Customer Service Reboot: The Rise Of The Gig Economy

The COVID-19 pandemic stretched brands’ ability to meet a flood of customer service inquiries. On their best days, contact centers struggle to balance cost containment and provide differentiated customer service. The pandemic’s strain on their resiliency only exacerbated these issues. To drive increased labor flexibility to meet these goals, brands should explore nontraditional — or gig economy — labor models. Many brands already have customer communities with peer-to-peer support. This research explores how and why customer service leaders should plan for a gig economy approach to support models to manage this process intentionally, reduce costs, and maintain high quality of service.