It shouldn't matter if people work multiple jobs. The former VP of HR at Microsoft shares how to react to double dippers — 'get over it.'
It shouldn't matter if people work multiple jobs. The former VP of HR at Microsoft shares how to react to double dippers — 'get over it.'
Much of the world needs to work two jobs. Chris Williams writes that managers should be careful in how they react to an employee working multiple jobs.
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Working a second job outside of the hours or scope of tour main job is one thing, but many people double dipping are literally getting paid by two companies for the same hours. That’s different imo.
Like people who are the boards of multiple companies, in leadership roles in multiple companies, and pretty much anyone at the top of company structures?
All that should matter is if they are doing what they were hired to do.
No, not like your example. If a CEO is secretly serving on another companies board you may have a point, but we’re talking about people having two jobs with the clear implication that their employers don’t know it.
“Doing what they are hired to do” is very often defined in employment agreements as working x number of hours. You can’t really say you’re doing what you’re hired to do if you take a second job that you perform during the same hours when you’re not allowed to under your agreement.
If someone wants to work 9-5, then 5-1 and somehow can manage both that’s different. For liability sake alone it’s a problem.
Mm iono, kinda sounds like people finally using the concept of salaried exempt positions properly.
For too long, people let themselves get bullied into equating salaried positions with hourly positions, having their time micromanaged and scrutinized when it shouldn't have been the case by definition.
That’s not really the same topic. Employers still have the right to set terms of employment. If they want you to work 9-5 and not 8-4, they have every right to set that expectation. If you’re hourly they can send you home at Noon on Friday and you just won’t be earning 40 hours of pay that week. Salary they really can’t.
That’s not to say that people aren’t miss classified as exempt or that some employers try to use it as an excuse to get over 40 hours of work out of someone. Different topic all together.
Nope.
“Doing what they are hired to do” is very often defined in employment agreements as working x number of hours.
Not necessarily true anymore in white collar professions, especially nowadays with gig work. It really depends on the language and terms of your employment contract. I've worked for places that define the employment as 40 hours per week, and also for places that define it as specific tasks for a length of time, and also for places that define it as availability during set hours of the day. It's very important to read the employment contract terms and the company's employee handbook.
You can’t really say you’re doing what you’re hired to do if you take a second job that you perform during the same hours when you’re not allowed to under your agreement.
If your job explicitly defines your employment as being available and dedicated during set hours, or if your contract explicitly says you can't take on additional employment, then you're right. That would be "double-dipping".
I also hated working for those types of places, because they're usually run by micromanagers who failed up and measure their worth by how many emails they forward along. Which are probably the same type of people who are mad about overemployment to begin with.
The way I see it, it only becomes a problem if you have multiple jobs that have a problem with it. And I can't imagine why anyone with the means to work two 6-figure jobs would choose to work for two of those companies.
Well yea. If you are staying in the lines of your employment agreement, you're in the clear to do whatever else you want. I feel people are conflating all of these things into what this topic is really about. The problem here is when someone has two jobs as either reports the same time to both employers for payment, or agrees to certain availability and does work for the other company at the same time. It does not include hourly workers having a second job doing hourly work during different hours, or anything similar with Gig work. If you for example drove for Lyft and Uber, picked up 1 passenger for Uber and 1 for Lyft simultaneously, that would be an example of breaking the rules.
I've worked for a company that has been doing WFH for over three decades. It's very clear when someone has two jobs. They are unresponsive, their work isn't very good, and they take forever to do everything. This assumes they have two jobs in the same line of work. If they are going and getting a night job at Target or something no one cares if their work is fine.
I can't think of anyone I know that doesn't at least partially collaborate with their co-workers where their availability is key to their jobs. So doing work for another company during that time would never be ok. The exception to this would be subcontractors who are free to set their own schedules within reason. They are free to take other work, often required to do so, due to IRS rules, but individual contracts likely have the same sort of language where they'd need to be available during certain hours, or available for group meetings etc.
Not really. If they're fulfilling their contractual obligations to their employer(s), then who the hell cares?
It's long past time that we stop treating employees like they're chattel of the company that they work for. You hire someone to do a job, which they either do to your satisfaction or not, but you don't own them and you shouldn't get to control the parameters of their life.
They aren’t fulfilling their contractual obligations if they aren’t allowed to have a second job and are doing it anyway, so this notion is nonsense to begin with. If you get paid hourly you can’t be working for someone else while getting paid by the first company for the same time. For salaried, typically there are expectations of how long you’ll be working or even your availability.
