Probably the biggest changes in managing digital workers have been on the learning and development front. Learning initiatives have to be far more updated, relevant, on-demand and customised for the digital workforce. They need to have real-time interactive dashboards and integrated analytics to be totally learner-centric and in fact learner-driven. Communication and collaboration for learning and development have to use effectively all the current day communication tools like instant messaging, enterprise social media, virtual meetings, and weave them with HR information systems, access and assessment tools.

With requirements of a more highly skilled and global workforce, the company human resources departments have a higher responsibility to provide access to the relevant knowledge resources, to the knowledge experts within the company, and to ensure both are used adequately. HR has to create a culture for the same with effective monitoring and incentives. Not only does this show employer concerns and priorities to the business and to employees, employees are well aware that building their skills improves their productivity, future job prospects as well as is an indicator of employer concern. Creating a culture of teaching and learning is the way to improve employee retention, as well as to ensure new skills required are available internally and can be on-boarded to new projects immediately.

What about freelancers and part-time or contractual employees? The same factors hold for them as well. Several business writers in the past have painted an image of freelancers, telecommuters and remote workers as working from home and taking calls while in bed, or working on the laptop dressed in pajamas. As the numbers of these digital workers have swelled and matured, it is no longer about being casually dressed or being laid back and away from office formalities. It is about flexibility yes, and even a physical nearness to the home perhaps. But it is increasingly about more speed, about anywhere access, about being networked and engaged, and about having the choice: of working on-demand, of refusing work, or of scheduling work to fit into life’s several other demands. This class of employees is extremely sensitive therefore, to their own requirements for continued learning and employability, and to an organization that takes care to include them in long term learning initiatives.

It is easier for the parent organisation, using current learning technology tools, to include freelancers and remote workers in processes of base lining organizational capabilities, setting learning goals, creating development plans, monitoring assessments and tracking resultant improvements in performance. This in turn enables organisations to adopt more effective technology tools, assess and justify their outlay, improve user interfaces, create an improved learning experience, plan for and build a talent pool and succession plan in advance.

A curious phenomenon that has been noticed of late, as the numbers of digital workers have grown, is that they no longer work alone at home unless they need to or want to. Several digital workers share workspaces whether it is at WeWork in New York City, BHIVE in Bangalore or SproutBox in Gurgaon. This combines the newfound freedom of flexible, digital and sometimes boss-less work, with the camaraderie of co-workers, coziness of shared workplaces and lives, and of course the opportunities of shared learning through a network of peers.

There is an added delight of some face-to-face chatting, sharing food and music, the latest movies, devices and killer apps with the peer group!