PwC launches online market place to tap into ‘gig economy’

PwC, the world's biggest professional services firm, has launched an online market place matching freelancers with internal projects, as its new global chairman seeks to ride a global trend towards a "gig economy".

The firm, which is the largest of the Big Four assurance and advisory firms by revenues, has launched what it calls “Talent Exchange”, an online platform that directly connects independent professionals with PwC teams. Freelancers register, upload their CVs, then apply to work on the firm’s client projects - from IT implementations, to product life cycle management, to anti-money laundering.

According to Bob Moritz, the firm's new global chairman, the aim of the site is to give PwC the ability to "bring in the right talent in the right place at the right time" while taking advantage of a general shift toward flexible employment, in which more people are opting for temporary or freelance positions and short-term contracts.

"We know when you look around the world, that an increasing number of people will want to be more of an independent contractor than a full-time employee," he told the Financial Times. "So the question is, how do I quickly scale up my own technology and recruitment processes to change, so I can bring third-party independent contractors to the table, as opposed to full-time hires?"

A study last year by Upwork and Freelancers Union, an advocacy group, found that more than one in three workers in the US - almost 54m people - are now freelancing. The study found that 60 per cent of those people were doing so by choice, a rise of 7 percentage points from 2014.

PwC’s Talent Exchange went live on February 8th and by Friday last week, more than 4,650 people had registered, with ages ranging from the 20s to 50s. Mr Moritz said the firm would screen applicants before assigning them to projects, to ensure that not only do the qualifications match, but that the right “mannerisms, the behaviours, the independence and the objectivity is there all the time”.

“What we may do today may not be the mix tomorrow, and may be different five years from now,” said Mr Moritz, who was named the global chairman for a four-year term on Monday. “The challenge for PwC - and I’d argue, any professional services firm - is how you get more agility in the place to be able to scale up and scale down, whatever the opportunities are.”

(Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2016)