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in this issue
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WAITING FOR SLIVERS: Changing Lives
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SLIVERS FUTURES: Kick-ass Kirklees
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TIP: Get a friend to multimap it
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CASE STUDY: Postering the park
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WAITING FOR SLIVERS: Changing lives |
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We're really beginning to see why people need to work Slivers-of-Time. www.sliversoftime.com was set up to link people to their local market and includes an optional comments box. People have started using it to tell us their reasons for needing Slivers.
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Karen: Slivering to Spain |
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Karen Black, 38, of Essex found she needed to work in this new way after being made redundant from her job as a charity administrator. “I decided to do something drastic, and I've always had this pull towards Spain”. She recalls. She's going to move to the Costa del Sol and pursue her dream career: singing in hotels. How could she support herself over a few months of unpredictable shuttling backwards and forwards to sell her house, find new accommodation and line up the first gigs? Sell Slivers of course!
People who need a Slivers-of-Time marketplace because their life has changed unexpectedly are a recurring theme in the comments box. There are relationship break-ups leaving people with new living expenses, cut backs in overtime even a heartfelt commitment to fund village children in Africa.
For Steve Punchard, 42, in Portsmouth, everything changed as his Dad, 75, became increasingly infirm. “I was on a full time course to get plumbing qualifications but it was clear Dad needed me at home, so I had to give up the course” he explains. Now Steve needs to work around his Dad's health. “There are good days when I could be out earning, but on bad days I need to be there to help him to the bathroom, prepare the meals or run him to the hospital”.
Why do you need Slivers? editor@sliversoftime.com
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| SLIVERS FUTURES: Kick-ass Kirklees |
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Some local councils can be a bit sleepy. Some are quite dynamic. And then there's the Metropolitan Borough of Kirklees. Based at Huddersfield Town Hall the authority is known for pioneering new schemes to get local people into work. Now they're launching Slivers-of-Time for a six month pilot with roll out to the rest of West Yorkshire if it's successful.
Dyanmic Huddersfield Town Hall |
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The council has its own agency, WorkLink. As Council Business Development Officer Tony Kelly explains, Kirklees quickly raised £97,000 to fund staff time for developing a Slivers marketplace. Half of it came from the EU's Equal fund, the rest in match funding from the council. Now Tony and two colleagues each work a third of their time on getting the new market off the ground. They aim to launch in February with evaluation by end of June.
Tony and the team appreciate that getting the market going is all about finding the organisations who will be the first buyers of Slivers-of-Time. “We have a three-pronged approach” he says. “The council is the biggest employer locally, we're looking at our own need for top-up workers. Then we're doing outreach to local companies with a specific need for Slivers and employers who already have a relationship with WorkLink”.
There's no problem finding people to sell in the new market. Over 300 people around Huddersfield have already registered at www.sliversoftime.com. And WorkLink plan to offer Slivers to local Incapacity Benefit claimants. Tony says it's not right for everyone, but it's been discussed with the people they think need this way of working. He says“they're definitely ready for it!”.
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| TIP: Get a friend to multi-map it |
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If you're willing to work at short notice you will sometimes get bookings when you're away from home. Use the postcode in your first text message and get a friend to type it into www.multimap.co.uk Then they can talk you through how to get to the place of work.
Cartoon by Slivers-of-Time seller Shamina Aktar Koli.
[Bookings: 35, Hours sold: 104, Buyers: 7]. |
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| CASE STUDY: Postering the park |
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Sometimes, buying Slivers-of-Time is an act of desperation. Lizzie Treip runs East London charity Friends of Mile End Park. They periodically use a distrubtion company to deliver posters promoting park activities to local schools. But, for one poster run, the company had other bookings and announced they weren't available for the task 24 hours before posters were due. The immediate solution for FOMEP? Hire a courier firm to do 20 delivery runs. |
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Park: poster crisis
It's a problem a lot of small businesses and charities face; they're just not important to their suppliers who have much bigger accounts to service. That's why motivated local people available for odd hours can be so valuable. FOMEP ended up booking 8 sellers for 2 hours that day. As Lizzie says “Slivers-of-Time sellers were a life saver”! |
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| Slivers-of-Time: the basics |
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Slivers-of-Time working is only now viable. The UK leads the world in its development. These marketplaces are for:
1) Anyone who wants to work around other things in their life, such as:
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childcare
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studying
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part-time work
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caring for adult
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medical commitments
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starting own enterprise
2) Organisations who need top-up workers at short notice, for short periods:
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councils
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caterers
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retailers
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logistics supplier
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service providers
Benefits:
Sellers: do whatever odd hours of work they want and quickly build skills, experience and a track record in many different types of work.
Buyers: access a self-selecting pool of local people who choose to work in a way that demands flexibility and rewards reliability.
Link to your local market:
Anyone who wants to know when a marketplace is starting in their area should enter their details at:
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