Maybe more than you think, argued Julien Vayssiere, chief development architect at SAP, on SAP’s Community Network recently. In the thought-provoking post, Vayssiere notes that despite the endless chatter about “free agent nation,” he actually doesn’t see that many independent pros around him. Instead of being surrounded by contractors, freelancers and the like – those we usually think of as independent workers – Vayssiere observes that employees themselves are adopting the mindset of the independent worker:

Why don’t I see more free agents around me? Is it just because governments are slow at creating “laws that reflect the new workplace reality“? Is it because of my vantage point, being employed by a large IT firm? Is it that, in many places of the world, being an employee is still more advantageous in terms of taxes, financial safety and access to social benefits? Is it that Free Agency may, in the end, not be the key to freedom, self-fulfillment and wealth?

My opinion is that those of us who still appear as employees on the outside have started becoming free agents on the inside. We now plan careers, education, projects as if we were free agents, or could become free agents soon, even though we work within the context of “traditional” employment.

Let’s look at the way we work today. We make sure our LinkedIn profile is up to date. We groom our network of connections on a variety of social networks. We maintain a certain amount of social media activity as a projection of our work persona. In short, we build our personal brand and personal portfolio. Or, in the words of [The Individual Age Economics author Andrei] Cherny again, “today each individual is ultimately responsible for guiding their own career and economic future. Today, everyone is an entrepreneur; everyone is their own small business“. Whether we like this trend or not, whether we see this as a threat or an opportunity, I think it captures the way many knowledge workers have come to think about themselves and their situation in the workforce.

He closes with a series of questions, asking readers to weigh in on whether their experience aligns with his. “Is becoming a Free Agent something you desire or something you fear? Are you already a free agent?” he asks. These are good questions to ponder, and one could also ask if this shift towards a free agent mindset among traditional employees is a precursor to a full transformation to largely gig-based employment or a stable development unto itself that has ushered in a career reality that’s likely to be here to stay for awhile.

What do you think?

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That’s shaping not only the career trajectories of individual knowledge workers, but also the practice of HR and management as teams incorporate more and more contingent workers employed on a project-basis. If you’re running a team made up of a mix of traditional employees and independent contractors, how can you ensure that the independent pros under your supervision feel as engaged and appreciated as long-term employees?

It’s a question author Alexandra Levit tackled recently on the American Express OPEN Forum blog, offering several tips to ensure your freelancers and independent pros feel like family. Her ideas include:

Recognize their value. Contract workers want to make a contribution quickly–they know their livelihood depends on it. So read their status reports and results summaries and illustrate the big picture so they can see how their work is fueling a greater mission.

Treat them like employees. When a contingent worker needs training to complete a new type of responsibility or keep current in her field, facilitate it. Give regular performance evaluations and gather survey feedback just as you would for any full-time employee. If you’re happy with his work, reward him by providing access to other people and opportunities within the organization. Don’t make your contract workers feel like a vendor who should be lucky to be working with your company and can replaced at any minute.

Engage in team building. Remote workers are more effective when they have solid relationships with their co-workers. If it’s feasible, introduce your virtual contract workers to each other and to their full-time team members in person, as this will build rapport and engender greater trust and cooperation. You should also invite remote contingent workers to visit your office, or pop into their locations from time to time. This shows that you actually care enough about the relationship to behave like a manager.

Don’t create a subculture. In their text Essentials of Organizational Behavior, Timothy Judge and Stephen Robbins suggest that subcultures often develop in organizations to reflect common problems, situations or experiences. What you don’t want is for a negative contingent worker culture to develop in the absence of guidance from management. If your contingent workforce is to be effective, your company’s leadership must go out of its way to ensure that members feel welcome and are effectively integrated into the larger organizational culture.

For more info on these tips, as well as statistics on the rise of independent workers, check out the complete post.

What tips would you add to Levit’s list?

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Careers going slash is not exactly news (Fast Company recently dubbed the same phenomenon ‘Generation Flux’ in a fascinating series of articles) but one corollary of this shift is just getting started — the slash space. The boundaries between our different identities are blurring in time as many more of us work flexibly at multiple gigs or projects throughout the year, week or even day, and it seems the hard lines between spaces for work, family and play are also becoming less stark.

