Chapter 15: Platformized People Practices: The Role of Crowdsourcing in the Future of Work

Crowdsourcing is an effective method of collecting information, ideas, input, content, or services by inviting contributions from the large masses of the country and the world at large. Here, the companies are not relying only on their employees or experts; rather, they take the help of a large audience who are experts in diverse fields. The intelligence and skills of a large population can be utilized to generate ideas, complete tasks, or solve critical problems. Crowdsourcing helps in reducing cost, collecting innovative ideas, assessing the large talent pool, etc. Companies can crowdsource a variety of jobs, such as transcription or website creation, or designing a new product. Companies generally take the opinion of the masses while designing a new product or while developing a new residential society. The builder can ask for opinions about the various facilities to be provided to the prospective residents of the society. The objectives of the present research are to study the challenges of crowdsourcing, to present strategies for the successful working of crowdsourcing, to present real-life examples of crowdsourcing in India, and to highlight the future trends of crowdsourcing. The research concludes with the fact that if the right track is chosen, crowdsourcing not only becomes an effective device for task completion but also an effective method for innovation and collaboration.