Speak to me of freelance vs full-time from a hiring perspective...

liztalago·Dec 28, 2021

Posted in:Advice

Hello friends,

Something I'm hearing more and more from clients is that they'll be part of the way through their pitch process for their consulting/freelance services and they'll get told that someone with clout has now decided they prefer an in-house person as opposed to a contractor.

In my mind (and I'm likely a bit biased as I'm self-employed), building a long-term relationship with a quality contractor offers the benefits of a FT employee without the cost associated with one. You get all the predictability, reliability, and flexibility without the price tag of an in-house expert.

Can anyone on either side of this weigh in as to why this still seems to happen? Is it due to bad past experiences with freelancers? Worries that you won't have someone's full attention and commitment unless they're FT?

When it's happened to me in the past I usually have just chalked it up to a poor fit and moved on. But I'd like to offer some support for others who are navigating these scenarios.

nadyne·Dec 29, 2021

Depending on the company, there are many reasons to prefer in-house versus contractor. Contractors and FTEs are budgeted differently. In many companies, budgets for FTEs are more likely to be stable/growing. Legally in the US, companies have to treat contractors differently than FTEs. They can’t effectively be FTEs lest the company run afoul of employment law. Most companies that use contractors have internal rules about how to maintain the separation between contractor and FTE. If there’s been some kind of breach about that, companies often clamp down on their usage of contractors while they ensure that they are treating contractors appropriately according to current employment law.If the company is in a highly-regulated industry like healthcare or finances, there might be additional legal and regulatory concerns about contractors vs FTEs. I’ve worked for companies that only allowed the use of approved vendors. Getting a new company added to the list of approved vendors is a multi-month odyssey, if it’s possible at all. For a single freelancer or a short-term need, the ROI on this effort is unlikely to be enough to justify it.

liztalago·Dec 29, 2021

That makes sense, and I can see the pros/cons of both. As a seasoned consultant, I've had to be very careful of scope creep that can lead to me getting treated like an in-house employee (with none of the benefits). Lately, I'm just seeing a change mid-course that surprises me. It tends to be a mid-level hiring manager who begins a conversation with a potential contractor only to what appears to me to be a sudden shift toward wanting an in-house person. It's most likely an internal communication snag that the contractor is not privy to.