At least that’s what a spate of innovative new space ideas that blur personal and professional space begins to suggest. In Europe, for example, Regus and other flexible office space companies are tucking workspaces into transport hubs to cater to a more location independent, office hours agnostic work style. Reuters reports:

Regus… is opening 15 on-platform railway business lounges in the Netherlands, 60 to 100 in France, and more in Switzerland and Germany. Regus is looking to do the same in shopping malls in the U.S and Shell service stations globally. The firm’s first motorway-flanking office opened in January in France on the A10 Autoroute’s Limours-Janvry service station.

In Britain, The Office Group has signed a deal to open five drop-in offices at railway stations, starting with London Paddington in September.

But it’s not just the railway station/office that’s going slash. How about coworking/daycare? Forget leaving your personal commitments at the door as you head out to the office, Plug & Play, a new coworking space in Austin, Texas is offering freelancers, entrepreneurs and remote workers office space and childcare under one roof, allowing members to meet parental and professional obligations in one place.

Do you think we’ll see more hybrid spaces along these lines as the rigid boundaries of traditional office culture break down further? 

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The campaign takes several forms, including “The World’s Longest Invoice,” an online tally of all the money outstanding to independent pros. According to a recent Freelancers Union survey, last year that sum amounted to an average of $4,600 for each of America’s 35 million or so freelancers. In May this massive invoice will be presented to New York State lawmakers in Albany to urge them to take action. The Freelancers Union hopes the final bill will exceed $1,000,000 to reflect the scale of the problem.  Coworking spaces and freelancing websites also participated in a day of action yesterday to raise awareness.

The solution to freelancers’ payment problems is the passage of the Freelancers’ Payment Protection Act, a bill currently in committee in the New York State Senate, which could be used as a model for such legislation elsewhere, according to Freelancers Union and campaign supporters. “It’s model legislation that gives freelancers the same protection as ‘traditional’ employees – they can file wage claims for the money they’re owed and get protection from the Department of Labor. We are SO CLOSE to passing the bill and creating a historic precedent in New York that can be replicated throughout the country,” Althea Erickson, advocacy and policy director for Freelancers Union is reported as saying by Shareable.

What’s the alternative to reforming a  legal framework which isn’t set up to handle the rise of independent work? For a heart-rending story of how terribly the current system can fail independent workers, check out the tale of Anthony, a creative freelancer in the New York area, whose battle to get payment for a six-figure invoice is recounted in DeskMag. It ended with him facing the threat of foreclosure and epic, time-consuming legal wrangling.

Do you have unpaid bills to add to the World’s Longest Invoice?

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Still, even if you’re among the most tardy and disorganized of freelancers, at least you can count on the media to help out, offering their annual onslaught of articles peddling tax tips for the self-employed. To save you time we’ve sorted through them to weed out the obvious (that guy who says he can get you your refund in two days? Yeah, he might be a scammer) and the repetitive (keep your paperwork in order, people!) to find the few less expected gems. Primary among them this year is the SEP IRA.

Accountant Neil Johnson told Business Insider that opening a Simplified Employment Pension IRA funded from freelance income could help reduce income tax. Both the Chicago Tribune and SmartMoney agree, with the latter offering more details about who should look into a SEP IRA and how to do so:

Establish SEP for Big 2011 Tax Break. If you’re self-employed and have not yet set up a tax-favored retirement plan for yourself, you can establish a simplified employee pension (SEP). Unlike other types of small business retirement plans, a SEP can be created this year and still generate a large deduction on last year’s return. In fact, if you extend your 2011 return to October 15, you’ll have until that late date to take care of the paperwork and make a deductible contribution for last year. The deductible pay-in can be up to 20 percent of your 2011 self-employment income or up to 25 percent of your salary if you worked for your own corporation. The absolute maximum amount you can contribute for the 2011 tax year is $49,000. To establish a SEP, go to your bank or brokerage firm and fill out Form 5305-SEP. It takes five minutes. But don’t jump the gun. You may not want a SEP if you have employees, because you would probably have to cover them and make contributions to their accounts. That might be too expensive. Bottom line: if you have employees, don’t start up a SEP without consulting your tax pro.

