Gig Mindset

Paul Estes is editor-in-chief of Staffing.com, a business advisory firm dedicated to the talent economy. He also hosts The Talent Economy Podcast which focuses on distributed teams, on-demand talent, and remote work. Paul Estes has become an evangelist for the Talent Economy, and also works as an independent consultant at Maven & Oak, a freelancer consulting firm. He previously worked for 12 years at Microsoft where he had several roles including senior director of Microsoft 365, as a partner at Investee (a social venture firm), as a senior manager at Amazon, and for 6 years at Dell, Inc. where he worked as a product manager and senior product manager for Dell Music. Paul Estes is a graduate of Louisiana State University and the University of New Orleans.

The Gig Economy is huge and growing, but most people tend to look at it solely as a way to take your skills and make money. That's okay, but that's just one aspect of the Gig Economy. You can also use it as a new and better way to reinvent and future-proof your career, and boost your personal free time.

Specifically, the Gig Economy is fundamentally changing the world of work. You can and should use freelancers to augment your time and expand your professional capabilities. To achieve that, learn how to apply the T.I.D.E. Model:

This may seem like new ground but this is exactly what Henry Ford did in the 1910s when his factory went from making two cars a day to eventually having a Model T roll off his production line every 24 seconds. Ford sold more than 15 million cars worldwide on the basis of that competitive advantage, which accounted for half of the vehicles sold by 1927.

1. The Gig mindset. The Gig mindset is that you should focus exclusively on what you do best, and outsource everything else to freelancers who specialize in those specific areas. This used to be hard to organize but the internet changes everything. Embrace the Gig Economy and thrive, keep doing what you've always done and fall behind as the world changes around you.

2. The T.I.D.E. Model. The best way to unlock and harness the Gig Economy and use it to best effect today is to apply the T.I.D.E. Model:

• Taskify — Break your roles and responsibilities down into a list of specified tasks and sequential steps.
• Identify — Clarify which work tasks you must do personally, and which tasks can be delegated to experts who can do them better than you.
• Delegate — Find the right experts in the Gig Economy, communicate your expectations, set milestones, and establish reporting and check-in systems.
• Evolve — Continue to grow and to find new and better ways to get more out of the Gig Economy for you and your company. This is where the real magic happens.

3. Reset your default settings. The biggest hurdle to adopting the Gig mindset will be the myths which surround the new economy and gig workers. People will have horror stories about working with incompetent freelancers and more. Ignore it. Realize that the best way to respond to changes in the workplace is to be ready to grow and evolve yourself. Reset your defaults, and make the Gig Economy work for you. It is the future of work.

I thought Gig Mindset was a great book. I loved the central idea that Henry Ford had taken his factory from producing two cars a day to having a car come off the production line every 24 seconds by identifying bottlenecks and implementing solutions over the course of a ten-year period of development. Paul Estes then suggests learning how to use the Gig Economy to best effect will require that we move down a learning curve until we get it right.

I happen to agree with him. It does make sense that in the future, much of what everyone does at work can be sent off to freelancers who can do it better and cheaper. This is closely aligned with what Tim Ferriss suggested in his classic The 4-Hour Workweek. As we all get better at using freelancers to supplement and enhance our work output, it stands to reason we'll all get much more done.

Most of the attention which is paid to the Gig Economy has been on the supply side, with people suggesting this is a great way to have a side hustle, to supplement your income, and maybe to become a self-employed entrepreneur. Gig Mindset looks more at the demand side of the Gig Economy, and details why the Gig Economy will grow much larger in the future. It makes perfect sense to me. This book is well worth reading.