Moonlighting (🌙) dealt in brief.

I already knew the meaning of the word "moonlight" which I suppose everyone knows. But knowing the meaning of this word can't help one to know the meaning of the term "moonlighting".

In fact had the news of sacking 300 odd IT professionals of Wipro not come in the media on grounds of being caught working stealthily for other companies also I would not have known the meaning of the term "moonlighting".

Now only I came to know what "moonlighting"refers to. It is doing a side job without informing your employer. 

Definitely I was unaware of the term but not the practice which is referred to by the term.

     The IT world which brought the paradigm shift after liberalisation,globalisation, privatisation(LGP) has given rise to many work opportunities and issues as well. Moonlighting as an issue is one among them.

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The question is why doing a side job while being on the payroll of the primary employer is frowned upon? 

Both employers and employees are divided on the issue. 

One group of people holds that doing a side job is not only an unethical practice but illegal also. They believe that this practice is equivalent to short charging your duty towards your principal or primary employer. 

In this age not only the IT sector but almost all sectors including service sector is internet driven. This makes most of the work sedentary in nature that involves flow of information through internet only. Therefore, it is just very difficult if not impossible to detect your employee doing work for his side job while remaining in the office or beyond purview of their principal employer.       

Besides, the question of loyalty is also involved to some extent if one has resorted to this practice stealthily.  

   I still remember how a programmer in the office I worked a few months ago purposely changed the screen of his computer desk whenever I happened to approach his desk in connection with some work related queries.

       Subsequently his trick of changing the screen was exposed. It was found that he did so to conceal his task engagement with other companies while on duty hours in that office.

 Before this misconduct of his was discovered,he was viewed as a very competent and dedicated staff  by most of  employees and superiors of that office. 

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         This is definitely a bad and reprehensible practice whose detection has become more difficult in this era of flexi-office and flexi-time mode of work modules.

  

      Such practice was unheard of in pre LGP and pre internet days.

It should be of major concern if the nature of business or service that your principal employer provides is more or less the same as that of the organisation which you made as an extra source of your earnings.

        It is also fraught with danger of leakage of critical data or information and poaching of personnel to your rival companies or organisation. 

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I know many IT professionals employed on contract with the state government utilising their computer knowledge and skill towards earning extra money by way of giving some kind of technical services to other private organisations. 

Though they deny doing so; in private conversation they admit doing this saying that they do it. They say that this they do only out of compulsion.

 It is necessary to supplement their contractual honorarium which is too little to support their livelihood in this world full of hardships for lower income groups. 

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The gig economy goes to support this practice directly or indirectly for understable reasons. 

The post-Covid economic scenario has aggravated the need of moonlighting from an employee's perspective. We are aware that job cuts or reduction in salary have become a normal personnel policy of companies. 

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My considered view on the issue is that moonlighting if permitted in view of additional income generation by employees or protecting their independence during hours other than hours of his contractual obligations, it must not remain unregulated. 

A policy on this issue is the minimum that we need to regulate it.

      Exploring the issues in greater details would enable us to come with a generally acceptable solution.

The consortium of companies or the government itself should come forward to address this issue. Mere making of policy by any individual company like Swiggy will not do.

Permitting moonlighting without restriction or making it completely illegal, both as an option will not be a valid one. 

Moonlighting must be rationalised keeping all aspects associated with it under consideration.

           But in no case an employee should be allowed to do a side job by way of selling his skill in an organisation other than his principal employer if the nature of business or service of the said organisation and his principal employer is the same. 

The reason behind this contention has already been explained in the preceding paragraphs.

                                              R.R.Prabhakar.

                                                24.09.2022.