Besides endorsing the SEP idea, the Tribune also suggests a crafty way to approach sorting out your health insurance via a suggestion from TurboTax: “if you hire your spouse and give him health care benefits, you can put yourself on his health care policy, which saves money on self-employment income and tax. Similarly, if you hire your dependent for clerical tasks or even to clean your home office, the wages will be deductible for you, and if their earned income is less than $5,800, they won’t owe any tax on the money either,” writes Anya Kamenetz in the article.

Of course, just because these are the less obvious suggestions, doesn’t mean the usual advice doesn’t remain valuable. It might sound like nagging to hear, once again, how important it is to get professional help and remember all your deductions (the Tribune offers a helpful run down of broad categories to keep in mind) but people still mess up the relatively straightforward aspects of filing. A recent study, for example, revealed that the most common small business tax mistake was mixing personal and business expenses. We all know you shouldn’t but apparently many of us still do. LearnVest helpfully compares specific scenarios that are perfectly alright to those likely to trigger an audit.

So good luck to late filers, remain vigilant on the basics, and try out some of these slightly more advanced tax minimization efforts  if they seem right for you.

Are there any other less well known tax tips that have helped you trim your bill?

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Not according to new research conducted by independent work consultancy MBO Partners released today. MBO defines independent workers as those “who work at least 15 hours a week in nontraditional, non-permanent full or part-time employment and self-identify as consultants, freelancers, contractors, self-employed.” Using a pair of surveys to study this sector, MBO uncovered some unexpected facts that show independent work is not just a young person’s game. Nearly five million Baby Boomers make up 30 percent of this workforce and, according to MBO, they’re thriving more than younger freelancers:

• Most Boomers (59 percent) actively chose to become independent.
• Of all those working independently they are among the most satisfied. 85 percent report satisfaction and 70 percent report high satisfaction, versus 58 percent for all age groups combined.
• They’ve done well as independents. The average income of the Boomer independent is $77,000.
• The vast majority of Boomers plan to continue work in the independent workforce over the next three years — only 8 percent plan to seek a traditional job.

These happy Boomer independents told MBO they enjoyed working solo for a number of less than surprising reasons, including the freedom and flexibility and ability to do work they consider meaningful. The research also found, however, that the particular struggles of older workers during the Great Recession played a role in pushing many towards independence “The Great Recession has resulted in a very weak traditional job market for aging Boomers. For many Boomers, going independent is their best or sometimes only job option,” concludes the report.

But while the troubled economic times may have driven some older professionals towards independent work, the statistics show that by and large they’re pleased to have made the switch. “In the face of recent financial uncertainty and a tumultuous job market, many in the Boomer generation have turned adversity into opportunity and taken charge of their lives by working independently,” said Gene Zaino, CEO of MBO Partners. In fact, 36 percent of Boomers actually feel more secure working independently.

All in all, the research paints a cheerful picture of Boomer independents and predicts that more workers in this demographic will make the shift. “About 8 million boomers are interested in going solo over the next two years,” according to MBO, which predicts “that roughly 1.2 million will actually make the jump to independent work,” within that time frame.

Does this report mesh with your experience — are Boomers in particular satisfied with the gig lifestyle and, if so, why do you think this is? 

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There are certainly limitations to this sort of broad brushstrokes description of who wins and who loses when the economy changes – subsets of populations may gain or lose more, other political or cultural forces complicate the chain of causation and obviously many individuals don’t fit the group average – but that doesn’t make these sorts of speculations 100 percent invalid either. So adding that hefty pinch of salt, what exactly does Susannah Breslin argue in her recent Inc.com column “Do Women Make Better Independent Contractors?”

Her case is that there are three main reasons that the ladies may be more suited to work as freelancers or independent contractors: their empathy, their creativity and their ability to handle the lifestyle. Before you start howling that a characteristic like empathy isn’t a pre-programmed characteristic of either gender, but instead is a cultural expectation women are taught, take note that’s exactly what Breslin is saying.

“Culturally, women are programmed to believe they excel at empathy,” she writes, concluding that whether it’s nature or nurture really doesn’t matter. It’s still a leg up: “As an independent contractor, it pays to be empathetic. It’s not about what you want. It’s about what the client wants.” The same goes for creativity:

According to a 2008 Pew Research Center survey… sixty-four percent of Americans declared women more creative, and 11 percent declared men more creative. My experience is that while both genders may have equal capacity to think creatively, it’s more culturally acceptable for women to employ their creativity than men…. Where men will fight—often effectively—for their vision, women are more likely to move into what I call “shape-shifter” mode, exploring various possible solutions to a challenge, rather than trying to drive one square peg through a round hole.

