Effective change management in freelancing projects

Abstract

This thesis will propose a framework that organizations can use to facilitate change management in projects that involve freelancers. Digitalization has brought about the breakdown of traditional organizational structures and many organizations have taken advantage of this to engage with freelancers as a core business model. As such, it is important to understand how freelancers as a core stakeholder group impact the traditional change management methods that organizations employ to realize change management project goals. To propose such a framework, this thesis will examine the role of freelancing in the global economy, describe the status of freelancing in the global economy, and understand why a framework may be necessary for such organizations that engage with freelancers. To that end, existing change management literature, both from theoretical and practical standpoints, will be examined to understand what would complement such a framework, and what could be missing from existing literature. Surveys with freelancers themselves will be conducted, as well as with experienced project teams, to hear directly what is important for each group in change contexts, considering their experiences in their respective roles to date. The key takeaways from such research methodology and approach are: change management projects teams must build team cohesion and in so doing articulate the change need to the freelancers clearly and refer to potential impacts on freelancer payments; teams must maintain clear communication, updating freelancers throughout the execution phase; the team must conduct post-mortems internally, as well as with freelancers, particularly to involve them on lessons learned and performance recognition, and; teams must continue to foster engagement with the freelancing community outside change management projects to cultivate a collective environment to future potential change initiatives.