Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Where The Money"s At: The Fastest-Growing Sectors For The Self-Employed

“Things may come to those who wait,” our 16th President once said. “But only the things left behind by the people who hustle.”


Abraham Lincoln, of course, lived in vastly different times than our own. He talked about the implication of expansion of the railroads. We talk implications of the expansion of data storage. A culture obsessed with Manifest Destiny, a culture obsessed with Facebook FB -0.68%. The Civil War, and whatever it is we’re fighting.


Still Lincoln’s America was every bit as enterprising as ours—and so while we may never know for certain that he was talking of the hardscrabble nature of America’s earliest founders, we feel it’s a safe bet. Because when it comes to the combination of acumen and aggression unique to America’s entrepreneurs, no one hustles like the self-employed.


According to newly released data from Freelancer.com, a Sydney, Australia-based outsourcing marketplace, the freelance economy has continued to thrive in 2013, thanks to the technical ambitions of small- and medium sized enterprises, a trend that shows no sign of stopping.


“2013 will be viewed as a year of unprecedented disruption, with tectonic shifts in the design and manufacturing industries as they struggle to adapt to the unstoppable rise of crowdsourcing and 3D printing,” Freelancer.com CEO Matt Barrie said in a release. “But with disruption comes opportunity, and over the next couple of months there is a unique window for any entrepreneur with an innovative business model to build a billion-dollar company.”


With that, Freelancer presents its quarterly data on the 50 fastest-growing sectors for freelance opportunity based on an analysis of over 300,000 jobs posted on the site during Q2 2013. According to the trend-spotters, as big business strives to innovate (and, often to keep up with scrappy newcomers in the race to do so), they are increasingly turning to the freelance community to keep pace.


But what talent do they need the most? Surprisingly, they’re not the code-heavy positions of the current tech talent wars. Sure, the gigs—like Powerpoint creation, report writing and 3D printing—are tech-focused, but they’re far less so than I’d imagined I’d see. Some, like photoshop design work, illustration and animation, are downright creative (depending on your clients, of course).


Creative types are winning from this shift to outsourced labor perhaps more than any other group. Design jobs are up overall, but illustration and Photoshop jobs in particular showed a nearly 20% boost in the second quarter of the year. Freelancers benefit from the unprecendented amount of flexibility provided by self-employment and businesses find themselves in a position to shop around for the best deal on a job-by-job basis. In an economy where the belt is still tight and the bar for innovation and creativity is set ever-higher, that matters.


Speaking of 3D design, Freelancer credits the $600 million Makerbot acquisition for driving up freelance activity for the self-employed with that particular skill-set. 3D rendering, 3D modeling and 3D animation all feature in the 20 fastest growing jobs for Q2 and have seen significant growth even in the past few months (rendering up 17.3%, modeling 12.5% and animation 11.7%). It’s projected to continue to be the biggest driver of freelance activity through the remainder of 2013.


via Where The Money’s At: The Fastest-Growing Sectors For The Self-Employed – Forbes.



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Where The Money"s At: The Fastest-Growing Sectors For The Self-Employed