Finally, Breslin notes that being a freelancer isn’t exactly a secure gig, or one that conjures high status images in others – in fact it’s more likely to make folks picture you in your pajamas. And that, writes Breslin, bugs men more than women. “Men aren’t as comfortable with what the ad hoc lifestyle of the independent contractor might communicate — that they’re maybe less professional or perhaps unable to join the workforce because of an embarrassing social problem,” she writes.

Breslin isn’t the only commentator to have made this argument. Lindsey Donner, writing for the Young Entrepreneur Council last year, argued that the future of work is more female friendly, citing, like Breslin, women’s creativity, but also their relative ease with the kind of relationship building on which being a successful freelancer depends. “My sociability, my willingness to assign importance to emotional cheerleading, and my capacity to build personal relationships –virtually — have helped me cultivate a loyal client base,” she wrote, using her own experience as an example.

But there are also plenty of potential counter-arguments. Professional men have been in the independent contractor game for a long time, and many excel at it. In fact, the constant negotiation and advocating for yourself being a freelancer demands could be said to be better suited to men, who study after study shows are more likely to ask for what they want and stick up for themselves at work. And then there are the demands of raising kids, which while they should fall equally on both genders in current reality often don’t. Women might benefit more then from the defined hours, the pregnancy- and birth-covering health insurance and the relatively steady protective cocoon of a corporate job.

What do you think – is one of the genders better suited to the rise of the freelancer?

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Yes, says lawyer and futurist Stephen T. Gordon on the blog the Speculist recently. Gordon agrees with the chorus of voices saying offices will become coffee shops, saying:

We’re going back to the future: the modern office was birthed in 17th century coffee shops. Steven Johnson has argued that coffee fueled the enlightenment. It was certainly a more enlightening beverage than the previous choice of alcohol.

The need for offices grew as the equipment for mental work was developed starting in the late 19th centuries. That need appears to have peaked about 1980. It was a rare person who could afford the computers, printers, fax machines, and mailing/shipping equipment of that time.

Now a single person with $500 can duplicate most of those functions with a single laptop computer. So the remaining function of the office is to be that place that clients know to find you. . . . Groups for one project will form and then disband and then reform with new members for the next project. What will that workplace look like? Probably closer to Starbucks than Bob Par’s cubicle.

That version of the future of work should sound familiar to any WebWorkerDaily reader, but it’s not just offices that Gordon foresees transforming (or reverting) into coffee shops. He sees retail stores and universities going that way as well. Citing the likes of MITx and the fact that the rise in tuition costs has outpaced inflation for years, Gordon writes:

Cheaper ultimately wins. Repeat that story a million times over the next few years and you begin to see how the local colleges – which already are overcharging for their product – begin to suffer in favor of free programs like MITx.

Eventually you could have local campuses becoming places where MITx students seek tutoring, network, and socialize – reclaiming some of the college experience they’d otherwise have lost. [Fellow Speculist blogger Phil Bowermaster] thought this sounded like college as a giant coffee shop. I agree. Every education would be ad hoc. It would be student-directed toward the job market she’s aiming for.

And how will “coffeeshopification,” as Gordon dubs it, come to retail? Just compare the experience of shopping at Amazon.com for Christmas presents with braving your local big-box retailer. “Which is more enjoyable: Starbucks or Walmart?” asks Gordon, answering:

For the sane: Starbucks. So if you can accomplish your Walmart shopping at Starbucks, why do it any other way? Also, imagine the 3D print shop of the future. You put in your order, probably from your smart phone, and then go pick it up. What does the lobby of such a business look like? Again: a coffee shop.

Should we all prepare to drink a lot more coffee in the future (or invest in coffee producers)?

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But if independent workers live in New York, New Jersey or Oregon, they will soon have a new option when it comes to obtaining coverage thanks to the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare to its detractors) and the Freelancers Union. The organization, which currently has 170,000 members, was recently awarded $340 in low or no-interest federal loans through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to launch “consumer operated and oriented plans,” or Co-Ops that are open to everyone, including independent workers who typically struggle to find affordable coverage. The new plans will be non-profit and will be run by a local CEO and board of directors in each state.

