Freelancing has never been bigger in Ireland – just over 10% of the 3.2 million Irish working population now describe themselves as ‘self-employed’.

Ireland isn’t alone in this trend either. In 2018, the US reported a rise of 7% in freelancing, while the UK experienced a 31% surge. In fact, freelancers contribute approximately £145 billion to the UK economy – a valuable asset for any organisation.

Now the norm rather than the exception in a multitude of industries, freelancer management is becoming yet another challenge that businesses and HR teams are faced with. As the saying goes, businesses up and down the country are asking themselves how they can get ‘the best bang for their buck’; how can they identify the best freelancers for their projects?

This article will delve into the ‘Do’s’ & ‘Don’ts’ of freelancer management for your HR team.
 
Managing the Freelancer
The clue is in the name… ‘free’-lancer. The whole purpose of being a freelancer is to escape the boundaries that often come with the traditional 9-5, office-based job. You’re free to work where you want to work, be it in your bedroom, a local café or a hotdesking space. You’re free to work the hours that you want to work, and once you are successful, you can decide which clients you want to work with, not who your boss has got on contract.

This might be great news if you are the freelancer, but for the business, this means growing a level of trust within this relationship. It means having a level of faith in your freelancer and a belief that they will deliver what they say they will within the given deadline.

However, it shouldn’t all rest on a game of faith. Here are some tips for managing your freelancers:

1. DO Your Research 

There is nothing worse than finding out that a hired freelancer cannot deliver on what you need. You might hire a marketing professional expecting someone with up-to-date graphic design skills, or a software developer that perhaps has too much other work on. Regardless, research is key.

Whether you search for reviews online or ask around your LinkedIn network, research freelancers, the skills they have on offer and past experiences will help you to separate the best from the adequate.

With the rise of freelancing, a popular alternative to finding the right contractor talent has emerged: freelancer comparison platforms. Giving your business access to an array of local freelancers for you to try, these platforms, like Toptal, are proving invaluable for businesses under tight deadlines and pressure to find the right person for their projects.
 

1. DO Communicate Effectively

Once you have hired your freelancer, it’s crucial that you keep communication high on the agenda. While they might pop into the office now and again, most freelancers will work remotely.

From video calls to monthly meetings at an agreed location, keeping in regular contact with your contractors will let them know that you value their contribution, keep them in the loop around project developments and make them feel like they are part of your team, regardless of employment status.
 

1. DO Make Yourself Approachable

Approachability for any manager is key, regardless of who you are dealing with in your workplace. However, it can be a particular challenge for a freelancer; they haven’t had the time that your employees have had to develop their relationship with you.

Ensuring that you remain available for any queries from your freelancers will help to boost your approachability and develop these relationships, a key element for effective and strategic communication.
 

1. DON’T Allow a Lack of Accountability

Your freelancers may work remotely and during their own working hours or schedules. They might have different lifestyles or different styles of work.

However, this should never go before accountability. If you feel a freelancer isn’t pulling their weight, or isn’t working cohesively with the rest of your team, step in. Alongside your HR team, ensure that this freelancer has the right equipment and knowledge to deliver the project effectively. If their work doesn’t improve, ask why.

You might feel tentative to approach a freelancer in this way, knowing that their work style may be so different from your own. But the work needs done – make sure that is happening.
 

1. DON’T Expect Freelancers to be Anything Else

Part-timers, temps, full-time commitments and the freelancers; we get it, it can be hard to juggle everyone, their contracts and their working patterns.

However, remembering what exactly a freelancer is, what is expected of them, and what is expected of you is important for your freelancing relationships.

You should not expect freelancers to report to your place of work daily or take the same lunch breaks as you.

Instead treat your freelancers as just that – freelancers. This will build positive working relationships and provide you with the bonus of having a list of talented workers you can rely on when you need projects completed and your own staff need a helping hand.
 
Freelancer 101
Utilising your HR team, ensure you manage your freelancers effectively. Communicate with them and remain approachable at all times, treat them as freelancers and ensure you keep them accountable.

​Your business will boom, you’ll meet your project deadlines and most of all, you’ll expand your talent pool. 
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Time, money, resources – they’re all limited when you work in a small business. Between juggling your need to keep up performance alongside staff job satisfaction, training and professional development has a habit of falling into the background, especially as your small company grows.

But training is a vital component for any business. It’s what keeps staff feeling refreshed, operations ‘on point’, and reputation high on the agenda. Fail to invest in professional and personal development, and you will quickly find both your employees and customers looking elsewhere.

Irish unemployment is at a crucial low of 4.5% - can your company compete for talent? Getting the most out of staff training and investment could be your key.
 
