This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic from Bloomberg Radio. Every time I talked with the company and senior leaders, I was doing it. So this morning, the really issue of the workforce, access to workers, reskilling, figuring out the way forward post pandemic. Really, what comes up a lot too is hybrid flexibility, work patterns. All of this continues to come up. We're all trying
to figure it out our way forward. Our next guest has often joined us to talk about all of this. She's got a front seat to it. Great to add back with us, Jody Miller. She's co founder, co CEO and chairwoman at Business Talent Group BTG, and she's back with us on the phone from Los Angeles. How are
you great, Carol, Thanks so much for having me. It's great to have you here, and it's a great day to talk with you, especially when we just heard from J. Powell, Chairman of the Federal Reserve, and he says the labor market has a ways to go in terms of getting back to those pre pandemic levels. How do you see it well from our point of view, which is, you know,
fast moving on demand talent. It's it's booming. Um. You know, everyone in the space is seeing you know, double digit growth and there's enormous demand and talent is busy, and uh so it's a it's a good time to be an independent professional. Well, remind our audience that the kind of talent you're dealing with, right, because we know that there's dislocations in the workforce. Where are you seeing, you know, this on demand talent, where is it really being called upon?
So we deal with what we would call the high high end independent talent, former management consultants, former executive subject matter experts um, you know, senior business people who can go in and take on projects immediately. And you know, it's interesting. We just did our fourth Skills Index and what we found, not surprisingly, is there a category of things that are somewhat related to the COVID period that
are growing very fast. So B two B marketing, you know, anyone who's in B two B marketing knows you had to we write the playbook UM forecasting, compliance, strategy and process these huge, huge growth. At the same time, the things that are most um common in the on demand world are basics project management, market landscape and research, growth strategy.
So I think we're seeing this population able to both pitch in and help on very specific things that are happening in the world now, but also take on, you know, the traditional roles that you know they can jump in and provide value for. What about the trend that you're seeing today post pandemic is different from what you saw pre pandemic And what does it tell you, potentially, Jody,
about the broader economy? So the most significant surprising trend is that our projects just flip to switch and went remote. Clients who would never consider remote work all of a sudden had to and they learned that it could be very productive. So, where you know, we used to have of, you know, let's say our projects with some on site component, we shifted to you know, almost fully remote. And I think that is a change that will persist and be
part of the mix going forward. Interesting, how do you deuxtapose that against companies who are with their regular workforce trying to figure out remote not remote hybrid? How do we do it? Someone said to me this morning, and I think it's a great line. Is remote is a capability, not a challenge, And I think that's really a great way to think about it. That companies have learned that
they can do a lot remotely. Um, there's also a lot of benefits to being in person, and I think each company is going to have to figure that out. I think with with the on demand talent, you actually have the ability to test right. You can try to do something remotely on a project and see if it works, and if it does, then you have confidence in doing it remotely going forward. So in other words, one size
doesn't fit all. Yes, yeah, which makes sense, Jody. If we start to see the economy or companies kind of pull back, we've already seen it, Google, Apple kind of postponing when they bring everybody back to the workforce, how might that impact what you're seeing? And just got about thirty seconds and then we'll come back and talk some more.
I think when you have instability and uncertainty, having an ability to quickly bring in talent and have them focus on something near term and specific can be a very smart way to deal with that kind of uncertainty. Jody, you said at the top of our last block that on demand talent is booming. What does it tell you about a lot of the businesses that are out there, and I'm assuming that a lot of the businesses that
you work with are large. But you can clarify that for me because that also gives us an idea of kind of what's going on in the economy. If if they're upbeat enough to hire these talent to work on projects, they must have some optimism about the outlook. Yes, um, our clients tend to be you know, Fortune one thousand or equivalents, the firms, major nonprofits, and they are busy and as you know, you know, the the whole talent market is busy. Um. The permanent recruitment is very um busy.
Right now. Talent have options, they have, you know, the ability to decide what they want to do, and as more and more projects become available, that also makes being an independent professional more attractive. And so we're seeing it happen on kind of both sides of the scale, more talent coming into the market and more clients understanding that
this is a resource that they can tap into. I'm always cursed when you talk about these because they are their senior level individuals um as you said, executive management who take on these projects. Do they often hire staff and others to do it or is it usually a one person kind of thing. It's a great question. Um, there can be small teams UM. Firms like ours can help build those small teams UM and they are able to leverage their expertise with people who can do different
pieces of the puzzle. So it's absolutely or you know, sometimes they go in and the company themselves have resources that they can surround them with. Well. Based on then, you know, I'm most thinking about trickle down trickle up, But these are obviously the senior people who are leading the projects. But I do wonder, based on where you know they're working, what does it tell you about kind of the younger workforce where they need to be focusing
their efforts. Again a great question. You know, the younger workforce is very intrigued by the control that being a project executive and independent professional gives you UM, And what you know I would say to that generation is you need to be sure you've got the skills that are in demand and have the ability to go in and
provide value right away. So you know, looking at you know, all of the growth sectors, look at the things you know that we get asked to do every day, compliance strategy and processes, you know understanding how to help these companies with the increase cyber security risks. You know, understanding how to go in and help a company that can no longer meet their clients in person the same way they used to. So having really relevant timely skills and the ability to jump in and create value is going
to be what's going to give them options. I am also curious to how much are you increasingly seeing big companies or the companies that you work with. You mentioned Fortune one companies and PE firms and nonprofits. How much are also increasingly just kind of outsourcing when they've got a specific project, rather than maybe having kind of a special projects team in house. You know, I think companies
do both. UM. They can have special projects teams in house, but sometimes growth comes, you know, when you don't expect it, and so you have needs that you didn't plan for. And this allows you to take advantage of opportunistic moments or to handle issues you know, like covid um that came up quickly, UM that you didn't care for. So I think you need both. I think it's an an
not an or. And you know, the whole on demand UM revolution is really about giving options to talent and clients to supplement what already exists in the world today. It makes sense. It makes sense, Um, Jody, we gotta run. Thank you so much. Jody Miller, co founder, co CEO and chairwoman of Business Talent Group, on the phone from l A. She also, in some of the research she sent ahead to us, shared with us the concerns of a great resignation with expectations of the global workforce considering
leaving their employer in the next year. That's according to some research out from Microsoft, so something that she is certainly focusing on too in terms of what she does