What's the impact on local economies?
This new form of employment spreads the available work around. It drives soft skills and engagement with a range of employers. For local businesses, it can dramatically lower the costs and risks of hiring.
It's still early days, but we're beginning to see what kind of forces might progressively be unleashed by widespread adoption of a hyper-efficient marketplace for “bits of work”. The following factors can be documented in the East London market which has been running since December 2005.
| “New Work” created | Some of what SoT does is spread existing work around (eg making it easier and cheaper to hire top-up workers rather than relying on overtime which concentrates work in a few households). But it also creates work that wouldn’t otherwise be in the economy. Examples include leafleting (once it becomes cheap/effortless to organise it can be a better use of marketing budgets than press advertising) and hiring top-up workers instead of just getting-by understaffed. |
| Personalised ramp into employment | Our biggest East London buyer, East Thames Housing has moved to a policy of interviewing SoT sellers who have done 10+ bookings for various departments for full time vacancies. Many of those people lack the formal skills that would normally be required but have proved themselves in SoT bookings. |
| Fast track CV | Our sellers have learned the value of their “My Bookings” list which can be taken to job interviews or used in other situations where personal solidity needs to be proved (eg renting accommodation). It subjectively and authoritatively shows all the bookings they have done for multiple employers and how many have re-booked them. This is particularly valuable for individuals who have been out of the labour market for some time. |
| Soft skilling | SoT sellers work for a variety of employers at a variety of locations on their own terms. We can produce sellers who have demonstrably increased their self-confidence and communications abilities as a result. |
| Multi-skilling | SoT makes it uniquely economical for employers to bulk-train a pool of SoT sellers. 20 people with a track record of reliability can cheaply and instantly be booked for a 2 hour induction session after which the organisation has a pool of trained top-up workers to draw on in times of need. |
| Drives computer usage | For the time-rich, cash-poor, there can be little incentive to take up internet usage even when access is available locally at no cost. SoT provides a compelling reason: earn money now! |
| Minimising the informal economy | Currently if you want irregular “bits of work” the easiest route is cash-in-hand working. We have sellers who were temped into the legitimate economy by SoT. |
Case studies