The company I work for has more than three decades of experience with WFH, and it’s almost always clear when someone is trying to double dip. It’s impossible to keep it hidden for long. Eventually you will have conflicting schedules, and excuses start piling up. Even if the work is good, very few jobs are done in a vacuum where you never need to talk to anyone or work things through. Most situations like that are handled by subcontractors who have all the freedoms you’re talking about. In fact the only situation I can even think of that would fit the mold of how work is being framed here is through contractors.
Salaried exempt positions should fit that mold nicely.
That’s a whole other topic.
Same topic, bud.
It has nothing to do with double dipping or the way the article describes it which isn't really what the word means. Having two jobs you work during different hours is usually fine. Working them during the same hours is the issue.
You can assert that it's a "problem" all you want, it doesn't make it true. Salaried exempt has a definition which is compatible, in abstract, with working two jobs in the same working day or week span. It has to do with being able to fill the key responsibilities of your job description on a given day or week. If you fulfill those, the rest of the time is yours to do whatever you want with. The expectation is that on the other hand you will work overtime if needed to complete those key aspects without additional pay. That's the definition in a nutshell. You adding stipulations about time and "double dipping", et cetera is fabrication. That's just what companies eventually pushed into being normalized as unwritten law in an ever-present desire to squeeze every single imaginary accounting cent they can out of their most expensive assets. It's high time people pushed back on this bullshit. Most people in office jobs can do their jobs effectively in well under 40 hours. One of the reasons there's so much bureacracy and time wasting in corporate environments is so people can fill up that arbitrary amount of time without 😱 looking like they're doing their jobs in less than 40 hours. Businesses heavily mismanage people (and their bottom line) by assuming every single minute spent on the job as recorded is linearly related to productivity. It's not. You will lose out much more from the inefficiency begat by a toxic culture promoted by those wrong assumptions than the comparatively minuscule gains in imaginary labor value you put down on the accounting journals. There's only so much you can squeeze from people, beyond that it's delusion and negative gains. A good manager understands that the true resource is employee morale, trust, and loyalty; and you can't get that without being realistic about what it means to treat employees like human beings. Jobs used to be 9 to 5, the 40-hour standard was based on half-baked quick math a clueless 10-year-old would've pulled out of their ass, and study after study after study shows nothing but positives both for employers and employees in more efficient and balanced work time structures than the current mass delusion standard.
According to ADP, the DoL, and the FLSA you're wrong.
Can you require exempt employees to work certain hours? 1
Employers are free to create work schedules for exempt employees however they see fit as long as they comply with any state and local regulations that govern meals and breaks.
Does an exempt employee have to work 40 hours a week? 1
No, however, many businesses have company policies mandating a 40-hour workweek for exempt employees. Employers may take disciplinary action, including termination, against anyone who doesn’t fulfill that requirement, but they usually can’t deduct pay. Doing so might result in the employee no longer qualifying for the exemption.
Further you keep making comments about "fill the key responsibilities of your job description" like most workers have extremely specific job duties. This is not the case for salaried-exempt workers: 2
- primary duty must be managing the enterprise...department...or subdivision of the enterprise; OR
- primary duty includes the exercise of discretion and independent judgment with respect to matters of significance; OR
- primary duty must be the performance of work requiring advanced knowledge, defined as work which is predominantly intellectual in character and which includes work requiring the consistent exercise of discretion and judgment; AND The advanced knowledge must be in a field of science or learning; AND The advanced knowledge must be customarily acquired by a prolonged course of specialized intellectual instruction.
It’s high time people pushed back on this bullshit. Most people in office jobs can do their jobs effectively in well under 40 hours.
This is a terrible hill to die on. By that logic, most office jobs can be outsourced to India for a third of the cost if all you do is check off a list. If Employers have to deal with people double-dipping, they'll pay a fraction of your salary for it.
A good manager understands that the true resource is employee morale, trust, and loyalty
It's a two way street. Employees hiding the fact that they are working a second job during the time they are suppose to be working for you is a breach of trust as well.
study after study after study shows nothing but positives both for employers and employees in more efficient and balanced work time structures than the current mass delusion standard.
Wait a minute, now you're trying to double-dip arguments! You can't sit there are argue that the 40 hour work week is bad and inefficient and then claim that a person should be able to work two jobs simultaneously like it wouldn't be even more inefficient or worse for work / life balance. It's absurd that you'd even say that. Your comments more and more are incoherent ramblings of someone who hasn't thought anything through and just wants to complain about work.
