Will A Bidding Process Be Applied To Jobs?
from the how-much-is-an-extra-hour-worth... dept
Roland Piquepaille writes "Two U.S. hospitals, one in Ayer, Massachusetts, and another one in Chicago, have found an innovative way to deal with nursing shortage. They post shift openings and the highest hourly rate they're willing to pay. Then, the nurses bid online for these extra shifts. The lowest bidders get the shifts and are notified by e-mail. The software behind the process, named eShift and marketed by FlexEstaff, is raising eyebrows at nurses associations. Still, FlexEstaff is negotiating with 8 more hospitals. This bidding process is almost certainly a good thing for the hospitals, but is it good for the nurses? Will we soon other industries adopt auction systems? Imagine a company telling you, "Hey, you want to make some extra dollars by building this car or writing this piece of software? Name your price, and you'll make some more cash." What do you think of this bidding process? Read more before posting your comments. Techdirt carried a similar story back in Decemmber 2003, "Techdirt:Nurses Bidding On Their Work Schedule, Hourly Pay Rate. But it didn't answer my basic question: what will happen if this process is adopted by other industries?"
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If you are a patient
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No Subject Given
I like the idea of it being applied to other industries but I suspect a labor orginazation of some kind will step in shortly on this will be found illegal or unconstitutional or some other such nonsense.
From both a business and employee aspect, if applied correctly, this could be good for both. The employer makes out by getting the 'low bidder' and ASSUMING the work is something the person WANTS to do, they making out but getting paid to do something they enjoy. For example; think of your 'junior programmer' who bids low to work on a 'uber cool' project that he/she would never have the opportunity to if it wasn't for the shortage/bidding process.
As long as the legal system doesn't get in the way, this method could be an effective method for everyone to accomplish their end goals.
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Already in other industries
Reverse auction for software development. Dominated by Eastern European and Indian contract workers that do stuff for criminally cheap rates. I feel like a sweatshop owner every time I use them.
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This sounds like a *bad* idea...
I guess it comes down to this: A nurse with 8 years of experience is worth more than a nurse with 1 year of experience. Conversly, a nurse with 1 year of experience is more likely to bid lower to gain experience.
Having people bid on a job assumes that everyone who is bidding on that job is equally qualified and skilled. Having worked at a company, I can tell you that there are folks with my job title that have more and less skills than I do. I'm sure -- in some way -- we all get paid to reflect that.
This is not a way to address the nursing shortage. In fact, this will probably serve to make it worse if it turns out there are several people willing to work for peanuts. Assuming a good nurse will not work for peanuts...those skilled individuals won't stay in that field.
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bid towards the lowest common denominator
You only want a competitive bid process in an environment where there's a reasonable equality of skills. It *might* work in industries where the employees are licensed, based on their ability to display minimal competence. In every other situation, it will simply allow those with lower skills and less experience to take work away from the more experienced, since they're willing to work for next to nothing in exchange for the experience. It's not a system that's sustainable over the long term (particularly in hospitals, where patients would not like the idea that they're being cared for by the low bidders).
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Job Bidding
In those lean, labor-surplus, job-short days work was 'sold' to the lowest bidder.
Sometimes the bid was a low wage proposal.
Sometimes it was a bribe to the job-boss' wallet.
Funny how today is looking more like yesterday.
Blue collar and white collar are being replaced by dog collar.
I didn't desert Windows,
Windows deserted me: BSOD.
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No Subject Given
The problem here is that the workers cannot spread their risk like the company can, so they end up getting the bad part of the deal. This would also set the workers against each other, which would not be conducive to a good working enviroment.
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