Top HR Department Tips for Staff Training

1. Research, Research, Research

There is nothing worse for a time-strapped employee than being asked to attend a workshop or conference that bears no relevance or key training that will help them with their jobs.

Between the earlier alarm call to catch a train or flight, the stress of finding the location and the boring, overestimated speaker, your employee can be left frustrated with the loss of time and lack of learning. Meanwhile, you have failed to improve employee skills and lost out financially.

Doing your research on the best courses or host associations is key. Implementing a mentoring scheme in work can help senior staff identify what skills their junior colleagues could benefit from, while e-learning courses give employees the option to develop more flexibly, avoiding the dreaded stress of commuting to courses, or juggling family commitments.

By taking the time to understand which skills you need to improve in your employees and the best training options available, you can get the most out of the resources, money and time that you use as a business to develop your workforce.

1. If In Doubt, Ask!

Even in a small business, it can be a struggle to understand what your staff desire; what training they want and what skills or equipment they feel they need to do their jobs better.

While you might have an idea of the needs of the overall organisation, some employees may be more experienced than others in different aspects of their jobs. Some may have received training in previous employment, while others may want to develop some skills associated more closely to their particular job title and role within the company.

As an employer, you can maximise training opportunities by evaluating what the business needs as a whole, as well as ask staff to request training that they are interested in and feel would improve their jobs. Whether it is a certain course or provider they have heard of or taking part in Personal Development Plans during their appraisals to voice their own training goals, your staff can help you to invest efficiently in development, so you can get more bang for your buck.

1. After-Training Feedback

If a training course or conference doesn’t deliver, staff may feel unable to share that with you, conscious of the money & resources you may have used up to send them.

Implementing a process through your HR team, whereby staff can share feedback on the courses they have attended and their recommendations for future training, will give you an insight into the quality of courses or conferences you are investing in, and help you evaluate your choices for future professional development.
 
Train Your Way to the Top
All companies, especially small businesses, struggle to give up the time, money and resources to provide employee development and training. Weeding out the useful from the irrelevant courses, as well as recognising staff training goals will help you to invest in the right training for the right person, at the right time.

​Make sure your resources aren’t wasted – research and use your HR team to ask staff the right questions, before and after you embark on your training journey. 

Irish professionals are taking their career beyond the limits of the 9-5 contract with the side hustle and improving their quality of life in the process.

Known as ‘slashies’ because their job title contains more than one occupation, these workers create a secondary job for themselves by turning a hobby into a second source of income. 

With Generations Y and Z entering the world of work, this multi-faceted professional lifestyle is here to stay as today’s worker becomes more and more professionally multi-faceted.

Employers may think ‘Why should I risk hiring a side hustler?’. Anyone not 100% dedicated to the company is a liability, right?

Wrong.

Having a passion outside of the business doesn’t make workers any less dedicated within the business, it allows them a creative outlet which speaks to who they are.

Against the background of high competition for talented staff, it is vital that employees’ hobbies are accepted and supported especially when they turn it into a side business!

While there are no official Irish statistics, the Independent revealed that almost two-fifths of UK employees have a side hustle and this figure is expected to continue to grow.

Are you ready to find out why these individuals are key to your workplace’s future? 
 
Here are the HR Department’s top 5 reasons why you should encourage your workers get in on the hustle…

1. Passion

Your employees’ passions come in all different forms so it’s important to encourage them to pursue them. Support for their personal interests outside of work will upkeep their passion for their job with you. This zeal will add a quality to employees’ work which is otherwise difficult to manufacture.

Encouraging new lifestyles for your workers to accommodate their outside interests whether through remote working or some other method will drive employee motivation during working hours because their personal needs are being met.

1. Security For You and For Them

With multiple sources of income, your employees will have improved job security and therefore, an improved sense of wellbeing. With less stress about paying for their expenses, employees will be more content with their salary.

This is not to suggest that you shouldn’t promote employees who deserve it but for SMEs who have less to spend on wages, it can be a great way of building profits until you can properly afford raises and other accolades for team members.

1. Highly Employable

One fear of employers is that the side hustle will detract from their primary job which is vastly untrue. In fact, a Forbes study revealed that 48% of side hustlers spend less than five hours a week on their external projects.  

Why are we put off by those who have start-ups or other businesses and yet we ask for self-starters on our job advertisements?

Those who are personally motivated to generate success in their spare time are often the types of individuals who take initiative and are very organised and it is these individuals who bring multiple types of experience which are invaluable to your SME!  

1. A Chance to Infuse Meaning 

Many employers focus on how their employees find meaning from their job but what about the meaning they find in their personal endeavours?

