Blockchain And The Rise Of The Gig Enterprise

Innovation Blockchain And The Rise Of The Gig Enterprise Dave Wright Brand Contributor ServiceNow BRANDVOICE Storytelling and expertise from marketers | Paid Program Jun 23, 2022, 03:09pm EDT | Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Distributed ledger technology could enable a new, high-agility enterprise model. Let’s say you have an urgent client presentation in Tokyo that requires people with very specific skill sets—a PowerPoint specialist who understands the nuances of Japanese culture, a hologram operator, and an engineer who can operate an obscure application. The gig enterprise will need new ways of connecting the right people with the right opportunities.

getty This project requires confidentiality and speed, so you rule out onboarding freelancers. You’re at a large company where you know there must be employees who fit the bill. You simply have to find them, vet them, and assemble a team that’s ready to hit the ground running.

Easier said than done. Suddenly you’re in a maze of emails, word of mouth, dead ends—and when you do assemble your team, you’re a bit hesitant because you’ve never worked with any of them before. The solution to this unwieldy situation may come from an unlikely source: blockchain .

From gig economy to gig enterprise The future of business just might be the gig enterprise . I’m not talking about the gig economy, where organizations rely on contingent workers. What I imagine is a company that combines the gig economy model—connecting team leaders with specialists on a project basis—with the traditional business model, in which the enterprise invests in developing non-contingent employees who are steeped in the company’s culture and knowledge.

According to a study by the Institute for the Future, 85% of the careers that will be around in 2030 didn’t exist as of 2018. I think it’s probable. Ten years ago, you probably couldn’t have named TikTok influencers, cloud architects, or chief listening officers as careers.

No matter what new roles emerge, work will become more varied and creative than ever as hyperautomation takes over repetitive tasks—which means your workforce will have to be agile, too. To survive, a company will need a diverse pool of adaptable employees with wide arrays of expertise and experiences. In other words, it will need to become a gig enterprise.

Blockchain to the rescue As your company scales, talent management becomes quite complex. For the gig enterprise, it will be even more so because each employee will work on several evolving teams in various configurations. That’s where blockchain comes in handy.

Set aside whatever preconceived notions you may have. Blockchain is about so much more than cryptocurrencies. As a shared, immutable ledger of information, blockchains record and track transactions around a given asset.

That asset can be intangible—like your employees’ talents and skills. By being able to confirm the knowledge, skills, and past performance of an employee in a matter of seconds, managers don’t have to rely on word of mouth to find the right people. Because blockchain can be shared immediately, it delivers complete information in real time.

That empowers managers to assemble teams for specific tasks based on the members’ abilities. By being able to confirm the knowledge, skills, and past performance of an employee in a matter of seconds, managers don’t have to rely on word of mouth to find the right people. And blockchain’s immutability ensures accuracy and confidence, while mitigating bias in employment .

An asynchronous future In an economy based on physical goods, collaborative efforts (harvests, for instance, or assembly lines) mean working at the same time and in the same place. No wonder the great cities of the world—from New York to Hong Kong—all started off as trading ports for physical commodities. But as we’ve transitioned into the digital age, we never bothered to change this residual pattern.

The last three years of hybrid work , however, have led to an epiphany: In an economy based on information and technology, we have an opportunity to rethink work and retire old work habits. As the rate of change grows exponentially, the old department-based management model won’t be well equipped to address the needs of an evolving company. The task-based gig enterprise, full of innovative workers, can provide an agile solution, but it also requires a different approach to management.

Whether you’re sold on the idea of the gig enterprise or not, you have to accept that your business may evolve beyond recognition in the coming years. And while blockchain technology is far from perfect, its transparency, data integrity, and speed have the potential to prepare your workforce for whatever changes are on the horizon. Now, all you need to worry about is your luggage getting lost en route to Tokyo.

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