
De Stefano, V. (2015) The rise of the just-in-time workforce: On-demand work, crowdwork, and
labor protection in the gig-economy. Comp. Lab. L. & Pol'y J. 37: 471
Kenney, M., and Zysman, J. (2019). Work and value creation in the platform economy. In Work
and labor in the digital age. Emerald Publishing Limited.
Kuhn, K. M. (2016), The rise of the “Gig Economy” and implications for understanding work
and workers, Industrial and Organizational Psychology, Vol. 9 No. 1, pp. 157-162.
Lee, M. K., Kusbit, L.K., Metsky, O and Dabbish, M.X. (2015) Working with machines: The
impact of algorithmic and data-driven management on human workers. Proceedings of the 33rd
Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. ACM, .
Lieman, R. (2018), Uber Voor Alles, Amsterdam, Business Contact.
McKeown, T. (2016), A consilience framework: Revealing hidden features of the independent
contractor, Journal of Management & Organization, Vol. 22 No. 6, pp. 779-796.
Office for National Statistics, 2023. Gig Economy Statistics United Kingdom.
Peel, S. and Inkson, K. (2004), Contracting and careers: choosing between self and
organizational employment, Career Development International, Vol. 9 No. 6, pp. 542-558.
Stanford, J. (2017), The resurgence of gig work: Historical and theoretical perspectives, The
Economic and Labour Relations Review, Vol. 28 No. 3, pp. 382-401.
Williams, P., McDonald, P., and Mayes, R. (2021). Recruitment in the gig economy: attraction
and selection on digital platforms. The International Journal of Human Resource Management,
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