Master Thesis
–Project teams and freelancers: Identification, selection and implications for
creativity and learning
Name: J.D. Maximilian Schwarzbeck, 11371730
Degree: MSc. Business Administration (EMCI track)
Supervisor: Erik Dirksen MSc.
Second reader: Leva Rozental MSc.
Date of submission: 22.06.2017
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Statement of Originality
This document is written by Student J.D. Maximilian Schwarzbeck who declares to take
full responsibility for the contents of this document.
I declare that the text and the work presented in this document is original and that no
sources other than those mentioned in the text and its references have been used in
creating it.
The Faculty of Economics and Business is responsible solely for the supervision of
completion of the work, not for the contents.
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Table of content
1. Introduction 4
2. Literature Review 8
2.1 Identifying potential team members 8
2.2 Selecting freelancers 9
2.2.1 Task orientation 10
2.2.2 Relational orientation 11
2.2.3 Additional influences 13
2.2.4 Creativity and learning 14
3. Research Methodology 17
3.1 Research design and strategy 17
3.2 Sample collection 18
3.3 Data selection 19
3.4 Validity and reliability 21
3.5 Research ethics 21
4. Data Analysis 22
5. Results 22
5.1 Freelancers, the industry and agency 22
5.2 Identifying freelancers 25 5.3 Selecting freelancers 30 5.3.1 Task orientation 30 5.3.2 Relational orientation 33 5.3.3 Combining orientations 34 5.3.4 Additional influences 35
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5.4 Managing creativity 38
5.5 Learning and Knowledge Management 41
6. Discussion and conclusion 44
6.1 Discussion of findings 47
6.2 Implications 48
6.3 Limitations and suggestions for future research 49
References 52
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1. Introduction
Today’s labor market is moving rapidly towards more short-term contracts and self-employment (Menger, 1999; Davis-Blake & Uzzi, 1993; Leighton & Brown, 2013), also called freelancing. As has been pointed out by Leighton & Brown (2013), the two most prominent reasons for individuals to choose self-employment are the wish to be independent and have greater freedom and flexibility. This is a result of greater control over time, place and pace of working. In this study, the approach of Rapelli (2012) is used to define a freelancer as: “a highly skilled self-employed individual who works for himself but does not employ others”.
In combination with the rise of freelancers, work is increasingly organized in so called ‘project-based organizations’ that use projects as primary unit for production organization, innovation and competition (Hobday, 2000). In these project-based organizations, project teams, consisting of members from an organization as well as freelancers are used to carry out specific tasks. Because the project team dissolves when the project is accomplished, it has to deliver a solution to a task with respect to a deadline (Lundin & Söderholm, 1995; Saunders & Ahuja, 2006; Hobday, 2000). The collaboration between the involved parties therefore comes to an end as soon as the project is completed or has reached its deadline. The fact that projects are temporary organizational forms is one of the big benefits of project-based organizations, making them inherently flexible and reconfigurable (Hobday, 2000). In this study, the project team is defined as: “an ephemeral group of individuals working together to achieve a common goal in a defined period of time” (adapted from Saunders & Ahuja, 2006).
In advertising (Grabher, 2004), as well as other creativity-driven industries, i.e. the film industry (Bechky, 2006; DeFillippi & Arthur, 1998; Ebbers & Wijnberg, 2009), television (Starkey et al., 2000; Sydow & Staber, 2002) or theater (Goodman and Goodman, 1976), project-based organizations are used extensively to increase flexibility and respond rapidly to changing client needs (Hobday, 2000; Bechky, 2006; DeFillippi & Arthur, 1998; Starkey et al.,
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2000; Sydow & Staber, 2002; Grabher, 2004). Marketing and advertising agencies are almost exclusively set up as project-based organizations. This results from the need to reduce the cognitive distance, meaning to bridge the different perspectives of multiple team members (Grabher, 2004). Professionals in marketing and advertising agencies work from project to project; each requiring different sets of capabilities to realize the desired output. Consequently, project leaders have to identify individuals external to the organization to increase the project team’s knowledge base and ability to complete the required task at a level that is satisfactory to the client (Grabher, 2004). While this is also often the case in large agencies, it holds especially true for young agencies since they typically have few employees, limiting the overall knowledge available in the firm and therefore increasing the likelihood for them to need to add new team members (Ucbasaran et al., 2003).
Because the need to access highly specialized skills is crucial in creativity-driven industries such as marketing and advertising, employing freelancers in a project-based setting enables an agency to employ experts for the time span in which their knowledge is effectively needed. Thereby, the project-based organization ensures that it will only be paying personnel necessary to complete the ongoing projects. Clearly, these internal factors increase the demand for freelancers.
To some degree, the rise of freelancing seems to correlate with the rise of project-based organizations; they seem to enable one another (Burke, 2011). The freelancers‘ wish for independence and control is combines with the companies need for flexibility, business development and less financial constraints Leighton & Brown, 2013; Tench et al., 2005; Burke, 2011). Further, firms were reported to hire temporary workers to avoid having to increase health and unemployment insurance costs (Casey, 1989; Christopherson, 1989) and to access highly specialized skills for a short time period (Gordon & Thal-Larsen, 1969).
In recent years, the amount of freelancers has seen a substantial increase. In the period of 2004-2013, the amount of freelancers in the Belgian labor market has increased by
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53% and in the Dutch labor market by staggering 93% while the European average lies at 45% (Leighton & Brown, 2013). Specifically in the creative industries, technical improvements decreased barriers to entry leading to an oversupply of creatives (Menger, 1999). Artistic and other freelancers working in industries with project organization continuously have to stand out because the growing competition has made it more difficult to get selected for a project team.
To address the freelancers’ issue of standing out, this research will focus on the identification and selection process of freelancers for project teams. We will study these processes by looking at young marketing and advertising firms that have been in business for at most five years. These young organizations are expected to experience what has been termed liability of newness and liability of smallness (Stinchcombe, 1965; Singh, 1986; Baum, 1996). Although Stinchcombe’s analysis aims to show that organizational age and size influence an organization’s propensity to survive or die, his notions of liability of newness and smallness have important implications for this research.
The notion of liability of newness assumes that young organizations lack societal approval and have to create new organizational routines (Stinchcombe, 1965; Singh, 1986; Baum, 1996). Young agencies therefore have to establish their own processes and routines to select freelancers and have to come up with ways to attract employees because they have not yet established their name in the industry. We expect these processes to differ among agencies.
