Driving Factors and Career Prospects of Food Delivery Gig Workers

Abstract

The gig economy has been growing from the global economic recession in early 2008 until 2011 and created new job opportunities for many parties. Food delivery gig workers are among the most important types of gig jobs, especially in urban areas. The objective of the study is to explore the driving factors and career prospects of food delivery gig workers and obtain a hindsight of gig workers especially food delivering services as this is the most blooming gig work. A qualitative study using a phenomenological approach was used to explore the experiences of the participants. Semi-structured interviews were used in this study. Participant were selected based on snowball sampling technique and a total of nine participants were obtained. Using Nvivo 12 software, a thematic analysis was used to analyse the transcription data. Based on the themes obtain, the attraction of gig work and individual personality is known to be the deciding factors for choosing to work as food delivery gig workers. The requirement for disclosure of gig career information that includes the knowledge of gig careers and other gig professions was the first theme that emerged for career prospect, followed by the second theme, "career development," which concerned with career growth and future planning. Gig work is still unstable in terms of job security and uncertain job prospects. Future study should be done in order to identify a better working system for gig workers with the involvement of vendors, online platforms and others. The government should also participate in policy that can help the gig workers especially in terms of employee protection.