The Co-Ops are set to begin enrolling members in the fall of next year and to begin offering benefits in January 2014. The Freelancers Union already covers around 23,000 workers and their family members in New York States through its existing insurance offerings, but anticipates covering an additional 200,000 workers across the three states within five years.

By cutting out the for-profit health insurance industry out of the equation, Co-Ops are intended to return insurance to its roots, in which workers pooled risk and supported each other. And by competing with private plans, the Co-Ops should also drive down costs for patients. “Co-Ops will promote competition in the insurance market and respond well to the health care needs of Americans,” according to Marilyn Tavenner, acting administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

“It’s like venture capital for healthcare,” said Sara Horowitz, executive director of the Freelancers Union. “By empowering nonprofit social entrepreneurs to compete with private insurers, Co-Ops provide a powerful new tool to bring more affordable options to the most people.”

Do you think the Obama administration’s healthcare reforms are the solution to independent workers’ health insurance woes?

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Recently, WebWorkerDaily phoned up Gene Zaino, a Net:Work 2011 speaker and CEO of MBO Partners which offers a package of back office services to independent workers they dub a “passport to independent work” — they’ll sort out your taxes, benefits, insurance and the like if you hand over a small percentage of billings — for a wide-ranging conversation about his predictions for independent work in the year ahead. (Check out his full predictions in infographic form here.) In his role at MBO, Zaino deals closely with a number of corporate HR and procurement departments, and his view of how quickly companies are coming to terms with the changing landscape of work varied significantly from the opinions of those who paint corporations as slow to adapt. For one, he defended HR against its critics, at least when it comes to taking advantage of independent talent:

HR organizations are very focused on the full-time employee segment of their business because that’s what they do, and they typically don’t deal with non-employees. Non-employees are paid through accounts payable or through procurement, so they tend to not be part of their system.

Now the more forward-thinking companies have decided to partner HR and procurement to figure out how to [handle independent workers], because HR gets upset when you hire an independent contractor who’s sitting next to or working alongside one of the full-time employees and they start talking. There’s a culture issue there, and I think the smarter companies have assembled teams or new positions, which have representation from HR, from procurement and from legal, and they put together a strategy and make [independent work] one other component of how they get work done.

And outside the boundaries of HR, Zaino insists, in the last few years, companies are really starting to grasp the benefits of hiring independent workers, as well as how to maximize their value while minimizing the compliance risks of nimble hiring.

I’ve seen tremendous change. Today most Fortune 500 companies have an actual position – sometimes it resides in HR, sometimes it resides in their procurement department, sometimes it’s a new department. It always has someone from legal involved because it’s generally a compliance issue. But they generally have someone that manages their non-employee labor and in more and more companies there’s much more publicity, much more education, much more awareness.

Most recently in 2011, for the first time, I’ve even seen public companies in their annual reports start talking about how many independent workers they have as compared to employees. Caterpillar is one where they actually boasted because they consider that a strategic advantage to be able to be nimble in terms of their cost structure. So there has absolutely been a dramatic increase in education on the corporate side that has taken about ten years to happen, but it’s prominent today.

As Zaino points out, ruthless economic realities are pushing companies to be equally ruthless about cutting costs and maintaining flexibility, but he also explains that a vigorous compliance drive by tax officials partly explains why companies are getting more savvy about managing their independent workers.

“There’s a huge enforcement effort to reclassify people as employees that companies are paying as contractors,” he says. “Today there are 14 new bills pending that will increase penalties for companies that try to engage independent workers who would otherwise be classified as employees, and the test for being an employee versus an independent contractor is extremely gray. It’s about behavior. It’s about control. It’s really easy for the state tax, the IRS, the Department of Homeland Security or the Department of Labor to come in and say: ‘You look and walk and talk like an employee, so we’re going to call you an employee and we’re going to give a big fine to the place where you’re working because that’s the easier way for us to go collect a lot of money.’”

Motivated by both the carrot of a more agile workforce and the stick of stiff government fines, it seems even the slowest moving organizational behemoths are learning to manage the exploding number of independent workers. (Zaino predicted independent workers will be a majority of workforce by 2020 at Net:Work.)

In your experience, are big companies dragging their heels or quickly coming to terms with the realities of the changing workforce?

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