Liability of smallness relates to the notion of newness in the sense that young organizations tend to be small, which leads to issues with recruiting and training employees (Baum, 1996). As indicated by Stinchcombe and many other studies, the ability to select the right people through the right processes, will ultimately impact their ability to survive in the long run (Stinchcombe, 1965; Singh, 1986; Baum, 1996, Forbes 2006).
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Most previous literature about project teams has focused on behavior within teams such as trust, motivation and communication (Lundin & Söderholm, 1995; Meyerson et. al, 1996; Jarvenpaa et al., 1998; Alrdich, 2007; Peters, 2009; Manning, 2010). Yet, the most important factor influencing good group dynamics are the individuals involved in the team, which therefore have to be carefully selected. Additionally, these studies have largely looked at dynamics of teams that exclusively consist of employees from a given company (Lundin & Söderholm, 1995), meaning that no external workers participate in project teams. Considerably less attention has been placed on how freelancers are identified and selected for project teams. This research will attempt to study the process of identifying and selecting freelancers for project teams by investigating the role of social networks and the nature of different selection criteria.
By studying young marketing and advertising firms, this research’s focus is twofold: firstly, it will highlight how managers identify and select freelancers. Secondly, implications of the use of freelancers on creativity and organizational learning will be investigated. The two parts of the analysis are reflected in the following research questions:
HOW DO YOUNG MARKETING AND ADVERTISING AGENCIES IDENTIFY AND SELECT FREELANCERS?
DO YOUNG MARKETING AND ADVERTISING AGENCIES ACTIVELY
MANAGE FREELANCERS TO IMPROVE CREATIVITY AND ORGNIZATIONAL LEARNING?
By answering these questions, this research will add to the limited body of knowledge about the characteristics of the identification and selection process of freelancers for project teams in young organizations. Further, it will provide insights about the implications of project-based work on creativity and organizational learning.
The remainder of this paper is structured as follows. In the next section we examine theory regarding identification and selection of new project team members and how freelancing impacts creativity and learning. Following this, we present the findings gathered
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from 10 interviews with key informants. Finally we will discuss the results, give some direction for further research and draw conclusions.
2. Literature Review
2.1 Identifying potential team members
In academic literature, consensus exists about the importance of networks in successful firm growth (Larson & Starr, 1993; Kamm & Nurick, 1993; Francis & Sandberg, 2000; Forbes et al., 2006), which in the case of project-based organizations reflects the successful completion of projects. Networks are widely seen as opportunity structures (Elfring & Hulsink, 2007), enabling individuals to pursue project-based careers as well as exchange knowledge and contacts (Jones, 1996; Manning, 2010; Ebbers & Wijnberg, 2009).
According to Kamm & Nurick (1993), social networks present the best point of departure when engaging in new member identification due to their convenience and ready access. Additionally, social networks reduce the cost of search since they provide inexpensive and trusted sources of information. This trust is further strengthened by internal control mechanisms present in networks such as reputational sanctions (Gemser & Wijnberg, 2001, Aldrich, 2007). These sanctions are repercussions to one’s reputation in a network that occur from actions including copying another one’s innovation or recommending unskilled labor. Therefore, many teams emerge (or are recruited) from among friends, relatives, and former collaborators (Kamm & Nurick, 1993).
Further, Francis & Sandberg (2000) underline the importance of networks by arguing that “personal and strategic factors combine to explain new member addition. Friendship allows the venture to bring in people who would otherwise price their services beyond the reach of a startup venture if friendship was not involved”.
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Another tool to aid the search process has recently emerged online. While Linkedin can be said to represent one’s professional network, online platforms such as upwork.com or
freelancer.com and even Instagram for more creative tasks, are creating links between
unconnected agencies and freelancers. These sites are extending the possibilities for businesses in terms of choice and for freelancers in terms of visibility and access. Websites include rating mechanisms designed to validate good work, thereby providing freelancers with recognition and recommendations which give job providers more confidence in making a choice. These facilitating platforms are rapidly gaining momentum and widespread acceptance but up to this point no empirical investigations have been made to study whether the network approach or online search is used more frequently to identify new freelancers. Combining these two approaches leads to our first proposition:
P1: Agencies will rely on a combination of both networks and online platforms, in order to identify multiple viable candidates for a project team.
2.2 Selecting freelancers
Various theories from different fields have been proposed to guide the selection process for new team members in small groups (Kamm & Nurick, 1993; Ucbasaran et al., 2003; Aldrich’s, 2007; Kulik & Ambrose, 1992; Forbes et al., 2006; Manning, 2010). They can generally be separated into two views: the first one describing the selection process as driven by rationality. Task-related criteria determine the selection to overcome resource deficiencies because teams will form with attention to technical skills, knowledge, expertise and ability (Pfeffer & Salancik, 1978; Kamm & Nurick, 1993; Ucbasaran et al., 2003; Aldrich’s, 2007; Forbes et al., 2006). This view reflects what Grabher (2004) calls the ‘service logic’, meaning that solving the problem to the client’s satisfaction is the prime objective. The second view places more relevance on relational attraction and social networks (Forbes et al., 2006). These influences originate from
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sociological and psychological theory and reflect factors such as homophily, which is the extent to which an individual is similar to another (Mannix & Neale, 2005; Aldrich, 2007; Manning, 2010), familiarity, being the amount of times team members have worked with one another (Hinds et al., 2000; Aldrich, 2007; Huckman et al., 2009) and trust, the belief in the reliability and ability of someone or something (Meyerson et. al, 1996; Jarvenpaa et al., 1998; Peters, 2009).
2.2.1 Task orientation
In their seminal paper about resource-dependence theory, Pfeffer & Salancik (1978) develop the basis of many models for team member selection. By demonstrating that strategic organizational behavior is strongly influenced by the procurement of external resources, resource-dependence theory stresses the importance of gaining access to the best resources available in an agency’s environment. While the resource-dependence theory was developed in a setting where companies represented the central unit of analysis, the mechanisms can be extended to project teams. Just like a company that wants to hire the best people to achieve its company goals, the project team wants to get the best possible people on the team, in order to successfully complete the project task. By analogy, the resource-dependency theory thereby predicts that project teams select new team members based on their task specific knowledge and expertise.