-You mean according to the law, I'm right, since it isn't law that you're required to work 40 hours, by definition of salaried exempt
-Yes, filling in key responsibilities is not a perfect science of what that means, which is is why the FLSA and it's enforcing agency the DoL go out of their way to develop logical "tests" on what kind of work should qualify for salaried exempt, a small percentage of which you list (for some odd reason)
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What's wrong with checking off a list? Anything is checking off a list. That's not a counter-argument. You're just stating what you wish happens, but just stating assertions doesn't make them true. Employers will get whatever the market will bear in terms of labor negotiations. If that means having to put up with "double-dipping", witches, and bears oh my, idc.
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Employees that meet the definition of salaried work and thus have freedom over their time earned from efficiency shouldn't have a problem handling their duties. If they choose to work more for additional pay from someone else at the risk of burnout and expense of their leisure time, so be it. It's not a marriage to an ultra-jealous controlling douchebag, even if you want it to be and redefine anything but complete submission as a "breach of trust".
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You are just being deliberately obtuse with hypotheticals. People should be allowed to work two jobs, if they are efficient and wish to sacrifice some of what should be their own time, provided they can actually handle it. Yes, the wins in efficiency by not forcing people to pretend to be productive for 40 hours are there. Anyone with a tenth of a brain that's actually worked in a corporate environment will attest to that intuitively. That doesn't mean in actuality, everyone will be able to work two jobs. Not everyone will have the same available energy left over, nor will choose to spend it that way. If someone wants to exert themselves further, let them. It'll be up to them to manage the possibility of burnout, decide how temporary the situation will be, et cetera. Making another 100% (ballpark) of your salary is not a bad incentive in the short term at least, though companies won't be handing out 100% salary bonuses for efficiency nor performance anytime soon. We all know how little a dollar goes these days, and how wages haven't kept up with inflation for generations. This is one of the results of that.
-"Incoherent ramblings" you sound like a bad small-time manager that blames younger generations for their ineptitude as one. Seethe and keep getting left behind, all that grandstanding is only gonna get you brownie points with your fellow boomers, but it won't actually help you navigate a changing labor market.
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But that right there is the issue. Why should a company be allowed to prohibit employees from having a second job if it doesn't conflict with the first one? And if a company does have that right, does it apply to all jobs? What is the difference in that case between working two jobs in the same industry in different market sectors vs working two retail jobs?
Another POV: if I incorporated myself tomorrow and offered what I do for a living as a professional service, then I become the company and the companies that hire me for my services become the client. Do clients have the right to say I can't take on other clients? (FWIW I have seen some clients try that and get shut down immediately, and I've also never heard of any company agreeing to those terms with a client.)
Why should a company be allowed to prohibit employees from having a second job
Different Topic IMO. If someone wants to work 9-5 at an office job, then go work at Target from 6-10 in theory that's fine. I don't support it as someone that's read the studies about productivity of the 40 hour work week being poor, I know that doing so is not sustainable and it's not a good idea. Should a company be able to stop you from doing it? I don't know. I'm open to the idea. It's a far more nuanced topic though. Along the same lines are how to treat outside of work drug use. I see no reason a person can't smoke Pot off the clock, but I don't want to extend that to hard drugs.
...f it doesn’t conflict with the first one?
That's been my argument since the start. Working two jobs during the same hours is conflicting. The stories I've read of high paid tech workers double-dipping during Covid were working both jobs during the same hours. Every time they ignore something from Job 1 because they are working on Job 2, it's conflicting. Same could be said for WFH users who treat it like they are home on a weekend doing chores, supervising children etc. It's not the same thing.
What is the difference in that case between working two jobs in the same industry in different market sectors vs working two retail jobs?
Usually a high level of proprietary or non-public information to start. But you wouldn't be working at Target and Walmart from 5-10 tonight walking back and forth between the two stores. So just at a base level they aren't comparable.
if I incorporated myself tomorrow...Do clients have the right to say I can’t take on other clients?
Absolutely allowed, but not likely. You are entering into a private contract with a company and agreeing between you on what you are do to be doing. Your contract is going to be far more specific than an employment agreement, and it's up to you to cover all the things they would have covered including: Health Insurance, Payroll taxes, Retirement, Liability Insurance, etc. Keep in mind creating your own LLC or Corp is different than being a 1099 subcontractor. There are certain IRS rules that you have to make sure are followed (well the employer side mostly) else they can get hit with penalties for misclassifying workers as non-employees.
