Growing a talented team is at the heart of every successful business. Recruiting, hiring, sourcing... they all mean the same thing right? While all of these terms refer to a common process which many of us attend to quite regularly, how often does one sit back and consider the way in which this process is actually designed? Does the current structure make sense in today's flexible working world? And who does it favour?
Whether we like to admit it or not, we all hold a certain level of conscious and unconscious bias when it comes to selecting candidates for a job. Whether it be gender, ethnicity, disability, nationality or something else, all too often employers allow certain biases to influence their hiring processes.
While acknowledging this reality is a positive first step to take, we want to help employers go further. We’d like them to make ethical hiring a central part of their recruitment process.
What is Ethical Hiring?
Broadly speaking, ‘ethical hiring’ is about understanding the essence of work life. Ensuring a fair exchange is experienced by both parties and recognising that, the way they work, where they work and who they work with, can have a significant impact on their wellbeing and livelihood.
Our ambition at Freelancer Club is to provide companies with a means to hire freelance talent in a fair and ethical manner that never compromises on quality or cost. It ensures that the process of hiring freelancers is entirely without bias or prejudice and not influenced by gender, ethnicity, sexuality, religion or disability.
Ethical hiring aims to promote fair rates of pay and encourages payment to be made on time.
It also strives to facilitate a meaningful respectful relationship on both sides.
Ethical, unbiased hiring is a fantastic starting point for a client-freelancer relationship, as it promotes and encourages empathy and understanding between both parties from the get-go. This results in freelancers truly investing in a brand’s mission and vision whilst also helping freelancers feel like valued members of a team.
Why does ethical hiring matter?
Talented, highly skilled individuals shouldn’t be overlooked for a job due to the colour of their skin, a disability or their gender.
It’s essential that we all play our part to make our workplaces reflective of a collective population - not just a small portion of it. We all have a responsibility to help make our society a place where inclusivity, diversity and fairness are prioritised and valued.
What about your bottom line?
Well, ever heard the phrase ‘doing good is good for business?’
Not only does an ethical recruitment process benefit your company's image and reputation, it positively impacts your bottom line. Ethical hiring is profitable for businesses.
According to a research project led by Verizon and the Campbell Soup Company, ‘doing good’ reduces a company's team turnover rate by up to 50%, increases its productivity by up to 13%, and boosts employee engagement and satisfaction by up to 7.5%.
But what does ‘doing good’ mean for a company and why does it matter?
In business terms, 'doing good' can mean a range of things. Broadly speaking, when a company has ethical values and a compelling purpose, its staff feel that they are making a meaningful impact and contributing something positive to the world.
When successfully implemented into an internal hiring process, a company should be able to attract talent that aligns with their brand values resulting in lower staff turnover, increased productivity and a happier, healthier workplace all round.
I mean, think about Millennials and Generation Z. They consider brand values to be as important as the salary or rate they are paid, and will turn down opportunities if they don’t believe in a company's mission.
Freelancer Club has been leading a #NoFreeWork campaign for years to combat the pervasive culture of unpaid work or work in return for exposure, both of which still remain rife in the freelance industry.
Our emphasis on ethical hiring has evolved from this campaign as both unpaid work and unethical hiring can have a damaging effect on the relationship between freelancers and their clients. Both create an environment where freelancers suspect their clients of trying to take advantage of them, which negatively impacts the freelancer-client relationship from the outset.
Unpaid work and unethical hiring not only devalues the individual, it impacts the creative industry resulting in a lack of diversity, a diluted talent pool and a poorer economy.
We don’t want to end up with a load of rich, middle-class people doing freelance work as a hobby. We therefore believe that we have an obligation to value, preserve and develop existing freelance talent so that they can continue to produce high quality, forward thinking work for their clients.
Here at Freelancer Club we’ve created a suite of tools and content across our site to facilitate businesses who want to make ethical recruitment a priority - from our unbiased hiring filter, to our pricing series, best practices articles, to our Concierge Service guiding both sides (client and freelancer) on a fair rate.
Our business model also facilitates a more human experience as we give companies the ability to connect with hired freelance talent on or off the platform. By creating an ecosystem where both client and freelancer have a profile (and accountability), Freelancer Club facilitates transparent exchanges between both parties, built on mutual understanding and respect.
Ethical hiring isn’t just a temporary fad or hashtag, it’s a growing movement and a crucially important one at that. Now's the time to incorporate ethical hiring practices into your HR strategy and we’ve made it easier than ever for employers to do so.
Let us help you join the movement. Book in a complementary consultation with a Freelance Growth Specialist who can help you develop a strategy to grow your business using freelance talent.
Liked this piece? Check out our articles Is it Time to Embrace a Freelance Hiring Strategy? and Why Diversity Matters When Hiring Freelancers and Building Productive Teams .