Multiple studies have embraced the resource-dependence logic as basis for team member addition. The network model developed by Larson & Starr (1993) proposes new members to be added because of an identified resource deficiency by the team. Similarly, Kamm & Nurick (1993) developed a competence-driven search model according to which teams are perfectly rational and seek new members based on the team’s perceived needs. Further, Ucbasaran et al. (2003) propose that teams select new members to fill specific gaps in skills, enabling them to pursue their goals and strategies. Based on their analysis, Ucbasaran et
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al. (2003) predict small firms to be most likely to add new members to overcome deficiencies in resources quantity or diversity (Forbes et al., 2006). These models implicitly refer back to the resource-dependence view because a new team member is selected based on his knowledge and expertise, which are seen as resource, having the ability to satisfy the team’s needs or to fill a specific resource gap. Consequently, new team members should always be individuals that provide the best access to resources that help a project advance (Forbes et al., 2006).
2.2.2 Relational orientation
Building on Forbes et al.’s (2006) work about team member addition being best explained by social-psychological theories, Aldrich’s (2007) social psychological model emphasizes the “interpersonal fit between team members and the need for smoothly functioning group processes”. He proposes homophily as mechanisms guiding the selection process. The notion of homophily, which can be explained as “the friends of our friends are already our friends” is reinforced by network clusters; subgroups formed by individuals that know each other and have strong ties between them (Alrdich, 2007). Both these factors create conditions of trust and social support among individuals (Aldrich, 2007; Forbes et al., 2006), which are proven to promote team efficiency and knowledge sharing (Francis & Sandberg, 2000; Meyerson et al., 1996).
The notion of homophily was also addressed by Fernandez, Castilla & Moore (2000), who reported that “new hires referred by current employees were more likely to be similar to current employees than non-referred new hires”. This is also addressed by the Similarity-Attraction-Paradigm according to which “similarity on attributes such as attitudes, values, and beliefs will facilitate interpersonal attraction and liking” (Mannix & Neale, 2005), thereby increasing the likelihood that a person with similar attributes will get selected for a project
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team. Aldrich (2007) advocates that social relations should be the major criterion on which to base new team member selection, since they will lead to beneficial group dynamics.
Another basis for selecting freelancers is familiarity, which looks as how often people have worked with one another (Huckman, 2009). This study looks at the selection of new freelancers that are unfamiliar to the group, limiting the applicability of this concept. However, Hinds et al. (2000) argue that familiarity not only applies to personality but also work practices and can therefore help to reduce uncertainty with respect to working with a new individual. Especially when selecting people based on recommendations, familiarity can be reflected in shared work practice of the recommender and the recommended freelancer. Thereafter, more familiar freelancers are more likely to be selected for project teams.
Finally, trust has been widely studied as determinant of project team performance because it improves information sharing, collaboration as well as ability (Jarvenpaa et al., 1998; Peters, 2009). Here again, recommendations through shared social connections will facilitate the creation of trust between people and encourage the selection of freelancers for project teams. Also, unconnected individuals can benefit from what has been termed swift trust, which assumes that new team members will initially trust other team members and over time reevaluate their initial assumption and adapt their level of trust accordingly (Meyerson et al., 1996).
Both task orientation and relational orientation have been studied extensively by previous literature, presenting plausible concepts to support their arguments. Therefore, we believe that some elements of both orientations are present when individuals make the final decision of which candidate to select, leading to our second proposition:
P2: A combination of factors from both task and relational orientation will be used by managers to decide which freelancer to select for a project team.
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2.3 Additional influences
Various studies have identified factors that have a moderating effect on team performance. Team performance can be expressed in terms of successfully completed projects, which in turn is influenced by a team’s ability because the available skills and knowledge base will determine whether it is able to successfully complete a project. Because the task and/or relational orientation determine which freelancer will be selected, the two orientations ultimately influence a team’s ability and thereby also team performance. As a consequence we expect managers to consider the factors presented below when deciding which freelancer to select and we expect these factors to influence whether more weight is placed on relational or task-oriented criteria. While testing these assumptions empirically will not be a focus of this paper, we will try to discuss some of them.
More frequent and face-to-face interaction (Lind, 2007; Saunders & Ahuja, 2006; Bakker, 2010; Bechky, 2006) among project team members is said to require more trust and confidence, in order to better manage conflict and improve a team’s identification with the task (Lind, 2007; Bechky, 2006; Saunders & Ahuja, 2006). This point supports the relational orientation, since team members are selected based on inter-personal characteristics. However, less frequent and more virtual interaction will lead to increased task focus and limited need for socialization (Lundin & Söderholm, 1995; Saunders & Ahuja, 2006; Bakker, 2010), thereby favoring task orientation.
Additionally, project longevity was found to influence team performance (Lundin & Söderholm, 1995; Saunders & Ahuja, 2006, Bakker, 2013). With longer project duration the risk of conflict increases, which can, however, be reduced through teams that use similar work practices or share similar norms and values (Katz, 1982; Bakker, 2010; Aldrich, 2007), supporting the argument brought by the relational orientation. Conversely, shorter projects will require tasks to be completed under time pressure, which increases the need for skills and
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expertise and narrows the teams focus on the task, favoring task orientation (Lundin & Söderholm, 1995; Bakker, 2010).
P3a: For projects that require frequent and face-to-face interaction and long-term projects, managers will place more weight on the relational orientation.
P3b: For projects that require little and mostly virtual interaction and short-term projects, managers will place more weight on the task orientation.
2.4 Creativity and learning
According to Mayer, 2002, the advertising industry has an interesting take on what concerns creativity. While common-sense tells us to ‘never change a winning team’, the restless need for creativity and originality drive the advertising and marketing industry to contrast this logic with the challenge to ‘always change a winning team’ (Mayer, 2002). This constant demand for freshness minimizes the capacity for reuse of previous solutions and increases the need for occasional modifications in the team composition with the goal to spark the creative thought process (Grabher, 2004). As a consequence, project teams often display unique team constellations.
As pointed out by Choi & Thompson (2005), membership change is beneficial for group creativity as it helps to avoid group homogeneity and encourages healthy cognitive conflict by increasing diversity in knowledge-base and functional backgrounds. This cognitive flexibility, facilitated by weak ties, allows access to ideas and knowledge from different networks and encourages novel and unexpected recombination (Choi & Thompson, 2005; Perry-Smith & Mannucci, 2017). The infrequent interaction and low emotional closeness of actors connected by weak ties strengthen the task focus of their interaction and stimulate creativity and innovation (Perry-Smith & Shalley, 2003).
