A Problem With Remote Working That No-one Saw Coming
The last 2 years have taught us all that certain jobs do not require individuals to be locked in an office for 8 hours. Most of the countries’ governments were also advising people to work from home if they can.
After the initial oddness, we have all evolved to adapt to this new way of working. We have all gone through a cycle that was close enough to the cycle of Grieving:
Denial → Anger → Bargaining → Depression → Acceptance
While most of us have accepted, many have also started enjoying working remotely. So much that it is becoming a consideration for staying in a job.
While it has brought convenience for many, in recent times, a new problem has made its way — Moonlighting.
moonlighting — the act of working at an extra job, especially without telling your main employer
As per this article in an Indian newspaper, an employee was found to be working for seven different companies at a time!
And it was discovered not because the employee was not performing well but because HR found that there were multiple active Provident Fund accounts on this employee’s name.
“Provident fund in India is a government-managed retirement savings scheme for employees who can contribute a part of their salaries every month.”
It is hard to imagine, how this employee must be managing seven jobs at a time when at times it is hard to manage even one. Their managers must be having a hard time getting anything done out of this individual.
Keeping aside the basic premise that it is unethical, and thinking on a brighter side, just imagine how skilled this employee would be in the art of saying no, time management, negotiation, confidence, and courage.
To avoid more such cases, the companies are trying to find out new ways of discovering moonlighting. One of the ways could be to review the income/tax statements to see what are all the sources of income.
While many companies were thinking of problems like losing the face to face time, mental health, decreased productivity, shallow connections, and weakened team spirit, no one could have thought there would be remote workers who could choose to work for multiple employers.
