QUALIFIED EXPERIENCE AND SELF-EMPLOYMENT: ISSUES OF TIME AND SPACE

Abstract

In the latest years, it has increased the discussions on the emerging alternatives to the traditional model of career as a formal fulltime employee in organizations. In such context, the self-employment, or the condition of being a freelancer, has been a focus of special interest of research, considering the increasing number of individuals that voluntarily adhere to this kind of work relation, or are taken to migrate to it, in face of the organizations’ increasing policies of outsourcing and partnership, among other reasons.  However, the literature on such subject remains mainly focused on describing the characteristics of the self-employment condition, not dedicating the same attention to its implications for the individuals, in terms of how they cope with the new context of their professional lives. This paper aims to contribute to fulfill such gap, by analyzing how people which have a higher level of qualification and have turned to the self-employment cope with the dimensions of time and space.  The analysis about these two dimensions are based, respectively, on the conceptual frames proposed by Lewis e Weigert (1981) and Lefebvre (1991), as well as on other authors who have been also inspired by these same references. The study is based on interviews with individuals in different ages that have changed from being formal employees in organizations to the self-employment, and that have remained in such condition for distinct periods. The results suggest that the self-employment experience leads individuals to review the concepts and values that define their notion of temporality and their representations of space, as well as the way they perceive their embodied space and understand the dynamics of the family, the organization, and the life in society spaces.