Creative freelancers out of work + underpaid – new research reveals realities of living as a freelancer in Australia’s creative industries
Newly published research has cast a light on the difficult working life faced by the freelance workers who power Australia’s creative industries.
The major survey of 1,127 creative-sector freelancers from across the country was conducted for creative industries networking community, The Loop. It revealed that freelancers regularly face long stretches without a job, sometime aren’t paid for the work they do, take lesser roles just to keep earning and seldom land a permanent job out of a freelance contract.
The research found that on average, full-time freelancers are only in work for eight months of the year. When between contracts, they typically spend more than five weeks (5.2) actively looking for work before finding any. Only 20% of full-time freelancers reported not having any periods without work in the last twelve months. 56% said they have taken on more junior freelancing roles just to get work. When freelancers are working, they’re juggling more than two freelance jobs simultaneously, on average.
Almost all freelancers (97%) said they’ve worked more hours on a project than they had costed for and alarmingly, almost half, at 46%, reported having not been paid in full for their freelance work at some time.
Freelancing is not the gateway to permanent employment many would expect. Three quarters (76%) said that a freelance contract rarely or never turns into a permanent role. And it isn’t a lack of quality tertiary education that is the problem. More than 70% of freelancers (72%) are university-degree qualified.
Yet, despite the instability and lack of long-term opportunity exposed by The Loop’s survey, the results also highlighted positive sentiments amongst freelancers working in Australia’s creative industries. More than two-thirds (69%) say they feel valued as part of the team by their freelance employers and 60% agree they are happier working this way than in permanent work.
Says Pip Jamieson, co-founder of The Loop: “These results show that working as a freelancer in the creative sector is often a far cry from the ideal scenario of high incomes, freedom and endless variety that many in the industry perceive it to be. Freelancers provide a flexible labour force that is a key pillar of most creative sector agency or consultancy business models. But freelance workers, who play a vital role in the growth and success of the creative industries in Australia, often find it fairly challenging to make a proper living this way.”
Jamieson added that the emergence of crowd sourcing and free pitching sites are heavily contributing to the problems, not just for workers, but for businesses that hire freelancers or outsource creative work too.
Says Jamieson: “These types of platforms exploit creatives, devalue their work and create an environment that encourages fast turn-around at the expense of the quality of work. Getting sub-standard creative from these channels only costs businesses more money in the long term.”
The Loop conducted the broad survey of Australian freelance workers in the creative industries, as part of the development of their new freelance job service, Freelance Pro. The free feature on www.theloop.com.au allows companies to find high-quality freelancers by referral and recommendations from trusted contacts, and connects freelancers to more and better job opportunities. Freelance Pro is also helping to standardise the value of freelance work at all levels through fair, salary survey sourced rate advice. And the service provides freelancers with a real-time calendar so companies can search for talent by availability.
Says Bane Hunter, The Loop’s global CEO: “The Loop is the leading professional networking platform for the creative sector with 65% of all Australian creatives now active members of the site. Our vision has always been to better connect creatives with commercial opportunities. Our highly participatory community means we’re uniquely placed to innovate and develop solutions that help service the needs of that community. Freelance Pro is not about getting cheap or free creative services. It will help to build an industry that is based on meritocracy by better aligning freelance creative service providers with the businesses that need their services most.”
Summary of key research findings:
– Nearly all (97%) freelancers have worked more hours on a project than they had costed for
– Nearly half (46%) of freelancers have not been paid in full by an employer for their freelance work at one point in time
– For the average freelancer, this occurs 11.5% of the time
– Nearly all (97%) freelancers have worked more hours on a project than they had costed for
– More than half (56%) agree they have taken on more junior freelancing roles just to get work
– The average freelancer estimates that for 45% (or 5 months) of the last 12 months they have had freelance work
– This is higher amongst those who freelance full-time (68% or 8 months)
– Amongst those who freelance full-time, in the last 12 months 1 in 5 (20%) have not been without freelance work
– The average period in the last 12 months that elapsed between contracts for full-time freelancers was 5.2 weeks
– More than a quarter (76%) of freelancers have rarely or never experienced a freelance job turn into a full-time role.
– When freelancing, the average freelancer will be working on 2.2 projects at any one time
– More than 7 in 10 (72%) freelancers have completed university level education
– Nearly 7 in 10 (69%) freelancers agree that as a freelancer they feel they are a valued member of their client’s team
– 6 in 10 (60%) freelancers agree that they are happier freelancing than in full-time employment
*Longergan Research conducted a survey of 1,127 subscribers of www.theloop.com.au, from all Australian states and territories, in January 2013.
