MOONLIGHTING: ETHICAL OR LEGAL - Shiwani Fogla

What is Moonlighting?

Working a second job after regular business hours is known as moonlighting. It means a worker may perform a regular 9 to 5 job as their main source of income while also working nights at another employment to supplement their income.

The concept got named moonlighting as the phrase moonlighting means to work a covert job, particularly at night.

Reasons behind Moonlighting

Some of the factors that lead to an increase in the phenomenon of moonlighting across the world are low salaries and a lack of incentives to maintain a good standard of living. Many employees feel that their employers take advantage of them for higher profits. Along with this, the employees got dissatisfied with their tasks and obligations. They started to feel alienated within the organization because their superiors didn't value their efforts. Rising inflation is another factor that has compelled people to work two jobs to maintain a decent standard of living. Work-from-home culture induced by Covid 19 pandemic allowed employees to take up an activity that gave them an additional source of income as they had free time along with no continuous supervision at the workplace. Another major reason is the new entrepreneurial spirit. Young people are more motivated than ever to launch their own businesses, especially after seeing so many high-growth start-ups. The start-up founders receive financial assistance from normal employment. Since startups have a very high failure rate, having a second career will give them a decent fallback in case things don't work out.

Why is moonlighting in news recently?

It became clear that people have the propensity to start side ventures or companies during the COVID-19 outbreak. It gave its employees the privacy they needed so they could simultaneously work on initiatives for other companies.

In a recent survey by Kotak Institutional Equities of 400 professionals in the IT and ITeS sectors, 66% of respondents said they knew of people searching for part-time work or side jobs from home. Among tech professionals, the subject of moonlighting has spurred fresh debates and polarised opinions. The main subjects of discussion are the moral and legal implications of moonlighting.

Industry’s stand on moonlighting.

The businesses are divided into two categories by side jobs: traditional and modern IT businesses. Most traditional businesses prohibit their employees from working for third parties for business reasons. While the current generation believes that morals should develop with time. Moonlighting came to the public's notice when Swiggy, a food aggregation company, allowed personnel to work on outside projects for compensation or for free under certain limitations and constraints like its effect on the employee’s productivity and posing a conflict of interest with the regular job. Any projects or actions that can potentially constitute a conflict of interest or interfere with an employee's work duties also need prior approval. The employee will need to offer a few basic details regarding their side projects in order to get the project approved by the team. Cred, a significant fintech, recently declared that it supports side jobs. Additionally, it stated that the Carnatic rock group "Agam" includes its head of design and engineering.

Meanwhile, employers in the IT industry are worried that employees will become preoccupied while juggling numerous responsibilities. While Tech Mahindra claims that the approach is widely recognized, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys, IBM, and Wipro have all said that they are against the trend.

Wipro Chairman Rishad Premji declared that working a second job constituted “cheating, plain and simple” in his Tweet

Kris Gopalakrishnan, co-founder of Infosys got in the debate, saying that in order to earn the trust of their employer and to fully focus on the project at hand, people should only work for one company.

Why are many IT firms stand against the moonlighting phenomenon?

Different companies have different outlook on the problem. Some of the factors because which IT firms are against the phenomenon are conflict of interest, concerns about the productivity and performance of the employee in the main job, chances of misuse of company’s resources, absenteeism as frequent leave becomes a regular practice, and poor attentiveness and fatigue.

IS moonlighting legal or illegal?

Moonlighting is not totally prohibited by Indian law; there are several statutes that make reference to numerous works. Section 60 of the Workplaces Act of 1948 prohibits the multiple employment of adults in factories. Organizations that do not run factories are free from the laws on double employment.

Following are the acts that are mentioned about dual employment in India

The Factories Act of 1948 has Section 60:

Restrictions on having two jobs. No adult worker may be required or allowed, unless otherwise stipulated, to work in any factory on any day on which he has already worked in any other business.

Industrial Employment standing order Act, 1946:

This Act mandates that employers in industrial establishments specify the terms of employment in detail and submit proposed standing orders for certification to the certification authority. It applies to all industrial facilities with 100 or more employees (50 workers, in the case of facilities for which the Central Government is the Appropriate Government)

Suggestions for improvement of the situation

Make appropriate laws that address the problem of moonlighting in every industry.

Employers can keep an eye on where their remote workers are spending their time while they should be working for them by using solutions like Workforce Analytics. If a few of them start spending more time than you expected on their side projects, talk to them about it.

Employers can use "remote employee monitoring software," such as "WorkStatus," to determine how much time employees spend working after hours.

Employers should make sure that the company's policy on moonlighting is crystal clear in all of their employment rules, as well as other papers like the employee contract and IT.

Employees should carefully review their employment contract with their primary employer to ensure compliance with any moonlighting policies before seeking for side work or launching a business.