Helping employees find meaning in their life helps employees get into a forward-thinking mindset in which they feel able to create their future.

This boost in personal agency will help them feel more empowered to provide high-quality customer service and to be an integral contributor to the team.

A commitment to your employees’ meaning of life outside of work is going the extra mile for them, a gesture which will likely breed loyalty and emotional connection to your workplace.

1. The Opportunity for a Healthy Employer-Employee Relationship

One of the negative stereotypes about side hustlers is that their daily performance becomes drained by moonlighting.

It’s important to remember that a part-time passion doesn’t mean that their productivity during their full-time hours is necessarily in jeopardy.

Often while their side hustle brings them extra money and fulfilment, employees will want to stay in their fulltime job for the salary, stability and benefits it offers.

Building a give-and-take relationship with those who do other forms of work could unexpectedly boost the health of your business processes.  

An example of how this could be done would be to communicate that their other work can’t be completed during working hours but respect that you have no sway over what they work on in their own time. Boundaries and respect from both parties breed a stronger relationship.
 
Side Hustle in a Nutshell
We need to rewrite the narrative of the fickle side hustler as making passions a reality is key to your employees’ self-actualisation.

Side hustlers who are supported in their passions will feel more fulfilled and can therefore bring something extra to your business as positive company representatives, people with greater job security and unique skills from their wealth of experience.

While multi-faceted careers bring more to think about, it also gives you a greater opportunity to build a meaningful relationship with your employees, one that will last the test of time.

​So, how are you going to show your support of the side hustler today to embrace your workplace’s future? 

Internships have experienced a popular rise in recent years, particularly amongst those career fields such as the arts that lack the funds for full-time, permanent roles.

But it isn’t just the interns that need the experience; businesses are increasing strapped to find the right talent & skills needed. While Ireland remains on the cusp of full employment, this multiple industry skills shortfall isn’t set to disappear any time soon.

Summer is upon us, schools and universities have finished up, and so too are its students & alumni. Why not fill those skills, give young talent an opportunity to develop their experience, and attract your future employees by offering robust and valuable internships? Check out why internships are important for your business, and the pitfalls to avoid.
 
Why An Intern?

• Performance Upkeep

As Summer holidays begin, many of your permanent staff may be looking forward to switching off and catching some rays somewhere for a week. But what about your performance?

While it may only be temporary, if a business is without several team members, productivity can slip and lead to customers or clients becoming unhappy.

Having a trained intern or two already available can help to level off some of this loss, and ensure your business keeps up its performance throughout the Summer period.

• Talent Gaps

On the other hand, Ireland has never been as close to full employment. Compared to 16% when the recession hit hard, unemployment now stands at an all-time-low of 4.4%, according to the Central Statistics Office.

Businesses across the island are finding it increasingly hard to attract talent, with competition driving up wage bills as a result.

Implementing internships can grab great talent early and give your business the opportunity to ‘sell’ and prove itself with these candidates. This will only make it easier to retain this talent permanently in the future.

• Fresh Perspective

Giving a candidate an internship will help them to learn new skills and develop a greater experience in your sector. However, an intern can also provide a fresh perspective and valuable feedback on your organisation from the ground up.

Whether it’s their views on the management model, to the training that they have received, this retrospect will only help improve your business and operations.
 
Pitfalls To Avoid
While internships are great for your business, it is important to tread carefully.

• No Pay, No Way!

Young candidates are growing increasingly weary of poorly paid or unpaid internships as a sign that your business will not offer practical experience, and that you do not care for your interns and the skills that they can bring.

Put simply, people are fed up working for free. In our low-level unemployment environment, young candidates will go elsewhere in their hunt for new skills and fair pay. Offering a reasonably paid internship will reap the best talent and the maximum benefits for your business.

• Poor Preparation

Whether you forget they are coming, fail to have a designated staff member to mentor them, or you haven’t enough tasks for them to work on, an internship can quickly become a boring exercise of administration.

While it might be great to get some tedious databases cleaned up, an intern won’t see it that way. Instead, they will view your business as disorganised and a negative place to work, leading to a poor word-of-mouth reputation when that intern returns to University during the next term.

Poor preparation for an internship will leave you without your skills gaps filled, while the Intern will fail to learn anything new or valuable, resulting in a waste of both time and opportunity.
 
Time for Skills, Time for Interns
The talent crunch is on. It’s time that you use your HR department to address this, seek out the skills that you need and implement robust, valuable internships that will reap these skills and introduce new talent to your business.

​Ensuring internships offer fair pay, a great experience and a valuable opportunity for professional skills development will attract the best candidates that could form part of your future workforce.