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The purpose of this paper is to draw attention to the lack of a clear theoretical framework in management education programs to allow students to understand the world in which gig workers operate. The article asserts the need for practical guidance for pedagogy to prepare students to manage in the gig economy.

This paper provides a rationale for the assertion that, beyond training students to create their own work configurations in the new world of work, management education should acquaint students with the specific challenges faced by managers responsible for a spectrum of workers in various work configurations. This paper explicates gig work configurations and offers theoretical and practical issues related to worker and manager identity to be considered in the development of an educational framework.

Management curricula over time have successfully augmented several competencies to the manager identity. Bolstering the competency of simultaneously managing employees working in multiple employment arrangements is the next natural progression of management education.

Particular challenges for prospective “gig managers” may relate to the management of somewhat elusive processes that enhance their own and their workers' organizational identity and related outcomes.

The authors invoke the literature of holding environments for identity development, along with the distinctness and inclusion facets of Kegan's theory of the evolution of consciousness and tenets of institutional theory, in a call for the examination of methods that may help aspirant managers recognize distinction and inclusion needs in others and cultivate tools to assist in their workers' need fulfillment.

High-quality employee motivation can contribute to an organization’s long-term success by supporting employees’ well-being and performance. Nevertheless, there is a paucity of research concerning how organizations motivate workers in non-traditional work contexts. In the algocratic context of the gig-economy, the purpose of this paper is to understand the role that technology can play in motivating workers.

Drawing on the self-determination theory, job-characteristic theory and enterprise social media research, this conceptual paper explores how the architecture of the digital labor platforms underlying the gig-economy (and the characteristics of jobs mediated through these IT artifacts) can impact key antecedents of self-motivation.

Combining theory and empirical evidence, this paper develops a mid-range theory demonstrating how organizations can support the self-motivation of gig-workers through the thoughtful design of their digital labor platforms and the integration of two social media tools (namely, social networking and social badging).

This paper answers calls for psychologically-based research exploring the consequences of gig-work as well as research studying the impacts of advanced technologies in interaction with work contexts on motivation. In theorizing around a large set of social-contextual variables operating at different levels of analysis, this paper demonstrates that individual-level motivation can be influenced by both task-based and organizational-level factors, in addition to individual-level factors.

The proposed theory provides novel insight into how gig-organizations can leverage widely accessible social media technology to motivate platform workers in the absence of human supervision and support. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an investigation of how different types of gig workers engage in the gig economy. Specifically, the authors distinguish between workers who view gig work as primary income (or not) and those workers who view it as a job (or not).

In total, 1,190 Mechanical Turk (MTurk) workers completed surveys across two studies examining whether types of workers differ based on demographic characteristics, utilization of MTurk, why they participate in the gig economy on MTurk (i.e. push and pull factors) and how this impacts life satisfaction.

Workers relying on MTurk as a primary income had lower incomes and spent more time completing large numbers of work units. This group of workers also reported fewer pull factors (e.g. enjoyment) as a reason for working in the gig economy and had lower levels of self-reported current and predicted future life satisfaction. Individuals who view MTurk as a job were more likely to treat MTurk like a job – engaging in online communities and having a regular work schedule. These workers were more likely to report pull factors (e.g. enjoyment and challenge) and did not differ on life satisfaction.

The current research contributes to our understanding of MTurk, one of the largest online platforms for gig work, as part of the diverse gig economy and highlights potential areas for future research.

Career management research and literature has been slow to respond to the rise of the gig economy. Perhaps in part due to the temporal, flexible and shifting nature of the gig economy, there could be an assumption that the boundaryless and protean career management models that have dominated careers thinking for nearly 30 years retain and extend their applicability. However, whilst there is clear resonance with discourses such as boundaryless, portfolio and protean careers within the gig economy, this chapter will argue these models cannot adequately address female career management experiences. Through a feminist poststructuralist and intersectional lens, the concept of the frayed career is advocated as a more useful approach for understanding the impact of gender and intersecting subject positions on career management experiences. With growing numbers of women employed in the gig economy and in addressing calls for a greater focus on gender and intersecting identities on the experiences of gig work, this chapter analyses the role of gender, ethnicity and class and career management outcomes in the gig economy amongst Human Resources professionals. The frayed career concept is used to demonstrate how gig work can be incorporated into the rhythmicity of a career and how shifting intersectional positions can reveal alternative discourses of privilege and precarity from the otherwise assumed position of multiple disadvantage. In doing so there is an opportunity to reflect on appropriate career management guidance for women in the gig economy beyond the dichotomous positions of privilege or disadvantage and career solutions based on Westernised linear career ideals.

