Wipro has made it clear that it will not tolerate moonlighters in the organisation, by firing 300 employees who were found to be ‘moonlighting’, and thus, “violating integrity”. These employees, while being on the payrolls of Wipro, were also working for its rival companies beyond work hours.
Moonlighting, as the word suggests, is the act of taking up a second job, on the sly, especially at night, over and above a regular job. Naturally, it is a cause of concern for IT firms, who believe that moonlighting can adversely affect the productivity of their employees and compromise data confidentiality.
Rishad Premji, chairman, Wipro has been very open about his disapproval of moonlighting. In fact, his open rejection of moonlighting and tweets about the act being as good as ‘cheating’ were criticised on social media. However, he has always maintained that Wipro will not allow its employees to work for competitors while being on Wipro’s payrolls.
Close on the heels of Premji’s tweet on moonlighting, Infosys had sent a warning mail to its employees that dual employment is a strict ‘no’ at the Company. The mail dated 12 September made it clear that Infosys considers moonlighting a serious violation of its code of conduct and the policies stated in the employee handbook.
While Infosys and Wipro are openly disapproving of moonlighting, Swiggy, the food aggregator platform had rolled out a progressive moonlight policy allowing its employees to take up third-party projects outside their usual working hours and on weekends.
