Over the last decade, there has been a lot of buzz on the Internet about ‘crowdsourcing’. The term
was first used in 2005 by Jeff Howe, Editor at Wired to describe the practice of outsourcing work to a
crowd of skilled people in order to achieve desired results. As more and more organizations resorted
to crowdsourcing for work organization, a whole new industry of crowdworkers was formed.
Simply a derivative of crowdsourcing, ‘crowdworking’ refers to the process where a crowd of people
comes together to work on small tasks for a person/business and gets paid for it. These participants,
or crowdworkers, may not have a real job per se, but what they have is the chance to earn a decent
income while sitting at home by dedicating more and more time to doing different tasks online.
With the rising trend of work-from- home in lieu of 9-to- 5 structure, more and more companies are
exploring crowdworking avenues to create content, design a product, resolve a problem, or even do
corporate R & D. In fact, a recent survey has revealed that more than 100,000 jobs have been listed in the past year alone for remote, freelance or flexible-schedule positions in different industries.
Here’s a list of top 5 industries thriving with opportunities for the global crowdworking community:
1. Computer and Information Technology
According to a latest trends database, the computer and IT industry has managed to be at the
forefront when it comes to hiring remote workers. The rise in internet usage and constant need for
innovation has driven most IT companies to outsource a wide range of their work to skilled
professionals – from software development and programming to cybersecurity, website
maintenance, systems engineer, computer repair, technical support and IT administrator, among a
number of other roles.
2. Customer Service
Driven largely by seasonal demands, more and more customer service companies and call centres
are now hiring experienced representatives in work-from- home roles. It is a great industry to dive in,
and a well-paying one too, for anyone who wishes to work over the phone or via email as a customer
care associate, technical support, or client service representative. Most companies offer training
beforehand to give remote workers a better understanding of their products or services.
3. Education and Training
Don Tapscott, Business Executive, Author, Consultant and Speaker, has been quoted at a TED Talk
saying, “To me, this is not an information age. It’s an age of networked intelligence, it’s an age of
vast promise.” This cannot be truer for the education industry as more and more people can connect
with students across the globe now, via an online classroom or virtual training sessions. Related job
postings on crowdworking platforms include online tutor, virtual teacher and adjunct faculty.
4. Medical and Healthcare
While it may seem that the healthcare industry requires office-bound jobs, the reality is that it is one
of the most popular industries for crowdworking. Presently, there is a broad range of home-based
job opportunities for nurses, medical writers, clinical investigators, psychologists, physiotherapists,
care managers, healthcare support specialists, appeals pharmacists and even experienced
physicians.
5. Market Research
Procter & Gamble, popularly known as P&G, is one of the first major corporations to employ crowd workers from around the world to support their vast R&D operations. They sought help of external innovators to submit new ideas to their product development team, which eventually led to a 60% increase in their productivity and resolved 75% of their problems. The success story of P&G has ever since motivated a large number of companies to hire original thinkers for research operations.
Besides these top five, there are plenty of other industries today that offer viable opportunities for
crowdworkers and make their chances of earning some real-money feasible. Retail sales, consulting,
content writing and translation, graphic designing, accounting and finance and even human resource
industries are known to recruit quite a large number of people for remote and freelance jobs.
Crowdworking platforms have played a prominent role in bringing the crowdsourcing companies and
crowdworkers together and allowing both parties to choose the worker/work that suits their needs.
Soham Thacker, Co-Founder, FixPocket
Soham Thacker an Electrical and Computer Engineer from Rutgers University, NJ, USA. He
has worked for multinational companies such as Motorolla, Johnson & Johnson and Colgate
Palmolive.
In 2012 Soham came to India to peruse entrepreneurial dreams. He started his journey with
internet startup, followed by a successful Just Mexican, a fast food chain in Gujarat and
ascend to Fixpocket in 2016.
Soham has a passion for teaching, conducting seminars and workshops across different
areas to generate awareness among the rural audience pertaining to digital world
opportunities. He is an active mentor of Bandna, UP under the umbrella of ‘Digital
Shaksharta Abhiyan’ a Government of India initiative.
One of such seminars in a small town of Bandna, UP under the umbrella of ‘Digital
Shaksharta Abhiyan’ a Government of India initiative. The students were given training on
how the digital world has opportunities for them to sit in a small town and still work on
projects across the globe. A lot of these students belonged to uneducated and non-affording
families and hence did not have the exposure to the freelancing world.
Fixpocket is a micro service based portal enabling freelancers/students to showcase their varied skills and reach out to potential employers seeking for services.
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