Moonlighting and the 4 Cs of post-Covid

The pandemic seems to be far away right now. But the dust still hasn’t settled yet. Work from Office? Or Work from Home? One would have thought that Hybrid Work would win out as a compromise. But both parties are sticking to their guns. The employee wants the home while the management wants the office. That’s one of the reasons the Great Resignation began and continues unabated.

The employee wants his 4 Cs: Convenience, comfort, commuteless and cost of living. It is obvious that WFH is convenient for the modern hectic lifestyle. It is as comfortable as ever and you can supersize your home to make it your optimum zone. Time, money and headaches are saved thanks to a lack of commuting. All this translates into an overall increase in the cost of living with the same salary (and even with a lesser salary if you head to Tier 2 towns).

The management also wants its 4 Cs: Client (servicing), cybersecurity, collaboration and cubicles. How can you know, understand and service your client if you are in the comfort of your home? On top of that, securing so many homes, devices and apps is a nightmare for the IT team (as if they didn’t have enough problems to begin with). While collaboration today means Zoom, in the good old days it meant the team getting together and brainstorming. It meant various departments getting together and sorting out their problems face to face.

The corporate entity is totally unwilling to let go of its cubicle culture. The cubicle as a concept came in the 1960s and since then has completely revolutionized the office space. Companies have spent tonnes on real estate and can only manage their employees in the cubicle world. WFH and Hybrid is still unknown territory for them.

Finally, is the word of the year in Indian IT: Moonlighting. First Wipro Chairman Rishad Premji went hard against it. What else did you expect? How can you hold multiple jobs at once? But curiously after that many companies have decided to turn a blind eye against moonlighting, so huge the attrition problem has become.

It is gaining so much acceptance that there are articles like the personal tax implications of moonlighting. Former HCL CEO Vineet Nayar called it inevitable, and some IT companies are OK with it if prior permission is taken. Who would have thought that first remote work and then moonlighting would become common terms in Indian IT. The term “gig economy” is also gaining ground.

The effects of Covid may be felt for many decades to come as the Indian workforce continues to evolve in ways that we would not have imagined pre-pandemic.