Lancify is a managed marketplace that connects students to startups and SMEs for freelancing jobs

Should you hire a freelancer or an intern when you are on a tight budget?

This is a global dilemma many early-stage startups and entrepreneurs face.

For the uninitiated, an internship is a temporary form of full-time or part-time employment that can be paid or unpaid. An intern can have several roles and responsibilities. A freelancer, on the other hand, is a contractor for a very specific task or to solve a very specific problem that he/she is highly skilled at.

“A freelancer is typically one who is given a set of deliverables, on the completion of which the contract is terminated. An intern on the other hand is a form of short-term employment where the candidate is given various different roles and tasks,” says Gowtham Sundaresan, a tech entrepreneur. “An intern is meant to be provided with time, mentorship and attention which will lead to their positive growth.”

According to him, most startups and SMEs know they can’t dedicate enough resources to track the personal development of the intern, thus voluntarily signing them up for exploitation.

“This is the perfect situation to hire a student freelancer instead. With minimal dedication of time and effort, the company can be sure that they will be given the deliverables required and with quality. Hiring interns, getting them used to the company culture and processes, and then figuring out what work to give them is big waste of time for the intern and the company. Hire student freelancers for efficiency and quality work. Hire interns when you’re ready to impart mentorship”, he continues.

With the intention to universalise student freelancing, Sundaresan along with his BITS Pilani classmate Azan Barodawala launched an online platform called Lancify.

Also Read: Freelancing is a new norm, but it still faces a massive problem

“While in university, we were figuring out ways to stand out to employers in the future, to get a good job after graduation. After getting into freelancing, we discovered a huge gap in the market that we were filling. We started getting projects that we couldn’t do ourselves, but our friends could, and so we started connecting people over email and WhatsApp,” adds Sundaresan.

“The impact it had on our personal and professional development was immense and we knew that we wanted to take this to the world and give every student this opportunity. This made us create a platform which can bridge the gap between students and the startup ecosystem,” he says.

Lancify was launched by the duo in 2017. Gowtham is a tech-enthusiast who has previously worked with multiple early-stage startups to build and launch apps, whereas Barodawala was a key member of GearShifters, UAE’s first student team that builds F1 cars.

Based out of Dubai and Bangalore, Lancify aims to build and back the world’s strongest young workforce by universalising the concept of student freelancing.

Sundaresan points out that internship is currently the norm and is the only way for students to gain experience. Having said that, majority of students find internships to be pointless, exploitative and more of a formality to blow up their CV. “With the future of work leaning towards flexibility and efficiency, we can safely assume that freelancing is the next big thing. It’s only a matter of time that freelancing replaces these pointless internships. Lancify aims to effect that change sooner and also be the pioneers of the concept.”

How Lancify works

Students can apply to be a part of Lancify and undergo a pre-screening procedure, after which they will be able to create their profiles and showcase their past work. At the same time, employers can post their projects and requirements. Students look through projects and bid for the ones they are interested in. Employers will then select the suitable student and a virtual workspace will be provided.

All payments are protected by an ESCROW system and a robust dispute resolution mechanism.

The USP

Globally, there are quite a few online freelancing platforms such as Freelancer.com and Upwork.

“Our USP is that,”continues Sundaresan, “startups and SMEs can use Lancify to get amazing quality of work that is cost-efficient, too. Also, thanks to the hyper-local aspect, there are endless possibilities of what work can be given to freelancers. Student freelancers do work in almost every field from developing software to painting wall murals at bars — students can do it all. There is also a much higher quotient of trust and effectiveness of work. All talent is verified and pre-screened by default. There is no mediocrity in our talent pool.”

“As for students, Lancify is a perfect platform to be introduced to the gig economy without being overshadowed by professionals and agencies. The kind of projects that students get are also in-line with their skill level. We’re building hyper-local communities so that students can network and learn form one another,” he says.

Sundaresan says that Lancify is aimed at students, dropouts and very recent graduates. In other words, it is exclusively for those haven’t entered the professional world yet. “We aim to solve the problem of youth unemployability by providing them with real-world problems to work on. There are tons of platforms for professionals to find big projects for themselves, we cater to a completely different side of the market.”

With over 50 per cent of the population under the age of 29 by 2020, there is a pressing need to up-skill the workforce that is graduating every year.

Also Read: The knowledge gap may be the biggest hindrance to blockchain adoption

“Freelancing is a fairly new concept for students here and we aim to launch programme soon that will help up-skill students and get them freelance-ready in a certain skill of their choice within a few weeks. With the booming startup ecosystem, we see a beautiful synergy that can be forged with the students community it thrives around. We are looking to get into Tier-II and Tier-III cities and leverage the drive and determination of the young workforce there to truly provide an equal footing for every student in the country to have access to amazing opportunities,” Sundaresan states.

Currently, Lancify is operational in India, the UAE, Sweden and Romania. So far, it claims to have connected close to 750 projects since inception, and has a talent pool of 5,000 students across four cities in Europe and Asia.

For students, the platform is free to use. However, Lancify takes an additional 18 per cent service charge from the employer on each project.

Gig economy in India

It is estimated that the gig-economy will comprise 80 per cent of the workforce in India by 2030. “We ourselves keep discovering new skills that can be freelanced. Football freestyling, dance performances, mock paper question creation, etc. are not typically associated with traditional freelancing, but with curated hyper local talent, everything is possible! The trend is here to stay, and we aim to provide students a launchpad to enter the future of work,” he goes on.

In his view, balancing both sides of the marketplace is a big challenge. The company doesn’t want too many students with no projects for them, or too many projects and nobody takes up. It requires a pipeline to be created on one side and deep foresight into what the month is going to look like on the other.

“Making students aware of their skills and eliminating the traditional thought that they need to do pointless internships or jobs they don’t like in order to gain experience and build their careers, is also challenging. This rhetoric is forced on to students as they are made to be seen as easy/cheap labour. It is sad to see many new-age companies with internet presence perpetuating the same message too,” he says.

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