Maybe The Best New Grad Job Is Freelancing. Here’s Why

It’s a confusing environment these days for young professionals starting their career in tech. Just yesterday, wasn’t the media describing an historic talent gap where employees had all the cards? How fast the mood has changed. Despite a still yawning talent need over 120 startups reported layoffs in layoff tracker since April 1 of this year. Some, like Sonder.com, Cazoo.com and Bird.com were already public companies. Even “it” companies like Clubhouse.com, a favorite just last year, are among the downsizers.

No region has been spared. Startups and established tech companies who let staff go included organizations home-based in the US, India, Brazil, UK, Australia, Turkey, Sweden, Israel, Germany, Canada and even Russia among others.

Here’s a new source of concern: Rescinding job offers as a preventive measure. Despite job-openings at near record levels, more tech companies – some that are doing well – are planning to rescind offers. Axios tells the story of a young graduate who turned down five offers before accepting a job at Twitter.com that was subsequently canceled. Companies like Coinbase.com and Redfin.com are also canceling offers. Axis points out that “’This is a trend picking up speed, as more leaders are seeing rescission as a feasible strategy’, says Erin Grau, co-founder of Charter, a media and services company focused on the future of work. HR leaders are now looking at this as a cost-cutting strategy, she says. “’A lot of people who never thought this was an option, it has now become an option.’”

A third trend is adding yet more confusion and noise; an increasingly loud executive chorus undermining remote or significantly hybrid work arrangements. Despite evidence from organizations like Angelist that remote work has proved as or more productive, and a majority of employees supporting hybrid, leaders of companies like Goldman Sachs , Apple , and Intel are jawboning employees back to the office.

New grads were already dealing with a trifecta of personal challenges: Joining the workforce, surviving a tough economy, and living through an historic pandemic. With media drums now beating bad news about inflation and recession, jobs rescinded and layoffs on the horizon, new and young employees are understandably nervous and many are seeking a safe harbor. For example, Forbes’ recently published its list of best employees for new grads, with a strong bias on well-established, large companies.

But, are they safe? The list includes more than a few of the organizations that few months ago were clamoring for top talent, but now rescinding offers, considering pre-emptive layoffs and hiring freezes, and insisting that employees return to the office. Take the case of Apple. Here’s what Fortune recently pointed out: “ Up until mid-April, many Apple employees had been working entirely from home for two years. Now, accustomed to no commute, they’re now balking at having to return to the office and say they will seek jobs at other tech companies that offer more flexible work arrangements.”

Under these circumstances, some new and recent grads might want to consider an alternative career path: Freelancing. Here’s why:

If you have the right skills, you will do well. Most pundits expect freelancing opportunities in tech to continue to grow nicely, not shrivel, despite (and because of) layoffs and talent attrition. The work must continue, and study after study shows the great majority of corporates increase their reliance on contingent staff in recession to complete key projects on a contingent basis.

Remember, having the right qualifications and experience in the right areas is key. Smart students in tech will pay attention to long-term demand trends and position themselves to benefit from areas of technical expertise that will have a long life . A list organized by edyoucated.org, shows the top 8 on-demand skills:

1. Data Science
2. Artificial Intelligence
3. UX Design
4. Web Development
5. Cloud Computing
6. Blockchain Programming
7. Remote Communication & Collaboration
8. Data & IT Security

Freelancing offers professionals the opportunity to invent the career you want, if you are good enough. There are plenty of opinions about whether a new professional should have a tour of duty at a large successful company to learn the ropes, find a mentor, and establish bona fides. But, freelancing may make sense for recent graduates who deeply understand their career interests and goals. Young careerists who have presence, clarity of vision, ambition, skills, and determination to create their own path may find that freelancing is an attractive alternative.

The catch: In freelancing as elsewhere, you need to establish the skill set, credentials, network, and reputation to attract clients and provide significant value. As Herb Shepard’s eccentricity principle allows, “you’re only allowed to be as eccentric (e.g., “different from the norm”) as you are perceived to be competent”. Want to jump the fence? You can, but you’d better have the skills and maturity to jump.

So, is freelancing a safe harbor? No, but it provides critical experiences that enable long term career success. Over 60% of freelancers in our global survey, and other recent studies like Upwork’s Freelancing in America series, report that they are satisfied with their income, feel successful, earn an income as large or larger than comparable full-time employees, and enjoy a degree of flexibility and work life balance that they would not likely give up.

Freelancing offers a variety of early career experiences that help young professionals learn where their long term career interests truly lie. A final advantage of freelancing is the chance to have a variety of work experiences early in one’s career. Few of us know our strengths, and the best and highest use of our capabilities, until we’ve have had substantive work experience. Micro-internships and other early career activities help, of course. But a period of part-time or full-time freelancing may well offer young professionals a masters class in what they enjoy doing and do well, and the work environments in which they feel most fulfilled and growing.

Is freelancing a path that will meet the needs of all young tech professional? No. But for some, the poet Robert Frost reminds us:

“Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.”

Viva la revolution!