Say Goodbye to the Organization Guy!
By Wendy Kent, Sales & Recruiting Director
Are you ready to fly and leave the corporate nest? Are you ready to cut the ties that bind you to one corporation, one product or service, one manager and one job?
Become a member of the fastest growing segment of the job market – become a free agent.
A revolutionary concept is sweeping America. During the last recession people became fed up with dead end careers, unfulfilling positions, and lack of employer loyalty, political agendas and dysfunctional workplaces. The result of this is a growing number of free agents. These individuals “are free from the bonds of a large institution and are agents of their own future.” Says Daniel Pink, author of Free Agent Nation.
In today’s market the largest private employer is not Microsoft, it is Manpower Inc., a temporary agency.
In the first half of the twentieth century we had the “organizational man.” Typically tethered to a large organization with explicit corporate paternalism, these organizations operated much like parents, taking care of their own. Gone are the days of Ma Bell and Mother Met.
In the first half of the twenty-first century the new representative figure is the independent worker who operates on his or her own terms, serving multiple clients and customers instead of a single organization.
There are typically three different kinds of free agents: soloists, contractors, and microbusinesses. Each works independently, but has nuances that make their situation unique.
> Next: The soloist
