In this quick 4-minute read, learn how businesses can turn groups of independent contractors into an on-demand workforce, ready to jump on new opportunities at a moment's notice

With over 55 million eager independent contractors in the American workforce, finding great freelancers has never been easier. But if you’ve decided to use freelancers for your business, how do you manage them efficiently? Wait, what? I’m supposed to manage my freelancers?

The freelance economy is a brand-new playing field, and most companies aren’t tuned in to the best practices for hiring and managing freelancers.

We’ve started to see some common management problems in the freelance economy. Maybe you’ve seen them too:

“We hire a handful of independent contractors at our company. But it’s hard to stay organized. It’s taking more time than we anticipated to onboard and manage everyone. If this is going to work, we need to make this simpler and easier for everyone.”

Maybe you’ve experienced some of these common problems with managing freelancers:

• Admin work taking WAY more time than you predicted

So how do you solve these problems to optimize your freelance workforce? The answer is simple:

Create your own private Uber-style marketplace of freelancers so it’s easy to schedule, coordinate and pay your freelancers.

Without an efficient way to manage, schedule and coordinate your freelancers, it’s virtually impossible for your business to take advantage of all they have to offer.

In recent years, we’ve seen the rise of the most efficient system ever for buying and selling services: the service marketplace. Widely popularized through the growth of Uber’s ride-sharing model, a service marketplace is straightforward: a group of people need a service, and a group of people provide that service. What makes this possible? It's all about the software that connects them. An app like Uber makes it effortless to communicate, find the right person for the job every time and exchange money seamlessly.

Just like Uber, there’s a simple tool that can turn any team of freelancers into a private, on-demand workforce that your company can tap into when you need them. It can’t get any easier to manage a team of independent contractors.

Use the Uber model to harness your own private workforce of freelancers, enabling your business and your freelancer workers to thrive.

1. Set up your company with a Contractor Management System and add freelancers. It’s fast and easy, and you can use free tools to find freelancers when you need to grow your teams.

2. Create a job when you need work done and select the skills that the job requires. Jolly FMS notifies the freelancers on your team with those skills and one of them can claim it just like an Uber-style marketplace. When they’re finished, Jolly FMS handles payment automatically.

3. Stay flexible. Not all jobs are the same, so instead of using the marketplace-style features, you can always assign work directly to one person.

Automating organization and assignments is the most efficient way to work with freelancers. You’ll find that you’re able to grow your teams of workers easily, so you’ll have more available trusted workers with far less effort. You’ll also find that your freelancers are eager to work for you because your system is simple, flexible and reliable. In short, because you treat them right.

Why does a private Uber-like marketplace work better for businesses and freelancers?

1. Quickly coordinate, precisely schedule, easily communicate and pay freelancers through one platform. This efficiency saves you time, hassle, money and reduces turnover. This single platform also enables you to build up your teams of independent contractors. It even automates 1099 tracking and reporting!

2. Know your freelancers’ skills and preferences. Shared knowledge and good rapport with your workers boosts performance

3. Freelancers can claim the jobs they want, when they want. Since you’ve automated so much of the process, it’s easy for freelancers to sign in and work for you when it’s best for their schedule. This means happier workers doing more projects they’re actually interested in doing.

Jolly FMS (Freelancer Management System), is simple and powerful Contractor Management software to help you streamline the entire process of working with 1099 independent contractors. Organize your crew, coordinate their work, and pay them securely online in a single tap.