Moonlighting is the concept of having a second job that you work outside your full-time job, typically at night. It can be another full-time job or a supplementary part-time job. It is a job that is just a source of making money and as the dictum goes, the more the merrier. There are employees finding a variety of ploys not to return to physical work and how many of them have a genuine issue, is now open to question.

Moonlighting has led to an increase in the number of Start-ups across the globe. Technology and software companies in India are divided on whether to allow their employees to moonlight for other companies while still being on their payrolls or not.

The companies opposing the Moonlighting are growing threat and competition. A report says that several successful companies like Infosys, Flipkart, Freshdesk, and others were established by their founders while they were moonlighting at their day jobs.

Going back to history, moonlighting is not a new thing. Infosys founder Narayan Murthy was working with Patni Computer Systems when he founded Infosys. At the same time, when we see the startups, Flipkart was founded by Sachin and Binny Bansal while they were working for Amazon.

Freshdesk, which got listed on Nasdaq last year, was founded by Girish Mathrubootham while he was working for Zoho Corporation. Whether they like it or not, company leaders need to recognize that their full-time employees might want side hustles or moonlight gigs.

Recently Wipro terminated the services of 300 staff members who it discovered were working for its competitors while still being on the company’s payroll. If we go by Wipro’s action and Infosys’s pronouncements, they mean business. It has to start with a full on office presence as in pre-Covid-19 days.

The movement of the employees should be completely controlled by the employer. An undertaking of single employment and well thought out Code of Conduct has to be put into .