WorkSummit 2025 was unreal. Every single person in the room was either running hugely successful freelance programs or deeply interested in what good looks like and how to get started. Below are my top 5 top five highlights from the day.
#1 Corporates Aren't Ready for the Shift
Bruce Morton, Simon Bradberry, David Gettins & Sam Smith all bullish that they will have to be - as it seems experienced and new-to-work Gen Z talent are already shifting away from traditional staffing models to freelance and independent working.
Fortune 1000’s Stance on Freelance
The minority of corporates are ready for the shift. The large multinationals are laggards with freelance and AI, and aren't ready. Lack of adoption of fit-for-purpose systems and processes for freelancers is blamed on heavy regulation (same reasoning as slow adoption of AI). PSC bans, payroll mandates and slow freelancer payment is killing their ability to be competitive with independent talent – leaving thousands of open jobs and ‘oil tanker’-like agility with talent.
The leading Managed Service Providers (MSPs) recognise the opportunity and are all improving their own ability to give competitive advantage to the minority of corporations who want to real access independent talent.
“Please login to our payroll portal” The six dreaded words for every freelancers working with a corporate client - Christine Armstrong
#2 - Make A Workflow That Actually Works
Working with freelancers comes with different compliance demands. Get this compliance *in* the workflow, not as an add-on, if you're going to make this work in practice at scale. Erika Novak, Mehmet Aslan & Russ Endacott are three of the best when it comes to walking the walk here.
Launching A Freelance Program
Compliance in the workflow, not as an add-on. Define the process and workflow fit for people to use. If a hiring manager can’t follow it, if it’s clunky or has too many steps in different systems – it simply won’t work.
The ones leading in this space are using technology, cutting friction and giving regular training to the business so that hiring teams can have freedom to source and manage their own independent talent – provided the right controls are in place. Test the workflow, let the business champion it. Once you have a defined workflow that works, give it to the business. Champion the user, promote the story. What revenue was generated, how did it impact productivity? Were any savings made, how do they scale up across the business? What was the feedback from the freelancer, would they return?
“Get the good work done early” - Russ Endacott, Publicis Groupe
Take the wins, promote both across the business and to your senior leadership. Make your example of what good looks like and test it with hiring teams before releasing it across the business.
#3 - Positive Experience Creates Cost Savings
Mark Chaffey, Imer Cakiroglu & Jo Libby (Jo Lennon) explained everything from the benefits of community building and skills tagging to the unintended cost savings of delivering a good freelance experience - it pays to run your freelance ops properly.
Supercharge Your Freelance Program
A positive experience is productivity. Getting the process right at scale can drive down the need to rely on 3rd party recruitment services over time. But a smooth freelancer onboarding and payment, combined with better productivity, means faster project delivery and a lower employee total cost.
Top tip – Pay for a day before the freelancer’s contract starts so that your staff team can gel with the new person joining. The freelancer can get the low-down on the project and then start fast on Day One – this reduces confusion, sets clear roles and improves productivity.
Keep a feedback loop, it saves you in the long run. Freelancers are everywhere, so find the communities of talent for (or with) your hiring teams, and make sure they know what you do and who you are – job advertisements are sometimes even too late for great talent so engage earlier rather than later.
Pool your freelancers, tagging skills and adding feedback after every hire. If you don’t have Worksome, just start simple in a spreadsheet – adding comments, skills and any other keywords to help you find the right people and make a better decision on where people fit ready for next time.
“Freelancers talk – so treat them well.” Imer Cagiroglu, Stride
Clear scope, effective onboarding, and fast payment means freelancers will want to come back next time.
#4 Policy is King... But Only When It's Realistic.
Create policy, create workflow to enable it, and communicate/train your business, according to Caroline Jones, Rebecca Seeley Harris, Fiona Coombe, & Matthew Burt. HMRC will only ever review the facts; so have your contracts, determinations, policy and communications with all freelancers ready for audit.
Create Policy Fit For Reality And Educate The Business
Understand if your own policy is fit for reality. The balance between Employee or Independent worker is a spectrum, so make sure your hiring teams understand this. Policy, Process and Training are the key milestones to communicate, and then regularly re-communicate.
Short of locking freelancers in a separate room, make sure any classification of freelancers is fit for the reality of what they do and how they’re working with you – no grey areas – HMRC is black and white and will only look at the facts.
If you don’t have a clear workflow and formal policy for freelancers, create one and write it down. HMRC will request your workflow and policy in any investigation.
“We make a call each time – how are we really working here?” Matthew Burt, VaynerMedia
Each freelancer works in different ways, and each project can be delivered differently. Ask how they work, what do they want, what do we need them to do and how realistic is it?
#5 Be Human
If you want to find the very best people for your business, whether employees or freelancers, cut the jargon. Sophie Worth challenges all People & Procurement teams to review your communications, use technology to invest more time in quality, and ask yourself "Is this good enough for the very best talent?"
Finding Great Talent
Finding human means talking to humans. Your employer brand is how you communicate with people wanting to work for you. Speak to people as one human to another. No jargon. Lots of curiosity and empathy in every touch point throughout the recruitment process; from job specs, candidate comms from your ATS and your careers page. Struggling? Ask someone who is a writer in the business, or hire a short term freelance copywriter. Lay a foundation with technology, which automates tasks and, crucially, creates time for quality talent engagement.
Your voice to talent comes before our employer brand. If you’re regularly receiving 100–1,000+ applications on jobs, make sure rejection is communicated in a human way. Both full-time applicants might become freelance, and freelancers themselves regularly upskill and take on more relevant work that might be more relevant and needed in the future. Unanticipated outcome of this, at a time when 8 in 10 employees are unengaged or actively looking to leave [Gallup]: The way recruitment teams communicate feeds directly back into your own company culture.
Your own employees reacting positively to their freelancer’s experience breeds more positively towards your own employer brand. Make sure your job descriptions, adverts, careers page and all communications that go out sound like they’re written for a human.
“If you promote average jobs you’ll get average talent.” Sophie Worth, Oatly
What a day, loved every second of it