But work-life balance is only part of the picture. Technology and the economy’s march toward specialization has rewarded people willing to provide narrowly defined services to a select list of clients. The result, say economists, has been an increasing symbiosis between big global firms and entrepreneurs: instead of hiring the talented workers on a permanent basis, the giants build business-to-business relationships with them, contracting their services when needed, in some cases keeping them on retainer. The arrangement can work as well for the upstart as it does for the corporate giant. Bonnycastle, for one, boasts a list of blue-chip clients that has included McDonald’s, Vancity Group and Bell Canada. “I think I’m the future,” says the 44-year-old. “All companies have their ebbs and flows, but because I work for several clients, I have year-round work.”
Linda Duxbury, a professor at Carleton University’s Sprott School of Business, agrees that the new reality can be liberating to the gifted and ambitious (though studies suggest they work just as many hours as employees with equivalent skills). It’s large firms and institutions, she warns, who might regret the implications, because their need for brains is as urgent as their need to keep a lid on labour costs. “These people starting their own businesses are also the ones employers are going to really want to hire,” explains Duxbury, who studies changes in Canada’s labour force and workplaces. “It leads to a situation I call ‘jobs without people and people without jobs.’ We’re going to have a shortage of people at the talent end, and an oversupply of people with no skills that the market needs.”
【Ebbs and flows】相关文章:
最新
2020-09-15
2020-08-28
2020-08-21
2020-08-19
2020-08-14
2020-08-12