April 7, 2026
April 7, 2026
Photo by Vitaly Gariev on Unsplash
For employers who’ve had to adjust their talent strategies to survive a flurry of challenges in recent years (skills shortages, AI changing the nature of work, and rising operational costs, to name a few), gig work, in its many iterations, paints a promising picture.
Non-traditional forms of employment allow employers to use talent on an as-need basis, typically for a fraction of the cost. There’s one major problem, though: Workers aren’t so keen on non-traditional work, and their qualms with it lie with the nature of these roles, according to a new Indeed survey of more than 10,000 employers and job seekers across 12 countries.
A “no brainer?” More than half (53%) of employers surveyed reported currently leveraging an “agile workforce”—meaning non-traditional employment like gig and contract work, interim or fractional roles, remote “digital nomad” jobs, and job rotations—though 67% plan to eventually do so.
From their perspective, leveraging alternative forms of employment is a “no brainer,” Priya Rathod, Indeed’s workplace trends editor, told HR Brew.
“For employers, it’s increasingly a business strategy,” Rathod said. “They’re evaluating agility in terms of what that means for them, and what that means for them is flexibility, speed, and cost efficiency, which are all things they’re very interested in taking advantage of.”
Well, not for workers. Just 25% of job seekers report currently working in “agile roles,” according to Indeed’s survey, though 45% anticipate that they’ll have one of these kinds of jobs in the future. While workers acknowledged that pursuing nontraditional employment could provide more flexibility and control over when and how they work, and help attain a better work-life balance, 55% believe taking an agile role is a risky career move.
These roles may sound fine in theory, but Rathod said that workers are put off from pursuing them over traditional employment when confronted with the current state of the labor market, as well as more structural issues with the state of gig work. In Indeed’s survey, respondents cited concerns like unpredictable annual income, lacking opportunities, and irregular or delayed payments as their primary worries about nontraditional employment models.
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