The gig economy’ sometimes gets a bad rap – people hear it and they think of ride-share drivers who really want to be full time.   In fact though the gig economy is a much more nuanced place, one that encompasses different kinds of gig workers, including those who are highly skilled and who very much want to work the way that they are doing. Pre-pandemic, they perhaps made up a sliver of the workforce, but there are reasons to believe that in the post-pandemic world they are going to be increasingly important, That is, companies will be looking for the right talent and the right way to get that may not be by hiring full time workers. That is going to leave us with a complicated workforce, one that is a blend of employees and gig workers. So who how can companies build the right culture around this new culture? To talk about what is happening and how organizations can adapt we are joined by Joseph Fuller Professor of Management Practice at the Harvard Business School and a co-leader of the school’s initiative called Managing the Future of Work. He is also the lead author of a new report out called Building the On Demand Workforce which centres around how companies can re-think their talent model by using digital talent platforms to get the best freelancers.

Guest: 

Joseph B. Fuller

Professor of Management Practice, Harvard Business School

Joseph Fuller is a Professor of Management Practice in General Management and co-leads the school’s initiative, Managing the Future of Work. He currently teaches the Becoming a General Manager course in the second year of the MBA program and formerly headed The Entrepreneurial Manager course in the program’s first year. A 1981 graduate of the school, Joe was a founder and first employee of the global consulting firm, Monitor Group, now Monitor-Deloitte. He served as the Chief Executive Officer of its commercial consulting operations until 2006 and remained a Senior Advisor to the firm until its acquisition by Deloitte in 2012. During his three decades in consulting, Fuller worked with senior executives and policymakers on a wide variety of issues related to corporate strategy and national competitiveness. He has particularly deep experience in industries with a heavy reliance on technology, such as life sciences, ICT and the defense and aerospace industries. He is currently researching the evolution of the role of the CEOs and the C-suite in public companies.

Links:

Here is the link for the Managing the Future of Work project at the Harvard Business School https://www.hbs.edu/managing-the-future-of-work/Pages/default.aspx

The paper ‘Managing the On-Demand Workforce’ mentioned ib the podcast

https://www.hbs.edu/managing-the-future-of-work/research/Pages/building-the-on-demand-workforce.aspx

Podcast: Play in new window | Download