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While these arguments support the view that diversity through team member change is beneficial to the creative process in marketing and advertising agencies, it can also provoke obstacles regarding group efficiency and organizational learning. Group routines, values and norms are often disrupted leading to problems in information processing and coordination. This social division can significantly decrease a team’s ability to be creative and perform a task (Choi & Thompson, 2005, Mannix & Neale, 2005). Yet, although the short project cycles prevent project teams from “evolving into coherent communities with shared values, they are nevertheless sufficiently connected through extended indirect and latent ties to behave ‘as if ’ they were a group” (Grabher, 2004). This can be achieved by, for example, swift trust (Meyerson et al., 1996).
In today’s knowledge economy and information age, knowledge has transformed into an asset and has become a crucial economic resource (Bontis et al., 1999; Beazley et. al, 2002; Grabher, 2004). Organizational learning through knowledge management, the process of capturing, storing, sharing and using knowledge (Davenport & Prusak, 1998), has become an increasingly important tool to improve business performance (Choi & Lee, 2002). It is nowadays essential for companies to build organizational knowledge and expertise by retaining knowledge inside the company boundaries, with small team size having a positive effect on knowledge accessibility and transfer (Davenport & Prusak, 1998).
Post-project evaluations are cited as being an important tool to capture learnings from finished projects and especially failures from prematurely terminated projects to increase the performance of future projects. However, most companies lack a structured approach for these evaluations or, even worse, do not conduct them at all (Zedtwitz, 2002). Having the right mechanisms to support organizational learning across projects is crucial because it affects organizational performance (see Bresnan et al., 2003). Yet, the discontinuous nature of project-based work itself creates a multitude of barriers to learning such as lack of regular contact with people outside the project, the willingness to share knowledge across project
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boundaries and lack of applicability of learnings to other settings (Lundin & Söderholm, 1995; Gann & Salter, 2000; Bresnan et al., 2003; Bartsch et. al, 2013). These barriers are especially strong when project teams are dispersed and when trying to integrate project-specific knowledge back into the permanent organization (Gann & Salter, 2000; Disterer, 2002).
Besides the learning barriers resulting from the temporality of project-based organization, agencies working with freelancers have to deal with constant in and outflow of workers. Freelancers bring substantial amounts of tacit, specialized knowledge and expertise into project teams, however, this knowledge leaves with their departure after project completion (Kasvi et. al, 2003; Sydow et al., 2004; Bartsch et. al, 2013). The difficulty for agencies is to absorb as much knowledge by documenting learnings, processes and their contexts, in order to increase organizational memory before this knowledge disappears (Levitt & March, 1988). Additionally, tools that enable knowledge transfer to future projects have to be developed (Kasvi et. al, 2003; Bartsch et. al, 2013).
Moreover, freelancers suffer from learning barriers imposed on them by project-based work, resulting in what is called the career progression paradox (Ebbers & Wijnberg, 2009). The paradox results from the fact that freelancers are hired to perform specific tasks, preferably tasks they have previously performed because the temporality of the project does not provide much room for leaning. However, to advance one’s career, learning and expanding capabilities is crucial, yet no firm will invest in teaching freelancers because the learned skills will not benefit the firm when the freelancer works on projects for other companies (Ebbers & Wijnberg, 2009). This lack of incentive to learn and grow together harms both individual and collective learning.
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3. Research Methodology
3.1 Research design and strategy
The aim of this study is to understand how young marketing and advertising agencies identify and select temporary workers for project teams. Further, it will investigate how the use of freelancers in project teams affects the agency’s creativity and organizational learning. An inductive research approach is used because it allows to develop an in-depth understanding and explore the how’s and why’s (Eisenhardt, 1989) of the project team member selection process. Furthermore, this approach was considered most appropriate to detect which process is truly used by practitioners when setting up project teams. Additionally, it enables the researchers to uncover how young agencies try to leverage freelancers for creativity and learning. The study follows an exploratory research design, which allows for flexibility and the possibility to accommodate modifications during the ongoing research process (Saunders et al., 2009). This study will therefore explore the different approaches used and variables that influence them.
To study the process of identifying and selecting freelancers, we look at ten young marketing and advertising agencies in the Netherlands (7) and Belgium (3) with a maximum age of five years. These highly related industries are very competitive, rapidly changing and mostly organized through collaborations in project-based organizations. Agencies present an interesting setting for this study for several reasons. Firstly, the work organization is done on a project basis with multiple projects progressing simultaneously. Secondly, the projects usually differ substantially in skill and resource requirements. As a consequence, agencies frequently have to identify collaborators with specific knowledge, making the selection process a decisive moment towards a successful completion of a project. Thirdly, while the core areas of expertise might differ between agencies, they all offer services that overlap to some extent. Fourthly, we expect young firms to have less established procedures in place, meaning that we
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expect to find differing practices among agencies. We expect selectors to make decisions based on different perceptions and subjective interpretations.
I will analyze both the identification and selection process for project team which has a clearly determined duration (see Figure 1). The empirical foundation for this exploratory study will be given by 10 interviews with key individuals from different firms. The findings will be based on primary data only, which provide specific information regarding the investigated processes.
Figure 1: Identification and selection process for new freelancers
Source: Author
3.2 Sample Selection
For this study, purposive sampling is used because first-hand knowledge about the identification and selection process of freelancers for project teams is only known to a limited amount of people. Participating marketing and advertising agencies are identified using personal contacts, websites acting as start-up repositories such as iamsterdam.com as well as
Selected freelancer
Identification of
potential freelancers Selection of freelancers
Creative Agency Social and professional network online Multiple candidates Task-related criteria Relationship-related criteria
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websites of co-working spaces such as B.Amsterdam, Spaces, WeWork and Betwcowork
Brussels. Finally, extensive online search is performed to identify additional agencies.
The agencies selected for the study all share some characteristics, in order to reduce the variables that could influence the selection process. Agencies all have between 4 and 12 full time employees representing their core team. This captures the requirement that an agency regularly works with temporary workers because its knowledge base is limited to some core capabilities and additional expertise has to be sourced externally. Further, the agency can be no more than five years old, has to have the lead in its project team and has to have completed at least five projects with involvement of freelancers. The most restraining condition clearly was the age restriction of maximum five years.
For the five firms identified through personal contacts, the response and participation rate was 100%. From the other 26 agencies contacted the response rate was 50%. Of those 13 remaining, eight agencies ceased to respond after a more detailed description of the study was sent and five agreed to participate. Only one agency formally declined to collaborate. This led to the list of participating firms displayed in Table 1 below.
