Work Market expands into Canada, rolls out new platform features

(TheForceField.Net) September 9, 2012 — Work Market, the world’s first Labor Resource Platform™ or LRP, is expanding its operation into Canada beginning today. In a telephone conversation with The Force Field last week, Work Market Vice President of Client Services Eric Castro confided the company is now actively recruiting technicians in Canada and will officially enter the market today.

Entering the Canadian market is a milestone for the company and one that places Work Market in an interesting position as a primary competitor against OnForce, the largest and most well known of the IT service platforms. OnForce, which introduced its services to Canada in 2006, has since been operating there with limited competition. The entry of Work Market into the Canadian market could potentially change that as Work Market recruits both clients and resources to work their LRP, including those who may currently use OnForce exclusively. This is of particular significance to both platforms, as Work Market CEO Jeff Leventhal, who founded the company in 2010, also founded OnForce.

According to Jeff Leventhal, Work Market is a welcoming opportunity to expand and compete beyond the US market. “Opening up to Canada is huge for us”, Leventhal said. “It is the first big step on our global mission to bring Work Market everywhere.”

In addition to the Canada expansion, Work Market is rolling out new features significant to the platform itself.

The company now provides techs (or “resources”, as Work Market calls them) with the ability to block companies from sending inappropriate or undesirable work, a practice referred to in The Force Field Forums as “spamming”. Resources will now be able to block any company they do not want to do business with and focus only on the work they want to receive.

The lack of ability to block undesirable clients has long been a point of concern and frustration among resources on the platform. Some complained they were recruited without solicitation by companies that they did not want to work for and bombarded with requests to perform work at extremely low rates or outside their area of expertise, with no option to opt out of such networks. Work Market aims to change that by empowering resources to block clients from which they do not want to receive work.

Another new feature is the recently released Resource Metrics, a tool for clients to rate the efficiency and reliability of the resources. Resource Metrics measures the number of assignments performed, punctuality, assignment cancellations and abandonment rates, level of activity and overall performance of each resource during thirty and ninety day periods. This tool helps clients better select resources for their groups and assignments, thus rewarding the most reliable resources with the best ratings.

Conversely, the client rating system was improved as well. Resources now rate clients after the assignment is completed and they have received payment for services rendered. According to Work Market, This improvement was made to encompass the entire work relationship.

While adding these new features, Work Market removed an existing one to improve the overall platform experience. The social and networking groups were phased out by Work Market due to under utilization by legitimate clients and complaints from resources alleging abuse of the groups by spammers. The company pared down the groups to a single category consisting exclusively of groups that send assignments.

In addition to the other features recently introduced on the platform, perhaps the most interesting is a new payment option. Work Market now offers PayPal as an alternate way to receive earnings. The new payment option was fully operational as of Friday, September 9. Resources who prefer PayPal to conduct monetary transactions can simply log into their Work Market account, go to Manage Accounts, click on Add Financial Account and choose PayPal from the Method drop-down box to receive payments from Work Market clients through the popular online payment system.

About Work Market

Work Market is the world’s first modular, web-based Labor Resource Platform™ designed to enable any business to efficiently deliver and manage employee, consultant and contract labor and services. Businesses post assignments and can invite professionals with specific qualifications or post the assignment to the entire Work Market network.  Professionals can post their profiles, join groups, take tests and background screenings to align themselves for assignments that match their skill sets.

Work Market was founded by Jeffrey Leventhal, (who also founded the on-site services marketplace OnForce.com) and Jeffrey Wald. The company is backed by Spark Capital and Union Square Ventures.