For decades, the basic model of work was remarkably consistent: companies hired employees, employees built careers inside organizations, and the full-time job sat at the center of both workforce strategy and professional identity.

That model isn’t disappearing. But it is no longer the only one.

A recent Fortune commentary by Noah Yosif, chief economist of the American Staffing Association, highlights a significant shift underway in the U.S. labor market. Temporary help services have been among the strongest job-producing industries in 2026, with one in ten jobs created this year being temporary positions.

Yosif’s larger point is even more interesting: both employers and workers are beginning to see flexibility not simply as an alternative approach, but increasingly as a form of security itself.

From Headcount to Capability

For years, companies largely approached hiring with a simple question: Who do we need to hire?

Increasingly, there is another question: What expertise do we need, and when do we need it?

Those are very different ways of thinking about talent.

Communicators understand the difference. Historically, organizations seeking comms help had two choices: hire someone or hire an agency. Now there’s a rapidly expanding middle ground.

Experienced professionals can work fractionally, on interim assignments, as independent consultants or around specific projects. Organizations can assemble expertise around the work that needs to be accomplished rather than building every capability permanently into the org chart. That isn’t temporary staffing in the traditional sense. It is a different approach to accessing expertise.

A company preparing for a CEO transition may need an experienced executive communications leader for just six months. An organization facing a major reputational issue may suddenly need senior crisis expertise. A communications department adopting AI may need someone who understands both communications strategy and emerging technology to assist with messaging and implementation. Not one of those examples calls for permanent subject matter experts.

Why Companies Are Changing

There are obvious economic reasons for the shift. Organizations are operating amid economic uncertainty, rapidly changing technology and continued pressure to manage costs. Leaders are understandably cautious about adding headcount when they aren’t certain what their organizations will need 12 or 24 months from now. But cost isn’t the only factor.

Comms itself has become more specialized. Corporate reputation. Crisis management. Public affairs. Employee engagement. Executive positioning. M&A. Social media. AI adoption. Content strategy

Few organizations need every one of these capabilities at the same level all the time. A more flexible talent model allows communications leaders to expand, contract and flex as business priorities change.

The objective isn’t necessarily to replace the internal communications function. Most of the time, it is to make that function stronger.

Professionals Are Changing, Too

The other side of this equation is ultimately just as important.

Many highly experienced communications executives are making deliberate decisions to build careers outside traditional corporate structures. They want interesting assignments, greater control over their time, exposure to different industries and the opportunity to apply decades of experience to multiple organizations.

For a senior professional who has spent 20 or 30 years building expertise, the next logical career step doesn’t necessarily have to be another full-time corporate position. It might be a portfolio career.

For employers, it creates access to a pool of highly experienced talent that previously might have been available only through a costly, full-time hire.

This shift requires one look at workforce planning like an ecosystem of talent rather than simply a collection of employees.

Unquestionably, some roles should remain firmly inside a company. Institutional knowledge, trusted relationships and continuity remain enormously valuable.

But other capabilities may be better when accessed on demand

Flexibility May Be the New Stability

A modern communications function might include a strong permanent team supported at different times by fractional executives, independent specialists, agencies, technology partners and project-based professionals.

The question becomes less about internal versus external and more about what combination of talent will produce the best result.

In a flexible labor market, career security comes from having expertise people value, relationships that extend beyond one employer, a professional reputation, an active network and the drive to for continuous improvement.

The future of work may indeed be more temporary, but temporary doesn’t have to mean transactional.

Done well, it can mean something much more powerful: flexible by design.