We believe that creative freelancers are bumping along the bottom of the bend in the 'U-shaped' model of demand, writes Emma Brierley, the founder and chief executive of Xchangeteam, a creative recruitment agency .
The government's fiscal measures have helped to restore calm to the marketplace and clients are beginning to plan again but remain highly cautious as confidence still remains low.
As a result demand for creative freelancers has improved but is not showing any "V-shaped" recovery, recently projected for the UK by the Bank of England, and we don't think we will see signs of this until 2010 at the earliest.
In the meantime there will be spikes of demand as companies need extra support or specialist skills to do key projects. But until clients become more confident, this demand will be lumpy at best. From a freelancer's point of view, demand for freelancers will return quicker than a desire to add more permanent headcount; the issue is that marketing budgets need to be unfrozen for this to happen and of course that needs a vital injection of confidence.
Currently we are seeing strongest demand in industry sectors such as healthcare and commodities. If you are operating in a part of the creative market where there are still skills shortages such as digital, particularly the video, mobile, and social media spaces, then you should be experiencing higher demand for your skills than those parts of the market where there is an abundance of talent.
Clients do still firmly believe and state that they will likely recruit more freelancers this year as a way to cover workload and projects. When that will start to happen is still early to tell as the future global economy looks both unpredictable and uncertain. Caution is what seems to prevail at the moment until an upturn is more recognisable. Yet because creative markets are led by and dependent on the commercial side, there will be more positive movements in freelance increase when new pitches are won and ad revenue increases.
Moving forward most of our clients feel that the second half of this year will be more positive. There are still pockets of growth and these offer freelancers opportunity.
Finally, with change comes opportunity. As companies "restructure" so the immediate need to plug gaps means that there are freelance opportunities where they didn't exist before. And there continues to be demand for good candidates. Even clients who are not looking for freelancers will potentially hire someone from a competitor or a freelancer who has A++ work. Good targeting is therefore key.
At Xchangeteam, we believe we are still in for a bumpy ride, with demand for creative freelancers still very competitive and likely to remain so for the rest of this year.
The views and opinion of Emma Brierley, Xchangeteam Group’s CEO and the author of Talent on Tap; Getting the best from freelancers, interims and consultants.
Jun 10, 2009
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