3.3 Data collection
To ensure the relevancy of data, interviews were held with key informants like founders and creative or managing directors. Only one respondent has the title of financial director but was extensively confronted with the process of hiring freelancers. The findings of this study are thus based on first-hand knowledge gained from practitioners who have personally dealt with the challenge of setting up project teams. The different processes used for selection identified by this research, enable it to illustrate selection approaches in different contexts (Larson, 2007), while staying within the marketing and advertising industry.
Data was collected using semi-structured interviews of roughly 30 minutes with open-ended questions, which enabled the author to collect a rich and detailed set of data (Saunders
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et al., 2009). Of the ten interviews, eight were held in Amsterdam and two in Brussels. Seven out of the eight interviews in Amsterdam were held face-to-face at the respondent’s respective offices and one interview with a Belgian agency was done over skype. Interviews with the other two Belgian agencies were held in Brussels, one in a café and the other one at the participant’s office. All interviews were held in English, except for two interviews with Belgian agencies that were held in French. The questions asked in every interview were identical (see Appendix), even though the order slightly varied with respect to the respondents answers. The interview guideline contains 20 open-ended questions that were derived from the academic literature outlined in chapter 2 and are grouped into eight topics.
Table 1: Participating firms
Firm Specialty Founded in Full time Employees Position of interviewee 1
Inbound Marketing, Video Marketing, Web
Development
2015 7 Founding
Partner
2
Marketing strategy, Brand activations, Creative conception 2014 8 Managing Director 3 Digital Transformation, Web development, Online marketing
2016 3 Founder
4 Business strategy, Brand
identity, creative concepts 2014 5
Founding Partner 5 Integrated marketing, Digital, Content 2015 5 Business Partner 6 Media advertising solutions, targeted advertisement campaigns 2014 10 Financial Director 7
Social Media Marketing, Mobile App Development, Growthacking 2014 7 Co-founder & Managing Director 8 Influencer Marketing, Creative Campaigns, Brand Activations 2013 12 Founder & Managing Director 9 Digital Transformation, Video Marketing, Strategy Development
2014 5 Founding
Partner
10 Brand Activation, Digital
Activation, UX & UI Design 2013 4
Co-founder & Art Director
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3.4 Validity and reliability
To ensure validity, interviews with multiple firms are conducted, which provide evidence for the reported findings. At the beginning of each interview, the informants are asked for permission to record the interaction. The recorded conversations are then transcribed to ensure that no information is lost and the audio files allow going back to the actual conversation at any point in time. To ensure their validity, transcripts are sent to the respondents, who are asked to point out any misinterpretations (Larson, 2007) and clarify those if necessary. Subsequently, transcribed interviews are analyzed to identify and code topics that have been mentioned. Codes are then sorted based on the frequency of appearance, in order to identify the most important characteristics of the identification and selection process of freelancers for project teams.
To ensure reliability, the questions for the semi-structured interviews as well as the codes to analyze them are derived from the theoretical literature mentioned in chapter 2.
The author acknowledges the limited generalizability of the findings due to the use of purposive sampling and the small sample size. Nevertheless, the results from the study will contribute to existing research and knowledge in the field. The analysis of data is qualitative using inductive reasoning to identify patterns, although the structure of research is based on academic literature representing deductive components.
The willingness and enthusiasm of respondents to share their practices during the interviews provides further reason to believe in the validity of responses (Papadakis et al., 1998). All respondents showed strong interest in receiving the final results of the study.
3.5 Research ethics
The identified agencies are approached by e-mail, in which the scope of the research, the requirements for participation and the expected outcome is communicated. This ensures that participating firms know about the conditions and requirements. Respondents are reminded of
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the policy of anonymity and confidentiality to which the study is subject. This is necessary to ensure honest and accurate responses about sensitive information such as internal, firm-specific processes. Never is any firm-specific element mentioned that could lead to the identification of any individual or firm participating in the study. Interview questions are designed to only address the identification and selection of freelancers.
4. Data Analysis
The data used in the analysis is based on primary data stemming from the interview transcripts. In order to facilitate the analysis of empirical data, different themes were identified using the coding technique. This technique is interpretative in nature and allows organizing the data and demarcating segments within the data (Yin, 2009). Thereby, coding enables the grouping of different findings and the identification of patterns within the different interview responses. The qualitative coding software Nvivo (2014) was used in the process of structuring the data and identifying patterns. To highlight differences and similarities in the findings, interview quotes are used to support the results. Quotes taken from interviews held in French are carefully translated to reflect the true meaning of the statement.
5. Results
5.1 Freelancers, the Industry and Agency
With occupations in ‘Arts, entertainment and recreation’ being the most affected by this rise of freelancers (Leighton & Brown, 2013), it is not surprising that marketing and advertising agencies are confronted with this evolution. Among the respondents, who represent the employer part in the equation, different reasons for this development are provided. According to some, the rise of freelancing comes from people’s wish for more independence and control
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over their work while others argue that regulation as well as project-based work organization force individuals to adopt freelancing practices:
‘I think this is a common mistake where a lot of people say “yeah the millennials they want to be more flexible”. I don’t think the rising number of freelancers is a choice by a generation. It’s a set of circumstances that forces them into being freelancers. […] so it’s the economics and regulations that lead to this.’ (Founding partner, firm 4)
A similar idea is presented by the following Managing Director who indicates that most freelancers they work with would embrace more stability:
‘I think that in general the freelancer, in any case the ones that we work with, prefers to be employed. He is tired of working as freelancer because it means constantly moving and changing teams, stress and so on, so it's not especially what he wants.’ (Managing Director, firm 9)
Yet, the larger part of respondents believes that freelancing is not imposed but rather emerges as a consequence of changes in people’s lifestyle.
‘I really think there are more and more people that want to be in charge of what they do. They want to be in charge of their day. I think, for freelancers sometimes it’s a choice. It’s a choice just to be able to make your own hours and do whatever you want and go up and have a long vacation or not.’ (Business Partner, firm 5)
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‘People are moving around the world much more fluidly […] so the freedom is essential. So, it’s not just millennials, it’s the older generations: 30s, 40s, and 50s who now have the same desire.’ (Founder & Managing Director, firm 8)
Another Co-founder adds that new technological capabilities and the growing ease of access to those empower people in many new ways which consequently encourages individuals to freelance.
