blog.ployme.com.au

This post comes from MX Magazine, syndicated around Australia

By Debra Bela
It’s Monday afternoon. Exams are looming. The credit card is maxed out and you desperately want to go out with the guys on the weekend. You’d get a job, but you don’t want to commit to anything long term.

There was a time when this scenario would lead to an un happy ending. But in an Australian first, potential casual workers can now hook up with employers in minutes to find one-off shifts using a new employment utility called www.PloyMe.com.au. All you need is a mobile phone and a computer.

The Brisbane-based initiative, created by former restratuer Matt Kesby, is a direct response to casualisation of Generation Y workforce. “Industries really are struggling.” Kesby says.
“Changing jobs more frequently is kind of what our lifestyle is all about. So it begs us to find a new way to work with this shift. Rather than seeing people leaving a job forever, let’s stay connected and view human resources exactly as they are – a resource.”

“It’s like water in a drought. There’s water in this dam, none in that dam. We have to pump water between to two. Essentially, that’s what we do. We allow people to stay connected to more than one employer with their availability, so at any time they can pick up extra work.
You simply log into the site, outline your skills, the type of work you’d like and your availability over the next four weeks or more. In minutes, you’re connected to up to six employers looking for your talents.”

The first person to email or text YES when a shift is available gets it, no questions asked.
Since launching in August, the record stands at two minutes between registering an interest and being offered a shift.

Make no mistake – this is work not a career, that’s being offered. It is not a career hob board or temp agency that is seeking a long term commitment from its casual entourage. Work can vary from packing shelves, delivering pizza and selling clothes to working as a roadie or theatre usher.
“It’s for students supplementing their income, who can only work at certain time of the day; for people whoa are unemployed and have found it difficult to get their foot in the door, for mums looking to find infrequent work from time to time,” Kesby says.

“We even had an article clerk who picked up work sending out flyers in the city in the mornings, because if you want to live the lifestyle but don’t have the budget, you need some options.”

PloyMe has 20,000 workers online and employers from 14 industries in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne with smaller representations in Adelaide and Perth.

Minimum award rates must up held and people with greater experience can quoting closer to award rates tend to get more work, because employers are trying to save money where they can.” Kesby says. “But those who really need people appreciate that paying $2 or $3 more an hour for a more experienced person saves them money in the long term.”

With the number of new employees entering the Australian marketplace in decline as the population ages, and the average worker expected to have 10 to 14 jobs by the time they hit 38, Kesby says building relationships could be a better investment than working towards retaining an existing workforce.

Tags: Employment skills shortage jobs shifts SMS mobile emplo

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 2nd, 2008 at 8:40 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.