For years, the staffing and gig economy industries have leaned on a familiar (and convenient) story: that workers choose contract work because of the flexibility it offers. Unfortunately, many organizations took that headline and conflated it with many assumptions about what contract workers didn't want nor require.
If a worker wants flexibility, they probably don't want good benefits or opportunities for learning. Surely, they’re not interested in professional development. If workers wanted flexibility, did that mean they didn’t want to be treated like valued employees?
To get to the bottom of it all, we asked the contract workers what they really wanted — and the answers were illuminating.
It should come as no surprise that communication is top of mind for many contract workers. They want to know the terms of their work, when the deadlines are approaching, communication channels to use, and all the nitty-gritty details that make work, well, work.
Contractors see training and skill-building as the way to move from “just a contract” into the next level of their careers. It directly connects to the finding that most workers want permanent roles as their next step
Who doesn't want a little flexibility in their work? The crucial caveat here is that contract workers don't want to "trade" flexibility for an otherwise inferior work experience.