‘I think today there are a lot of freelancers around also because there is a chance to be a freelancer and to use software, networks and other tools. […] A lot of people can do more work or even study and try to launch their own career. (Co-founder & Art Director, firm 10)
Most respondents defend the idea that the evolution is influenced by both the labor market as well as business dynamics, ultimately benefitting both sides. On the one hand, freelancers benefit from increased flexibility, autonomy and freedom of choice, while on the other hand, agencies are able to stay lean and agile with simple cost structures.
‘I think that the wish to be flexible is definitely something from our generation. […] It’s not only for the freelancer but it’s also for the company to be flexible. I don’t want to employ too many people because that would also reduce my flexibility and increase my risk with the market going up and down. I think it’s a healthy trend.’ (Managing Director, firm 2)
Additionally, as argued by other managers, many tasks performed by freelancers are very specialized in nature. Hiring a specialist can pose a financial risk to the agency because it
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will have to pay the specialist even though it might not always have a project for him or her to work on.
‘What I see for sure is the other side, so companies that need some specific skills for a short time. I see now with [company name] for example that something we can’t afford is to have many persons on payroll. (Co-founder & Art Director, firm 10)
‘We are a small agency and we don’t have enough work for specialists. […] We don’t have enough work for a video team for example.’ (Managing Director, firm 2)
Certainly the demand fluctuations for agencies as well as different skill requirements of projects limit an agency’s ability to employ more professionals. This is, however, reinforced by strict labor law (at least in the Netherlands) that makes long term contracts risky as the following two quotes indicate:
‘[…] Dutch labor law is so stringent on the employee contract. If I employ someone and he goes sick I have to pay him for two years if he stays sick. These kind of ridiculous rules make me scared of actually hiring someone.’ (Managing Director, firm 2)
‘I think its way easier [for freelancers] to get a project than get a job. I mean in the Netherlands employment law is very tough so if you hire someone you are really stuck to this person. […] And this is sometimes a big risk if you have a specific project running then it’s very hard to say “okay I will hire you” because after six months the project ends and you can’t just fire someone.’ (CFO, firm 6)
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the operating risk would be too high. This actually presents freelancers as critical enablers for the business models of small agencies that are highly focused on agility and low cost structures:
‘We are actually obliged to have this flexible method of freelancers because we cannot use a business model that is too risky and that doesn’t provide us with the same flexibility, especially for a structure like ours.’ (Managing Director, firm 9)
‘When you’re this small, hiring someone is a big step, even if it’s permanent or for a short time. It’s a big step. Whoever you hire has to have something to do. […] Truth has taught us that you have to have big projects, big clients to keep many people active. So, we decided to just start small and get everything we need on projects and only what we need.’ (Business Partner, firm 5)
‘[…] it defines our business model because if we were a very big company we would have to feed the mouths of these services. We want to stay agile and in order to do that, I’ve been noticing the shift for the last 10 years.’ (Founder & Managing Director, firm 8)
The increasing need to be flexible, in terms of skills and expertise, as well as the financial pressure put on agencies, makes a sound argument to use project-based organization and freelancers. Yet another influence has been the requirements regarding the contract and deliverables imposed by the client side. To mitigate this pressure and at the same time find the best solution for the client, two respondents mention the possibility to take on a role as facilitator.
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‘Customers have become increasingly demanding […]. It's never good enough, it never goes fast enough, it's never the right price, it's always too expensive […]. I am almost willing to tell the customer “we have selected two freelancers and two guys online. This costs as much and this so much, what do you choose?”’ (Founding Partner, firm 9)
The following respondent is already using increased transparency in the selection process:
‘I actually have a big project running where I’ve brought a Creative Director in who’s got his own company name. […] it’s just being much more transparent with clients. “You want the best people on this? I can facilitate that”. It doesn’t have to be [Company name].’ (Founder & Managing Director, firm 8)
5.2 Identifying freelancers
With a growing amount of independent professionals offering their services, it is becoming increasingly difficult to distill out the right freelancer for a project. This trend is further reinforced by the ongoing globalization and the pace of technological progress, especially regarding communication technologies that enable people from around the world to work in project teams by virtual means. This raises the question of how young agencies deal with the challenge of finding the right freelancer, a problem that can seem like looking for a needle in a haystack.
All respondents reported that they use their social or professional network and referrals as first point of reference.
‘We use our social network or get recommendations […]. I saw a very good video on Facebook from my sister’s company so I asked her who made that video. She gave me
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that contact and the next time we had a low budget production we called them and they did a great job.’ (Managing Director, firm 2)
‘There was only one time we went outside to look for a freelancer. After that it was all personal network.’ (Founding Partner, firm 4)
The reasons indicated for not wanting to use online websites in the search for new freelancers were manifold and intuitive. As this respondent puts it, trust plays a major role:
‘If I would look for somebody that is not in the base yet, I would call people that I think are in the field that would know other people before I would go to anonymous websites. […] you do tend to trust the people that you’ve worked with in the past and also trust their network.’ (Business Partner, firm 5)
The following Art Director points to the fact that choosing someone from within one’s network also reduces risk by providing confidence through network recognition. He further goes on expressing his skepticisms towards the rating mechanisms that websites use to increase job providers’ confidence in their selection.
‘I made some risky steps in my career when I had to, let’s say, put on my shoulder the fact that I chose someone not known by the environment, or someone that didn’t have the recognition from other colleagues for example.’ […] on Freelancer.com, after the job, every freelancer you work with asks “can you rate me 5?” […] this kind of ranking is totally fake and I prefer something that is more open, that is more artistic.’ (Art Director, firm 10)
29 This statement is extended by the subsequent manager:
‘I find it really hard to assess the quality if you don’t know them or haven’t seen work; for people you don’t have a recommendation for or know them through somebody.’ (Managing Director, firm 2)
According to another respondent it is simply not necessary to go beyond one’s network due to the amount of freelancers in the labor market:
‘Honestly I never needed that [websites]. Freelancers are people who are all over and they all keep on sending you emails. So we never really had to search for some specific skills if it comes to freelancers.’ (Financial Director, firm 6)
While most people don’t use online channels to find freelancers, some people actually are willing to try them and also believe in the possibilities that online websites can provide in the future:
‘Clearly first by recommendation; it's quicker and easier than searching between all possible candidates. Then after I sometimes look on upwork.com and freelancer.com. So I contact between 50 and 100 freelancers and usually there are between 5 and 15 who are interested and who we choose from.’ (Founding Partner, firm 3)
Missing trust and greater uncertainty regarding the quality of work clearly hinder the use of websites in the search for freelancers. The following co-founder, however, finds value in new search possibilities and describes his model as hybrid, using both his network and online channels in the search process:
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‘I think it changes the situation a lot because it provides us with more agility. I would say that for now we really have a hybrid model, that is, we will send it to two freelancers with which we work regularly to see how much they ask for. [Then] we put the job online, we see the different profiles, and select from all candidates based on what is best for the client.’ (Co-founder, firm 9)
5.3 Selecting freelancers
Once managers have identified potential candidates for a project team, the final decision who to select has to be made. This decision is influenced by criteria evaluating task-specific characteristics and relational characteristics of the candidate. All respondents recognize the importance of both types of characteristics. As will be shown in the following sections, however, the respondents differ in how much weight they place on the different orientations, depending on certain characteristics of projects. Selection criteria mentioned by the participants during the interviews are listed in Table 2. This table was created using free association, which is an open and nondirective technique that “increases the likelihood that the full variety of cognitive associations in a person’s memory structure may be evoked” (Joiner, 1998).