8 Comments
This is a very important study. Life as a freelancer is beyond tough. Even if you’re very senior, you won’t get work unless you lower your rate to the same rate you would have charged 5 years ago, and even then it is questioned by management. It is especially tough when you add paying for childcare into the mix. I was recently booked on a job, and went to some trouble to organised pre-paid childcare, only to have the work cancelled on the day with no cancellation fee offered, even though they were well aware that I had booked childcare. To be treated like a doormat is easier to take when you don’t actually have to fork out for childcare as well.
If The Loop was the only source of reference in this study then some of the results are going to be skewed. The Loop is a website to help freelancers find work. If you are a full-time freelancer who is consistently employed throughout the year then you are less likely to be visiting a self-employment web site.
This is interesting, but so is the project post on the Loop for a major food retailer seeking a promo idea for $1500 bucks.
http://www.theloop.com.au/jobs/Boost-Juice-Promo-1500-for-Best-Idea/Melbourne/10806
One survey highlights the plight of individuals being ripped off on another page the entire industry is – Well done !!!
Waiting for the day when ideas are valued as much as administrators, financiers, agents etc – after all, without a product they have nothing to sell.
Well for better or worse at least The Loop is bringing this to light . In terms of what is posted on their site, I think they really can’t set the price points people will pay for work – but this is their way of saying hey maybe the value of the work the freelancers are doing is not appreciated enough . I know I have not been paid anywhere near enough as a freelancer, and the hours are really tough. The article is a bit too heavy focused on the founders quotes – would have been better to lead with the survey results.
This is just a free advert for The Loop.
Growth must be down. Who is going to buy the loop once it is fully puffed out ?
Adverts for ‘unpaid’ intern opportunities are posted by the loop so I find that comments about crowd sourcing and free pitch sites highly hypocritical and a true indication of the substance and colour of the hole inside the loop.
I was sent the survey in question and declined.
Did anyone else have a profile automatically generated for them by the Loop ?
A very interesting topic, that probably isn’t best represented by this particular study. Whatever the industry, the condition of the freelance market is usually very telling.
It points to where supply, demand, talent stocks, revenue models, profitability and more.
And, by all reports, the current freelance market isn’t pretty. Agencies, after allowing marketers to screw them over or running on ridiculously inefficient business practises, are paying freelancers marginally more than they were 10 years ago. And that might be fine, if electricity, food, entertainment, clothing, rent, mortgages and all other utilities/ living expenses were the same as 10 years ago.
What this clearly signifies is that the agency world is in deep, deep shit.
That said, a few things have to be pointed out:
1. Not all freelancers are looking for permanent work. As a general rule, the better the freelancer the less likely that s/he actually is looking for full-time work.
2. When an agency wants a creative, it generally falls into 2 categories. The either want a) a piece in their machine, or someone who will just do whatever the agency direct them to do; or b) a professional who will advise them (and whom the agency are willing to actually take advice from) and offer the agency a level of expertise they don’t currently have on the books, so to speak.
To the Non – Looper – try using the site before you so eloquently bash a community that actually works. Not sure what dodgy sites you use, but there is now way to generate a profile automatically on the loop – took me a fair bit to get a profile up, and there is no way unless you post projects that you will be able to apply for any job.
Nobody forces you to apply or respond to intern jobs – which the Loop allows to be posted for free , so of course there are a few unscrupulous organizations out there trying to take advantage of it. I read an article about this just recently where some of the largest publishers were engaging in this sort of underpaid exploitation, nothing to do with the loop. Is it a despicable thing? – of course it is.
For me at least I got one freelance job out of the loop last year (not a bad one at that). Did I accept the first rate offer? – no I negotiated a better rate, but then again if you are any good its easier to do. So give the loop a break mate, if you knew anything about them you would know they are not your useless phone directory that LinkedIn is (and don’t get me started on the horror that Seek is).
Will give freelancepro a go since its free and see what happens. Their Ceo (cool name I have to admit) gets it, its not about driving rates down, but getting the best people the right job and doing it by listening to what we have to say about features needed – which is much more than most digital or social site executives are capable of . LinkedIn just try’s to get more money out of me for enhanced visibility nonsense.
Just an observation from the other side, the rates we are allowed to give come from management. It is driven by project budgets which is all about margins. When clients get greedy or cheap then its a problem all around. But I will tell you this, any tool that allows me to save time in filtering a load of suitable applications I will use. The shockers we get as applicants through Seek is just a waste of time.
To the point the loop user made , we have not had much success with LinkedIn for creatives, but commercial sales roles are much better than Seek. If you think LinkedIn is expensive for a job seeker then you should see what they charge for a company package. The Loop I think recently repriced their rates, so we will give them more of a go especially if this new product works as advertised.