The careers of gig workers that work via platforms like Uber and Deliveroo are non-standard, precarious and hyper-flexible. They move from one short-term gig to the other and can be easily laid off. At the same time, as independent contractors, they learn to cope with the uncertainty that platform-based gig work creates. So far, little is known about the flexible careers in the novel context of the gig economy. By adopting a ‘career shock’ lens, the proposed research examines how gig workers experience a sudden disappearance/withdrawal of a platform they work with and which new/alternative job(s) they embark on afterwards.

Although vulnerable workers that share a disability with other intersectional characteristics (e.g., migrant background and/or low socio-economic status) are increasingly employed, many are given short-term, precarious contracts. To make up for this these precarious forms of employment, we aim to design and implement online labor platform (OLP) cooperatives, and underlying matching algorithms, to foster the sustainable employment and inclusion of individuals with a disability. We do so, by combining insights from the engineering and social sciences and by involving individual workers, employers and government bodies.

This research focuses on innovative characteristics of employees? human capital: their abilities, motivation and opportunities to develop and implement new ideas. The common-sense opinion remains that R&D departments and high-tech firms compose the main source of innovation. Instead, this research builds on previous studies showing that, if properly supported, front-line employees effectively develop and produce novel products and services, called ?employee-driven innovation? (Høyrup, 2010). However, research hardly considered how personnel management affects individual employees on the work floor or how their human capital influences organizational innovativeness. To address these issues, this project sets a twofold research goal. First, we aim to examine whether innovations in personnel management, such as employer branding, New World of Work (?Het Nieuwe Werken?) and talent management improve employees? human capital. Second, we intend to examine how the human capital of front-line employees influences their innovative work behavior and in turn aggregates to organizational performance. To meet these goals, the proposed research is based on an interdisciplinary approach composed of three PhD projects that integrate theoretical insights from different disciplines: sociology, organizational psychology, and strategic management. These PhD projects will be empirically conducted in the Top healthcare and public sector, and supported by four organization-consortium partners representing them. By means of mixed methods (case studies, surveys, and qualitative comparative analysis) the project will result in the knowledge of how organizational innovation performance is affected by front-line employees? human capital and innovative behavior; and in practical recommendations on how to stimulate this by innovations in personnel management.