We have some subcontractors on staff, but afaik they sign agreements on availability and are more or less treated like employees when it comes to work output. They may have specific clauses they've negotiated on availability or things like that, but that's also true of some employees too.
If you CAN do both at the same time, who gets hurt?
It’s preposterous to think you CAN simultaneously do so without impact either at all. All it takes is two meetings or two impromptu phone calls at once. You will choose one over the other, in which case the company you didn’t prioritize is hurt as well as the other employees that you’re collaborating with.
Become a contractor if you want to double dip. You set your own schedule, work as many jobs as you want, and even get to choose your own raises.
There will be impact for sure, but as long as you still perform your job to the satisfaction of both employers, then it does not matter.
Paying a wage doesn't mean you own 100% of the concentration of a person. It means you want them to do a job, and as long as they do it well enough for your standards, then the contract is fulfilled. Whether they can do the job at 70% or 40% concentration does not matter. You still get what you have paid for.
If you want your employees to concentrate more on your job, then pay them more so they don't have to get a second job.
There will be impact for sure, but as long as you still perform your job to the satisfaction of both employers, then it does not matter.
If both employers know you are doing it and are ok with it there's no problem. Its when it's being hidden from them that it's a problem. I'll give you an example:
So say I'm a lead collaborating on a project with two people under me. Bob does great work, needs little to no assistance, and I can trust that he gets it done not only right, but also takes ownership of it and will bring things up if he sees problems. He doesn't just wait for me to find them as the lead. Jim on the other hand takes a lot longer to do his part. He doesn't bring up anything like Bob does even though it should be pretty obvious that it's wrong because it impacts his part of the work, he waits for me to review, find it, and then have to reach back out to him for it to be fixed or changed. He is also far less responsive than Bob to emails, IMs, and isn't able to multitask nearly as well. So clearly in this situation Bob is a better employee than Jim, and Bob receives bonuses and perhaps higher pay depending on other factors than Jim. However that's not to say Jim is a bad employee and should be fired does it? A lot of the work can be subjective. Maybe Bob found those errors because he has more experience in the job and has run into the problem in the past and Jim has not. I can't put "find problems in documents" in their job description so vaguely and then dock them every time they miss something, that would be absurd. People are different. Bob will likely be promoted to a higher role shortly, while Jim won't, even though they were hired at the same time for the same role. I'd like to see Jim take more ownership of his work and take it upon himself to not just wait to be told what to do on a micro-level but come to me with what he thinks needs to be fixed, and so on. These are things that can be covered at reviews, and often have, and for a little while he seems to get better at it.
So given this situation, am I wrong in keeping Jim as an employee? His work isn't as good as his peer who was hired for the same job at the same time, and he hasn't stepped up to take on the same responsibility in the work that I would expect someone being on the job as long as he does. Is the right thing to do to fire him outright?
But now what If It comes to my attention that during the time he was working on the project he was working a second job, and not focusing on the task he told me he was working on. Did he not find those errors because he wasn't paying attention due to working on something else? Was he avoiding any added work from found errors so he could do work for that other company? Is his lack of multitasking ability not actually true and he's doing work for someone else while ignoring me further delaying the project and taking my time up to help him?
"Well Enough for your standards" is entirely subjective. I don't treat my people like robots who can be mathematically judged. There isn't a binary existence of good or bad. I don't fire people immediately upon feeling they are sub-standard. I feel I often bend over backwards trying to help people get better, I push for bonuses and promotion when I think they are deserved. I don't at all believe that outcome that is all that matters. I truly believe that a person who puts in more effort and gets a worse result will be a better employee long term. I've seen it time and time again.
And to your last point about paying people enough; While that's certainly true in some cases, the article cites tech workers pulling in $500,000 through it. Clearly it's not about being under paid.
The other perfectly qualified person out of the job so that you could buy a second house?
Awfully presumptuous of you to assume someone else’s financial situation.
It’s an exaggeration to prove a point. But do feel free to get offended.
I don't see anyone being offended by your statement.
And this "offended" comment if yours is just sophistry - yet more presumption (and accusation, a personal attack) in an attempt to "win" an argument, rather than a discussion in search of truth or understanding.
That being the case, it tells us all we need to know about you.
Calling someone presumptuous in the context of a hypothetical is an accusation. But keep trying.
I don't work, so there's at least one job free :) And I also don't need any more houses. So, someone must'nt work two jobs because he steals one job from someone more needy? He got the 2nd job despite the needier one also applying, right?
Jobs are finite. You asked who gets hurt? Someone does.
In theory you're right. But the best always gets the job. If the dipper gets a job he was the best. Can't blame the winner for a system that is inherently flawed.
