Moonlighting

Moonlighting is a term that is doing rounds in discussion often these days. The employer and employee have multiple views on this work practice. ‘Moonlighting’ means working with more than one job at a time. This practice has been going on for a very long time. Still, in recent times the number of peadoptingpting this practice has increased as companies earlier were either unaware or wouldn't mind employees pursuing it. According to a survey by Kotak Institutional Equities, around 65% of IT sector employees are involved in moonlighting, and this is just the figure of one industry; more digging might be done in it going further, and it is obvious the numbers are going to be higher. The reason that this concept is talked about almost every day is the generation today is highly progressive, insecure, and luxury driven. For instance, IT companies in India have been doing well in revenue and expenditure despite the pandemic hitting the global markets. Hence the CXO suite is highly paid for the brilliant performance of their firms, but recognition on the ground level is zero, which affects the morale and motivation of the employees. This makes the employees feel that they don’t belong to their organization. Due to non-recognition practices, monetary limitations, and bounded exposure of talents moonlighting is a perfect window to fill all these gaps.

Now that we know the reason for moonlighting, let’s listen to what some top executives say about the concept. The initial eruption occurred when Wipro Chairman Rishad Premji took to Twitter recently to highlight the issue: "There is much chatter about people moonlighting in the tech industry. This is cheating - plain and simple." Learning from the practice, Wipro fired 300 employees for moonlighting. Still, that decision later took a U-turn. The employees were allowed to work part-time but only with the reporting manager’s and HR manager’s consent to ensure it was not a conflict of interest for the company.

Similarly, Infosys’s Salil Parekh has a slightly different opinion about the concept; he says the company’s stance is that employees cannot work in two specific/permanent companies or dual employment. However, the employees are encouraged to take up any gig opportunities with the consent of managers, just like 维布络 . Ever since the concept has come out in the limelight, the opinions of corporate companies have been almost parallel, which is ethically correct, but this is about employees who have different reasons for moonlighting. It is important to value their senses as the COVID-19 pandemic has made employees think about their jobs, work cultures, and behaviour. Post-pandemic, the most crucial thing is job security, and now that every company is in the recovery stage, the performance of employees is the factor that would help an employee to retain their jobs and since the employees don't feel confident about it, moonlighting is a pass that they can redeem.

Moving on to how moonlighting can be managed, the first thing is that the company should be clear about its policies and communicate the same to employees. Secondly, companies should interact with their employees and know their points of view, which would further help decision-making and policy formulation according to the company’s interest. Also, some employees have been lazy about their work attitude, which is unacceptable and unprofessional and needs to be changed. It is also necessary to keep in mind the mental health of the employee along with physical health, as too much work pressure can bring significant mental health issues and the same would be reflected in the employee's performance. The companies should also learn from Infosys, where the employees are encouraged to take up gig projects which would embed trust and morale in employees towards the employer. While giants like 塔塔咨询服务公司 , HCL, and others have been displeased with the work practice, we also have companies like Swiggy . The latter has already introduced the ‘Moonlighting Policy’, allowing employees to work externally on specific projects. Now the question stands what the long-term decisions for the practice are? What will be the employee reaction and perceptions about it? Is government intervention required for the same?

Written by - Deval Desai (Class of 2022-24)