**Abstract**

The IT/ITeS industry has had an impressive growth trajectory over the past two decades. However, it continues to be plagued with talent shortages, managing employee satisfaction, and growth aspirations while trying to reduce employee attrition. COVID-19 has presented an unprecedented opportunity for IT Service organizations to transform the established paradigm of working. The industry has been exploring non-linear growth models that address the talent demand–supply gap. With skilled talent shortage continuing to limit the industry growth, nonlinear initiatives of growth are urgently required. Based on the self-determination theory and the dynamic capabilities framework, we propose a model of "Internal Gig" worker (I-GIG) for the IT Services industry. The new I-GIG workforce would be providing non-linear outcomes without increasing costs significantly. We also argue that this model would be motivational for employees who opt for it, with commensurate reward motivations to engage them. Additionally, this model would enable the work-anywhere, anytime, and leverage talent availability on a global scale. We adopt a qualitative research approach to understand the mechanisms to institutionalize internal gig working, the potential issues such a system may face, and then suggest an internal and external enabling framework that organizations need to adapt to support internal gig work.

**Keywords:** gig work, employee motivation, flexibility, talent management

### **1. Introduction**

India is emerging as a superpower, with a strong IT powerhouse and among the world's largest five economies and over a billion potential customers [1]. Over the last couple of decades, the Indian IT industry has been a leading sector contributing to its economic growth. In 2017, the IT industry contributed nearly 8% to India's GDP, providing direct employment to almost four million people and indirect employment to nearly 10 million people, and is approaching US \$ 200 billion by 2021 [2]. With over 500 global delivery centers employing over 600,000 foreign nationals, the Indian IT industry has established its IT and BPO services dominance. For the continuous growth of this industry, intellectual capital availability is key to

sustainable competitive advantage. Despite the burgeoning population, the workforce shortage in the IT sector looms large [1]. This constrains the Indian IT industry's growth potential exploring non-linear revenue growth models [2]. With skilled talent shortage continuing to limit the industry growth [1, 3], non-linear initiatives of growth are urgently required. The survival and success of the Indian IT industry in a post-COVID-19 world depends on how work is re-imagined, redefined, and the workplace is restructured accordingly.

COVID-19 has presented an unprecedented opportunity for IT Service organizations to transform the established paradigm of working. In the new world of work, the office building or factory floor is no longer synonymous with "workplace" [4]. With clients willing to embrace the "anytime, anywhere" working, IT organizations equip their employees with the required infrastructure support and enable their remote working with requisite changes in policies and incentives. Agility and resilience are fast becoming the most appreciated competencies of employees. An uptake in demand for IT and IT-enabled services will require IT organizations to add more employees with digital skills in the future, resulting in a skew between talent available and talent needed to support the industry. The World Economic Forum's recent study on 'Future of Jobs- 2020'<sup>1</sup> shows that 90.3% of companies will provide more remote working opportunities, and 87.1% are accelerating the working process's digitalization. 58.1% of organizations are accelerating tasks' automation, 67% are more likely to hire new temporary staff with skills relevant to new technologies, and 65% of organizations are likely to outsource some business functions to external contractors. In comparison, 56% are likely to hire freelancers with skills relevant to new technologies. The trend of hiring more gig workers is an outcome of the economic crisis and is stronger in the IT, data, and technology service sectors [5] where skill obsolescence and mass layoffs are expected. However, gig working is associated with significant risks of income fluctuation, career path uncertainty, social isolation, low psychological well-being, and increased psychological dysfunction [3, 4, 6]. The data clearly shows that the global labour market is shifting towards a new equilibrium in the ways of working and the division of labour. However, utilizing external gig workers does not solve the talent shortage problems plaguing the IT services industry. Additionally, these external gig workers add to the cost. Therefore, we explore a new way of working, which integrates facets of gig working, but within the internal workforce of an organization, thereby reducing the cost burden and alleviating the talent shortage problem.

Based on the self-determination theory and the dynamic capabilities framework [7], we argue that internal gig organizational processes will allow the industry to effectively and efficiently address the talent shortage. By embracing this opportunity with commensurate enabling structures, IT/ITeS organization can sustain their growth trajectories and retain a competitive advantage in a rapidly changing technology environment and shortage of qualified talent to support the growth.

The proposed new mechanism requires reconfiguring internal and external ecosystems and providing enabling processes. However, the challenges of institutionalizing this new way of working are not clear. Our study, therefore, adopts a qualitative research approach to understand the mechanisms to institutionalize internal gig working, the potential issues such a system may face, and then suggest an internal and external enabling framework that organizations need to adapt to support internal gig work.

<sup>1</sup> World Economic Forum. 2020. The Future of Jobs Report.

*The Emerging New Order: Exploring New Ways to Build an Internal Gig Employment System… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.96731*