5.3.1 Task orientation
According to many respondents, freelancers are hired to fill gaps regarding skills and knowledge as well as to perform specialized tasks.
‘We have a fixed team at the moment of 7 people, including me and my partner, and then the missing links, you might say, are just filling in specific needs for certain projects.’ (Co-founder, firm 7)
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Table 2: selection criteria
Source: Author
Additionally, when the freelancer is selected for a task requiring specific skills, task related evaluation criteria will be dominating the selection process.
‘If it’s really specialized work, like a photographer or a video team or whatever, you really look at the quality of course.’ (Managing Director, firm 2)
Evaluating past work and past experiences obviously provides agencies with confidence regarding the skills of the multiple candidates, which is necessary to ensure the delivery of high quality work to the client.
‘What we're going to do is look at the portfolio, at least for what is purely creative. If it's copy then it's going to be the writings that the person made. So a candidate's selection will be based on tangible experience, nothing intangible at a meeting but rather what we can see already created by him. […] For me it is more important that he is able to perform the job that is asked and that he does so effectively. That he Agency
Selection criteria
Task-related criteria Relational criteria
Past work Cost Experience Recommen-dation
Organizational
fit Trust Commitment
Firm 1 x x x x Firm 2 x x x x x Firm 3 x x x x Firm 4 x x x x Firm 5 x x x x x x Firm 6 x x x x x x Firm 7 x x x x x Firm 8 x x x x x x Firm 9 x x x x x x Firm 10 x x x x x x Count 10 4 9 10 6 8 5
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enjoys himself is of course important but, you know, I primarily focus on my client and that he is happy with the result.’ (Founding Partner, firm 9)
The task focus when evaluating freelancers also comes from the implicit features associated with freelancers. They reduce the need for agencies to invest time and effort into familiarizing them with work procedures and established norms, as indicated by the following quotes:
‘You know the freelancer is supposed to deliver you the output. […] This is maybe one of the biggest advantages of working with freelancers. Like you know when you hire someone it takes such a lot of time to get him up to speed like what is expected. If you work with a freelancer then you clearly define the output that you need, like this is also why I like setting the price upfront, I mean I don’t care how he’s going to make it, I want it to be made.’ (Financial Director, firm 6)
‘I just want somebody to perform the task but deliver it in a way the organization isn’t disrupted in a way.’ (Founding Partner, firm 4)
Although task orientation seems to be the primary source for evaluation criteria used in the selection process, these criteria appear to be complemented by criteria originating from relational aspects. This tendency is illustrated by the following brief comment:
‘[…] it’s almost always past work and after past work it has to be personality. But then still, I pay a lot of attention to personality so I’ll probably try to look for somebody who has both.’ (Founder, firm 1)
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5.3.2 Relational orientation
When selections are made based on relational aspects of freelancers, the choice often reflects the wish of managers to facilitate favorable intra-group dynamics based on trust, values and collaboration as is expressed in this quote:
‘We really try to have a flexible pool of people around us that we like to work with and that we also feel have a good fit with us. We tend to look for people that are “people” people; that like to give it an extra effort because they love the work, they love the project or they just love the atmosphere or the energy. We really look for people that are fun to work with, have a sense of humor, you know, that you can have a good conversation with. There are a lot of freelancers that come and they sit and they work and they go and they’re not the kind of people that we’re looking for.’ (Business Partner, firm 5)
All respondents acknowledge the importance of relational criteria with trust and referral being the strongest criteria, as can also be seen in Table 2.
‘If I know someone and I trust their level and how they work and they recommend someone I don’t even need to interview. I just take them.’ (Founder, firm 8)
Having fun with the team also seems to play a deciding role, supporting the argument of selecting people for team fit and shared vision. The achieved ‘chemistry’ will lead to favorable outcomes:
‘I just want to make sure that the thing I do or we do is also fun. You know I just want to make sure that we have a blast because if you do this then you’ll see the results of this ‘chemistry’ or ‘thing’ you have together. […] so I’d rather work with somebody
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with a little bit less experience and this guy or girl is a great person, than to work with somebody who is a total asshole for example.’ (Co-founder, firm 7)
While tasks requiring specific expertise will induce task-related criteria, the nature of the deliverable can lead to the use of relational criteria:
‘Especially in the cultural sector, since the core product is so intangible, there needs to be a basis of trust. So this is the most important thing for sure. […] I’d rather work with somebody who I can really work with and who’s got the same core values and state of mind, instead of somebody who gets it done.’ (Founding Partner, firm 4)
5.3.3 Combining the orientations
All respondents, at some point, made the statement that both orientations play a crucial role in the selection and shouldn’t be considered exclusively. Task-related criteria are used to ensure that freelancers will produce high quality work and relational criteria will be used to screen for freelancers that will provide positive interpersonal and group dynamics.
‘Well, I think we really look for the two together because we really want to make premium work. […] There are so many people in our field that we are able to choose who we really like to work with and who we trust and who we know that will be good.’ (Business Partner, firm 5)
‘[…] what we usually do if we haven’t met someone before is that we invite them to let them present themselves a little bit, show some work and then we just ask for a quote or an hourly rate. Then on the basis of budget vs past work vs feeling you decide.’ (Co-founder, firm 7)
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An interesting addition is made by the following manager, who illustrates that combining the orientations can be a result of an agency’s leadership structure; in this case a dual leadership with a Managing Director and Creative Director:
‘I am more functional, wanting to hire experts of a function who will be able to perform in a specific domain; the fastest, the best, and so on. And he (name of Creative Director) is going to look more at the fit with the company and someone’s willingness to perform but within the structure.’ (Founding Partner, firm 9)
5.3.4 Additional influences
Throughout the interviews, it has become increasingly obvious that the weight placed on each perspective depends on many additional influences. As pointed out by the following quote, the longer a project lasts, the more important it gets to consider relational aspects when selecting a freelancer:
'The point is, they have to match first with what you want, what you have in mind and of course, it’s so risky because if you skip the step of the relation, maybe you can encounter a problem later. For example how do they react on judgement or requests and stuff like that.’ (Art Director, firm 10)
More virtual and/or infrequent interaction might lead to more importance being placed on task-related criteria.
