The world of the workforce has experienced a significant change along with the increase of freelancers as the internet technology provides flexibility in terms of time and space. Based on data from Jora Indonesia, a job vacancy info site that shows vacancies from the company’s career page, the majority of job seekers in Indonesia currently come from the 18-24 year age category (58.02%) where freelance work goes into the top five jobs most sought in Indonesia. The rise of freelancers is what we call it the ‘Gig Economy’.

According to Sribu Corner, those who choose to work as freelancers are 47% for a flexible time. They can manage the time and place of work more freely. Forbes reported that by 2030, millennials will be no longer interested in 9 to 5 work model like today.

For companies, the availability of freelancers allows them to get the workforce in quick to fill out posts that are needed for short term while saving costs. Say, when a company needs additional personnel to produce additional content on the website or additional workforces for certain event. However, there are several risks that need to be understood by the company if working with freelancers, including the risks of corporate data confidentiality and communication problems.

These risks arise because the company certainly cannot control the work hour and place of freelance workers. Of course, there are sensitive company data that can only be accessed by certain parties in the company, even not all employees can access them, let alone freelance workers. In addition to data confidentiality. Another risk is the problem of communication: freelance workers could be difficult to reach out or absent from responsibility without notice.

What can the company do in managing the risk of hiring freelancers? Here are the four tips

1. Do background checks when recruiting. Same for permanent employees, the company needs to do background checks for freelance workers who even bring greater risks.
2. Make sure the freelance contract specifically states that all products or work products belong to the company and the workers cannot use it in any way. It is strongly recommended that companies ask the freelance workers to sign non-disclosure contracts.
3. If company facilitates freelancers with laptop devices, make sure they are equipped with a strong security system, for example, full disk encryption, malicious software protection, VPN, firewall, content filter, strong patching system and monitoring as well as authentication and authorization.
4. Delete all passwords that allow the workers access the work file or other company’s data after they have completed all the tasks and have fulfilled the contract.

Sources:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/open-economy/are-freelance-workers-a-security-risk/

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