Despite widespread interest in the gig economy, academic research on the topic has lagged behind. The present chapter applies organizational theory and research to compose a working model for understanding participation in the gig economy and how gig work may impact worker health and well-being. Drawing from past research this chapter defines the gig economy in all its diversity and advances a framework for understanding why individuals enter into gig economy. Next, the authors discuss how various characteristics of the gig economy and gig workers can be understood as both demands and resources that influence how gig work is likely to be experienced by the individual. To understand how these characteristics are likely to influence worker health and well-being, we draw from past research on alternative work arrangements and entrepreneurship, as well as the limited extant research on the gig economy. Finally, a research agenda is proposed to spur much needed research on the gig economy and its workers.

This chapter draws together the main themes and conclusions from the book to provide an interdisciplinary analysis of the impacts of the gig economy. The effectiveness of the dynamic structural model of the gig economy for structuring and understanding of this heterogenous and somewhat hidden economy is also addressed. This chapter identifies the primary locations in which boundaries are shifting and suggests the onward impact of this, as well as ways in which organisations may be able to ameliorate the effects. It focusses in particular on the implications for the human resource management community and key stakeholders in the wider economy, in relation to future of work debates. Reflections on the utility, benefits and opportunities for interdisciplinary research within the current constrain of journal rankings and higher education performance regimes are also explored. Finally, a number of potential avenues for further research to advance our understanding of, and engagement with this form of commerce, are identified.

This article seeks to answer the question: how should we conceptualise the “gig economy”? In doing so the authors shall explore if gig economy work should be understood as a novel concept that stands alone, a concept that is a subtype, or whether it may in fact be conceptually redundant.

The authors conduct a thematic analysis of interview data drawn from 27 interviews with policymakers, trade union officials, key figures within labour organisations and gig economy workers.

The authors reveal how, from the perspective of key stakeholders, the concept of the gig economy exhibits a lack of “differentiation” from the long-established concept of precarious work of which it is best understood as a subtype.

The empirical findings from the authors’ study should be regarded as limited in terms of being situated in the specific employment context of the UK. Nevertheless, the implications of the study have a broader reach. The authors seek to provoke debate and discussion among scholars across disciplines and contexts working in the areas of precarious work and the gig economy. The authors’ analysis will be of interest to scholars who are concerned with how they conceptualise “new” forms of work.

The analysis offers a novel intervention by revealing how key stakeholders perceive the gig economy through a prism of continuity rather than change and connect it with broader processes of precarity.

This chapter addresses the two important themes that we believe characterise how the platform-based gig economy operates. The first of the two themes explores the shifting boundaries of the triangular business model and its place within the wider, evolving capitalist structure. The triangular business model is the foundation of the platform-based gig economy and consists of the digital platform, the producer/worker and the end consumer. The digital platform acts as the intermediary and provides a market for exchange of goods and services between the workers and the end consumers. The fluidity of the triangular relationship has left the platform-based gig economy beyond the reach of the traditional neo-liberal regulatory system leading to the blurring of employee and employer relations. The second theme is based on the exploration and application of the Marxist concept of surplus value creation and its appropriation within the gig structure. Here, the authors seek to show the exploitation of the worker as a participant in the triangular business model. Given that the worker bears the majority of the entrepreneurial risk and provides capital they ought to receive a proportion of the surplus value created from the transaction. The authors have established the increasing dominance of platforms within the triangular business model and the enhanced scope for exploitation of workers in form of poor remuneration standards due to employee status ambiguity and the appropriation of a disproportionate amount of surplus value flowing to the platform owners.

The definition and essence of a trade union is to provide a voice for the worker, enabling a balancing of the power gap between employer and employee. How does that shift in the gig economy when the worker lacks even the most basic elements of protection through employment law? This chapter interrogates the proposition that the trade union movement has until recently neglected to engage with the issues that these workers are facing and so has denied its own roots. One result of this has been the emergence of alternative forms of organising for collective voice. This shifts the boundaries between organisers of collective voice and representation with varying results. This chapter discusses the impact on trade unionism of the gig economy and critiques its approach and pace. It identifies the conflict engendered within the trade union of advocating for members only, as well as the shifting sectors in the broader economy and trade union responses to that. The importance of trade unionism moving forward is assessed through a series of interviews and secondary research using the lenses of social movement theory at macro-level, social network theory at meso-level and social identity theory at micro-level. These theories allow an interdisciplinary analysis of trade unions responses to assess the causes of responses of trade unionists to this emergent gigging workforce and its challenges. It identifies that there is a more recent intention and potential for trade unions to engage with giggers but that an innovative and international movement for voice is required.