The Gig Economy and Hiring Short-Term Staff

As the gig economy grows, our economy is changing. It’s becoming increasingly common for companies to hire short-term freelance or contract workers for help on big projects or tasks that require advanced skills.

In fact, a recent survey of 500+ workers found that [nearly half of businesses (45%) hired new employees for their technical skills in the past year.

At the same time, your current staff might feel nervous about their future careers. After all, many workers struggle to master the advanced technical skills contractors swoop in to provide. Employees might fear being replaced or downsized, and this could interfere with their ability to effectively collaborate with someone who has skills they lack.

If you are preparing to lead your team in collaborating with a tech savvy contractor, you can use this article to learn 3 tips for making the process smoother.

Host Team Building Events

The easiest way to build rapport between your current team and someone new is to give all employees a chance to get to know one another on a personal level.

If you’re paying a contractor on an hourly basis, you might be tempted to skip this step. But a simple team building event, such as a working lunch or happy hour at the end of the day, will go a long way in signaling that your employees should treat freelance or contract hires as full members of the team, even if they’ll only be working together for a short period of time.

If you are working with a remote contractor, you can still facilitate effective team building by using digital tools. Be sure to allow contractors access to company tools such as Slack, where group channels can help everyone get to know each other better.

When people connect in a non-work context, it’s much easier to build trust and enjoy working together.

Task Non-Technical Employees With Sharing Institutional Knowledge

Even though most companies must adopt new technology to keep pace with industry changes, their institutional knowledge, values, and culture should inform how they adapt.

If you plan to hire a contractor to work with your in-house team for an extended period of time, you should consider empowering non-technical workers to train him or her in your company’s values, vision, and current processes.

This approach provides two key benefits. First, it’s another way to arrange opportunities for in-house staff to work closely with a short-term hire, which can strengthen communication and collaboration.

Additionally, sharing institutional knowledge will help your contractor deliver work or propose new approaches that are already aligned with your organization’s rhythms and values. This can prevent costly mistakes, such as launching a campaign that is at odds with what your company stands for.

Instead of sharing an easily-ignored one pager on your company culture or failing to provide context at all, you can allow short-term hires to learn about your company culture by experiencing it first hand.

Prioritize Coaching Skills When Hiring Technical Workers

If you’ll need your short-term hire to collaborate seamlessly with your in-house team, you should pay special attention to evaluating a potential contractor’s coaching skills during the hiring process.

Chances are, there are plenty of candidates who have the technical skills you need, but it’s much harder to teach someone how to coach others, especially when you’ll only be working together for a limited time.

This is especially important when hiring a short-term worker who will be advising on how to change current work processes. If in-house staff are ordered to change work processes too abruptly, it’s the kind of disruption to routine can negatively affect morale – especially if the changes involve mastering new technology.

Your current employees will be less likely to resist the advice of a technical consultant when it’s delivered in a friendly, approachable way.

Final Thoughts: Communication and Team Building Are Key to Successful Collaboration

As more businesses turn to short-term hires to guide them through changes in technology, business leaders must find ways to blend short-term workers with their in-house teams.

Collaboration can become especially difficult if in-house staff feel threatened by a consultant’s technical expertise, or if managers don’t devote enough time to simple team building practices.

By approaching short-term collaboration with an intentional strategy, leaders can ensure smoother communication and a better end result.

About the Author

Michelle Delgado is a content developer and marketer at Clutch, a B2B ratings and reviews firm. She reports on HR and the future of work.