KEY POINTS:
The trend towards a more casual workforce with fewer full-time employees is set to increase in the future, says the general manager of Hudson NZ.
Roman Rogers says it's an absolute win/win for employers and workers.
"It provides greater options for employers to meet their objectives and goals. It also allows the job seeker to make choices around whether they choose to be a full-time permanent employee or move into more of a casual job-share or contract type career moving forward."
In the past when organisations needed casual labour, they weren't as skilled at tapping into it. Often the retiree or parent wanting part-time work was not as aware of the opportunities. But Rogers says there is a lot more communication between the two parties now.
"In order to get New Zealand's productivity up, we need to be looking at being more flexible as to how we have our workforce. Much of that is around casual labour and job sharing."
With people less inclined to live for their work, many are only looking for part-time or job-share situations.
Rogers says there are a lot of experienced and successful professionals who are looking to wind down the number of hours they spend at work.
Whether it's because they're starting families or just wanting more work/life balance, more skilled workers are going for casual work.
"They've got a whole raft of experience that they can apply on a project basis."
Many businesses are also operating more on a per-project basis and are more timid when it comes to taking on full-time employees.
"From the employer perspective, it's around the awareness of the shortage of talent out there. I think part of this too is that when employers look to 2008/2009 there is some wariness to a degree around the economic outlook."
Rogers says the upcoming election year is also creating uncertainty for employers and many are prone to go with the safer option and simply use contract labour.
"The low unemployment issue is not going away. People need to be and are exercising greater care when they go about bringing people into their workforce."
But Rogers says deciding how to utilise contract workers can be tricky. It's important that full-time employees participate in some of the project work so that they don't become alienated. Permanent staff can be assigned the new and interesting assignments while casuals do their usual everyday tasks.
"It's a great opportunity to engage and develop the capability of your employees by putting them on the projects and backfilling their role with some casual workers," Rogers says.
If casuals are given the project work then they are also gaining all the experience regarding that new project. When the contract is finished, all of that experience walks out the door with them.
These special projects are also usually funded separately, so finding money for additional contract workers is generally not an issue.
"When organisations look at projects, they actually fund it and create a budget specifically for that project so they can absorb the potential additional cost," Rogers says.
But it is not a free-for-all for contractors to charge whatever they like. In fact, Rogers says the gap between full-time pay and contractor pay is shrinking.
"Organisations are also aware of the fact too that if you bring this contract resource into your organisation at a higher rate to your existing employee base, there can be a sense of dissatisfaction and disengagement with your existing staff."
With the skill shortage, most contractors are confident to forego the company health insurance or gym membership for life on the outside.
"Most people know that if they need to pick up work that it is out there, it's a more comfortable situation for them to be in."
Employers are stricter about hiring full-time staff than they are in taking on a contractor. Few organisations expect casual workers to fit the mould of their company culture. Allen Lowyim, managing director of executive recruitment firm Low Yim Partners, says they're more interested in if they can do the work.
"If you've got a client looking for a resource, they want to know that that resource is a heavy hitter for what they need and overqualified for the role. There would be far more of a developmental curve for a full-time worker."
Casual workers need to have the hard and soft skills to earn repeat business. They need to be up with the play and be able to hit the ground running.
"You don't want them to come in and learn on your expense. You expect them to come in and get the task completed efficiently and in a cost-effective way," Lowyim says.
Whether it's the new parent who wants to work a couple of days a week or a retiree wanting to resume some work, casual workers are in demand. Lowyim says that it's particularly small- to medium-size enterprises which often don't require a full-time permanent professional but need some help. Even people in the prime of their careers are taking advantage of going casual.
"It cross-pollinates the experience that individual gains. That person is upskilling themselves with a broader range of experience and that experience can be brought across to different organisations," Lowyim says.
The variety of experience contractors gain makes it almost like having parallel careers.
"Casualisation has become an industry. It's now a mature industry. Once upon a time probably people would have seen contractors or consultants as being a little offbeat or a little strange, whereas it's pretty mainstream now."
One area where contractors are not so mainstream is with sales.
"In sales where you're building relationships, you really ideally don't want someone coming in for six months or 10 months and then disappearing. It's lack of continuity for the business and the relationships. No clientele wants to be dealing with a different account manager every six months," Lowyim says.
But just about every other sector is moving towards casualisation. Two factors compounding this trend are fewer corporates here and Gen Y.
"There's probably less loyalty because there are less corporates around now. That whole building and structuring of a career inside a corporate has disappeared. That is something that is going to stay with us given the whole advent of Gen Y."
For the small- to medium-sized business, taking on an employee is a big risk.
"If an organisation needs to adapt its resources, under the current employment laws, it's quite difficult to achieve that," Lowyim says.
More and more organisations are tending to go with casual workers and avoid the commitment of employing someone full-time.
"We've probably seen it from being on the peripheral to being mainstream. Most companies probably build it into their HR budgets now."
Rogers says organisations have been operating with a low head count in recent years and the trend towards using casual workers to fill those gaps is only going to increase.
"We've been relatively slow to adopt this as a country when compared with some of our international partners," Rogers says.
"And as we continue to see a flow of international talent into New Zealand, it's becoming more of the way in which we do things."
* www.davidmaida.com
