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Discussion:
Your Thoughts and Suggestions

Our recent call for your thoughts on the matter of commissions and disclosure has elicited one response which appears below. The initial starting point for this discussion was our earlier forum---Are Recruitment Agencies Bad?---which, in turn, led to a spin-off discussion on practical suggestions for improving recruitment agencies.

You can find our original posting on recruitment agencies' commissions and disclosure here.

[If you would like to contribute to this discussion, please e-mail your thoughts to us at: disclosure@contractworld.com.au.]

On 17 September August 2009, Simon wrote:
    I run a management company.

    I believe that one of the ITCRA code of practice elements is that members should not accept referral commissions.

    We don't have a referral commission structure, however, from time to time, we will send an account manager some movie tickets/bottle of wine as a token of our appreciation - and sometimes these are returned by the agency...


On 31 August 2009, Electra wrote:
    Can independent contractors exist in Australian institutions?
    One issue that confronts all ICs working in the public and private sector is the ability of organisations to allow ICs to operate in a manner as they should rather than as quasi employees. The current taxation and legal system is such that it punishes contractors for working the way that organisations dictate: taxation laws attempt to catch any individual that operates "like" an employee while workplace law is structured to "construe" independence as employment if certain tests are failed . The problem is that most, if not all, organisations can only handle the model of employment - you bundy on at 9am and bundy off at 5pm. Rather than management actually managing outcomes they manage people and so contractors just become additional resources, and generally treated with contempt.

    Many contractors will say that they want to operate in an independent manner but organisations wont allow it to happen. On the one hand the ATO has legislation to "catch" people that work for a single organisation for 12 months and deem them as employees and on the other hand it employs contractors year after year because it wants the best expertise and continuity of service. This contradiction continues without any attention from workplace relations reformists or the government. It is one of the governments enduring dirty little secrets to create legislation and not abide by it.

    True independence can only exist when an organisation commissions a body of work that is done at the discretion of the party engaged. Management need to learn to manage outcomes rather than bodies. Just because a person is sitting at a desk typing on a computer does not mean that they are productive. ICs and management need to be able to engage and agree on an outcome. Why should a career person care whether a contractor is sitting on a beach or in a basement as long as the outcome is delivered? Should it be necessary for a contractor to sit in a cubicle eight hours a day so that the surrounding employees feel as though someone else is sharing their burden? What ever happened to telecommuting and using the extensive technology that we have created? Are we an advanced technological society or just masquerading as one?

    The main problem is that many organisations operate on the basis of crisis management. A situation arises that requires additional resources which then necessitates a contractor who can be brought in at short notice with the requisite skills. That person is not a "temp". They are not there to fill the shoes of an "employee". They are engaged to deliver a result and should be able to do so at their discretion. They should also be able to do this for multiple clients. The current system regards such concepts as heresy. If ICs are going to operate as anything other than as "quasi-employees" and exist under the legislation currently in place then there needs to be a change in mindset across the public and private sectors towards ICs.

    There is a social change underway that is challenging the very basis of the way that organisations deal with people. We all want more leisure time, more time with our children rather than dropping them into detention centres in the morning, less time polluting the air with our cars as we commute to and from an "office", more time in that expensive piece of real estate with the crippling mortgage, less time with people that we have little in common, and more time doing what fulfils us. These things are driving people out of "employment" and towards independence. But there is strong resistance from organisations as they attempt to maintain their power. In time it will change and the current arcane model of collocating in buildings will become anachronistic. The process has begun but there needs to be a realisation that the old ways of managing subordinates to deliver results is not sustainable. If you want something done by a person that is qualified to do it then clearly understand and articulate what you want and then allow them to do it. In the end the result is all that matters.

[If you would like to contribute to the discussion, please e-mail your thoughts to us at: disclosure@contractworld.com.au.]