Most employers have verbiage against moonlighting, though not for any benevolent society serving reason of course. In practice the system is majority unaccepting of working multiple jobs.
If there were more jobs available than there were active job seekers, you’d be correct that no one gets hurt. In fact, it would be a net benefit! There are also highly skilled labor categories with thin applicant pools where an individual working a second job may be the only qualified candidate. There are certainly exceptions.
For the record, no one blames people for being people and looking out for their best interests. Just don’t ask me to defend the policies that allow it. The same policies that stagnate the economy and drive wealth inequality.
Jobs are finite
Got a source for that? Or is this just more sophistry?
https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/labour/employment-and-unemployment/labour-force-australia/sep-2023
Australian Beauro of Statistics lists half a million Aussies are currently "Unemployed".
Note in this context, "unemployed" doesn't mean "not working". It means half a million are currently "not working and actively searching for a job".
The ABS doesn't track it, but less reliable sources estimate about twice that many people are "Underemployed" which means the job they have doesn't give them enough hours. For example maybe you've got a job delivering pizza on Friday and Saturday nights when they need extra staff - the ABS would classify you as "Employed" even though you're only earning $300 per week.
The number of people "underemployed" varies a lot from source to source, in part because there isn't a clear definition of what that means.
No offense, but if you have to ask this question, it’s not worth my time debating with you. If you’re genuinely curious, look up what an equilibrium quantity is in supply/demand economics.
It depends on the terms of employment. If they are salaried, then there are no real work hours and just work to do. In general, if someone is salaried, they're paid to do a job not when they do it.
They want it both ways - we are 'overtime exempt' because we're 'paid for the job' but also after the job is done - they think they own us.
This is not true. Salaries only means your pay is decided on a yearly basis and divided into each paycheck and not calculated and tracked per hour. Other conditions of employment including working hours and specific job duties are all part of your employment agreement. If your agreement has no set hours of any sort or limitations for other work, then there’s no problem. If a company is going to agree to pay you a salary, they are going to set how many hours you should be working, and reasonably expect you not to be double dipping.
No to the second-to-last assertion, not definitionally. The last one is simply begging the question.
Which are you talking about specifically?
The one I said
Not sure why people downvoting you.
You have some good points and arguments, specially compare to the "they think they own us" comments. Everything isn't black and white.
There isn’t a lot of room for discussion here from what I’ve seen. The demographic is very far-left to a fault. Those that are in white collar jobs should probably read their employment agreements, handbooks, etc. a lot of incorrect information floating around.
Maybe it is because I have worked in tech oriented roles (which this article is geared towards)but none of my jobs have stipulated number of hours I need to work.
How specific is your employment agreement?
Not nearly that specific. Not sure why it would be unless the company sucks at measuring performance.
There have been times in my career I wished it were more specific. I've found companies with loose employment agreements tend to make things your job by reclassification more often than not.
If they can get their work done on time, and with appropriate quality, who cares? If they can't keep up with the workload, then they can get in trouble for that.
The truth is they can't, and that's how they get caught, and why it comes up.
Full time employees might have core hours and then flexibility outside of that. Otherwise, you do your work as quickly as possible and then outside of that is free time. Unless they are reusing the same work at two jobs, they likely are not double dipping. If their metrics are fine, there is no reason for a manager to care other than wanting to micro manage someone's life.
To be clear: If you Tell two employers that you are working for them from 1pm to 2pm, you are double dipping. The title of the article doesn't line up with the content. Having a second job that you work outside of the hours / commitment of your first job is fine as long as you didn't agree not to do so with your first employer. If you want to work 9-5 earning 6 figures in a WFH white collar job, then go out and get a night job at Target and are somehow able to succeed during your first job the vast majority of employers aren't going to give a shit. The reason employers give a shit is this is a largely fake narrative. Studies have shown the 40 hour work week is too long. People working two jobs cannot keep it up for long and be as good at their jobs. Second, people are conflating having 2 separate jobs with working two jobs at the literal same time. Working 9-5 at two companies and juggling email and meetings between them. The article touches on this, but I completely disagree with the author. So much of business is based on collaboration that having to wait for a peer who is doing work for another company now costs the first company for every person that is waiting on them. Maybe 2% of my work can be done without a single other co-worker being involved in some way. During regular business hours the expectation is that you are being paid to work and collaborate with your co-workers on a regular basis outside of normal PTO etc.
If you are getting paid Salary then you aren't getting paid for any hours.
You are getting paid for the job.