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‘There are also some freelancers that live in another country so you never see them and so you don’t really look for personality in those people. […] they just email you their work and it doesn’t really matter if they are nice or not.’ (Founder, firm 1)
Correspondingly, more frequent and/or more face-to-face interaction is conductive to using relational criteria for selection.
‘We used to work also with freelancers who used to be in our office continuously for 3 months or something so then it’s more important if the person fits the team or not.’ (Financial Director, firm 6)
‘If you spend a lot of time with them it definitely will be the second [relational] approach.’ (Managing Director, firm 2)
Multiple additional influences were mentioned by respondents. These are listed hereafter and might already give some direction to future research.
To some degree related to frequency of interaction, group size is also indicated as a factor influencing the importance of relational aspects such as mindset.
‘Mindset is, for me, more important now than it was when we had a big group of people in a traditional set-up.’ (Founder, firm 8)
According to the following Co-founder, having a high budget leads to high expectations regarding output quality and this will increase the use of criteria evaluating task competence:
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‘[…] if there is a huge budget then there is another expectation and I will maybe quicker say “I’ll make sure that I’ll have the best professional on the team”.’ (Co-founder, firm 7)
In contrast to the previous statements regarding a relation between frequency of interaction and relational selection criteria, the Co-founder of firm 7 indicates that for repeated collaboration, the importance of relational criteria becomes marginal. He argues that once a good relational basis is established, the focus will lie primarily on task-based criteria.
‘Well we got together for a project because I thought or think that we get along and then you have the project and ideally nothing changes, so you still get along […]. [On the next project] the new criterion is then that they can deliver the work that you need and getting along is then more the context factor. […] if you do the project and the output is terrible then it doesn’t matter if you get along. So for the second project, if you’re asking to work with somebody again, then work becomes more important.’ (Co-founder, firm 7)
‘For small projects or projects that are routine projects, […] the trustfulness is first. But if you know somebody that has that skill and you can leave it with him alone without following that person, you always go back to that freelancer. […] this is more valuable than the price you can pay.’ (Art Director, firm 10)
Interesting statements relating to increased project longevity as well as repeated collaboration are also made in the following quotes. They confirm an influence of both project longevity and frequency of collaboration on the relational orientation.
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‘[…] we even [start to] have environments where they [freelancers] can tap into and give us information when they’re available so that we can use them at the right time but that becomes more ‘Permalance’, it’s more of an ongoing relationship than go searching constantly for a new person or specialist. I would continue to use someone if they share the mindset, they want to work in the same way and they consistently deliver great work. (Founder, firm 8)
‘If you found someone that is really trusted, he stays kind of like an employee but freelancer. ’ (Art Director, firm 10)
‘We have this guy at the moment and he comes 3 day a week for six weeks, so he’s freelancer. [But] actually you know this guy; I don’t call him a freelancer anymore. Even though I pay him on a freelance basis it feels like he’s working here, it feels like an employee and I treat him like that.’ (Managing Director, firm 2)
5.4 Managing creativity
According to all respondents, creativity is a central necessity in order to develop new ideas that can lead to winning pitches for future projects. Yet, different opinions were presented when inquiring about practices to manage creativity in terms of group member change. Some prefer keeping more stable team constellations while others regularly switch it up, as is indicated by the following quote:
‘Especially for artistic stuff of creation, for illustrators or of course photographers and so […] I like to not always use the same freelancer, actually this is something that I avoid. […] you always need to have some twist in what you produce also in terms of what you did on the previous job.’ (Art Director, firm 10)
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Regularly involving new individuals in project teams not only provides new ideas and approaches to problem solving but it also grows the database of freelancers one can fall back to whenever needed. This is very important since one can never be sure that a certain freelancer is available for a given project.
‘We really try to teach ourselves, to say, “OK. We can go that way, we know that way, maybe we can try another way now.” Because we always want to keep expanding the base of good people because there’ll always be a little difference how one person does it and another person does it.’ (Business Partner, firm 5)
Another approach to manage creativity by focusing on group creativity gives the notion of group membership change another twist. In the words of the founder:
I don’t believe in the old form of creativity which is top-down, Creative Director-driven, one-person idea. The best ideas don’t come from one person; best ideas come from a group of people: all multi-disciplined coming from different areas. That diversity is much more important than saying, “oh let’s just bring a new creative in to have a bit more diversity.” Then it’s about how do I put that person with a group of other people for the issue we’re trying to address. It’s about the group dynamic way more than one individual. [So] do I choose someone else for diversity or for new ideas? No. I would continue to go back to someone who I can trust.’ (Founder, firm 8)
Some respondents also indicate a wish for more stability and believe that keeping the knowledge inside the company and learning together also results in good work.
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‘Not at all. Actually I’m trying to make it more stable. I think the change of teams is already done because we’re working with freelancers in different settings for different clients. So no, I’m just looking for more stability and keeping the knowledge and keeping the force together instead of mixing it all up.’ (Founding Partner, firm 4)
‘No, we do not do this consciously; I actually think that it’s one of the consequences of working with freelancers.’ (Founding Partner, firm 3)
Disadvantages from too much freelancer rotation can also arise. Some respondents state that sometimes it is more important to develop an understanding of client needs and this is achieved by using the same freelancers.
‘[…] we are looking to hire an internal designer because freelancers also give you disadvantages. You work once with this designer then with another and then the designs are not really consistent.’ (Financial Director, firm 6)
‘[…] if you work with the same people then you don’t have the creative spark anymore, you stay in your comfort zone. Yeah that is also true but for me I think building our client relationship is the most important for us […]. We’ve been working for [client name] for about 2,5 years on tons of projects and also with a lot of the same people and what you then get is that these people get to know the clients, the brands, what and what not to do.’ (Co-founder, firm 7)
Additionally, local differences in taste and humor can limit the effectiveness of using different freelancers.
