BENGALURU: When Sangita Ramachandran’s (all names changed on request) husband got an onsite opportunity in 2019, she began wondering how to manage her professional life as a coder if she had to join him. She could not immediately travel with her husband since her visa would take time. That’s when Sangita, a full-stack developer at one of India’s leading IT services companies, began taking up freelance gigs. She thought she would at least be able to continue her freelance projects once she moved.
Sure, the extra money did help. “I did not want to give up my profession as we had financial commitments. At the same time, I wanted to be with my husband. So, in India, during the day, I would work on my office project, and after wrapping that up, I worked on my other assignments,” she told TOI.
Then she discovered another advantage of moonlighting. It so happened that her husband came back to India earlier than expected. But, she says, the moonlighting is now about exploring new projects and sharpening her skills. “My current freelance project is more about using my skills to create a fresh product for MSMEs. I am doing this with two others. It is in a sense a startup, and we have decided to share the profits when the product begins to make good money,” she says.
There are many reasons why technology professionals moonlight, and it’s not just money that drives them. Honing skills is one of the biggest. Debasish Biswas works for a multinational firm in Bengaluru. An avid reader, he has been upgrading his skills and learning new technologies. For Biswas, freelance assignments meant a chance to test all that he had learnt, something he can’t do at his regular workplace.
“If you have read something extensively in tech, you need to try it out first hand. That’s when I found a project through a common friend from astartup. I make good money as I am paid per hour. At the same time, I now have the confidence to crack any interview because I now have hands-on experience. I might not be able to put it in my CV, but I can show the interviewers how it is done,” Biswas said.
Amit Gupta, a 30-year-old coder in Delhi who works with a startup, lends his coding expertise to his brother’s firm — another startup. He says that he has taken this up to learn more technologies so that he can get a jump in his career. An Android developer, Gupta is paid mostly in kind. “My brother sponsors my holidays, buys me a phone. And when I get some money, it is a bonus,” he says.
Accessing infra, in WFH
Moonlighters would often need the resources of the company for which they moonlight, even though they are not employed with it. In Biswas’s case, he is given access to a company employee’s computer to complete his work. One thing that has helped all of these moonlighters is the ‘work from home’ mode. All say that WFH made it easier for them to continue the dual lives they lead professionally.
Sure, the extra money did help. “I did not want to give up my profession as we had financial commitments. At the same time, I wanted to be with my husband. So, in India, during the day, I would work on my office project, and after wrapping that up, I worked on my other assignments,” she told TOI.
Then she discovered another advantage of moonlighting. It so happened that her husband came back to India earlier than expected. But, she says, the moonlighting is now about exploring new projects and sharpening her skills. “My current freelance project is more about using my skills to create a fresh product for MSMEs. I am doing this with two others. It is in a sense a startup, and we have decided to share the profits when the product begins to make good money,” she says.
There are many reasons why technology professionals moonlight, and it’s not just money that drives them. Honing skills is one of the biggest. Debasish Biswas works for a multinational firm in Bengaluru. An avid reader, he has been upgrading his skills and learning new technologies. For Biswas, freelance assignments meant a chance to test all that he had learnt, something he can’t do at his regular workplace.
“If you have read something extensively in tech, you need to try it out first hand. That’s when I found a project through a common friend from astartup. I make good money as I am paid per hour. At the same time, I now have the confidence to crack any interview because I now have hands-on experience. I might not be able to put it in my CV, but I can show the interviewers how it is done,” Biswas said.
Amit Gupta, a 30-year-old coder in Delhi who works with a startup, lends his coding expertise to his brother’s firm — another startup. He says that he has taken this up to learn more technologies so that he can get a jump in his career. An Android developer, Gupta is paid mostly in kind. “My brother sponsors my holidays, buys me a phone. And when I get some money, it is a bonus,” he says.
Accessing infra, in WFH
Moonlighters would often need the resources of the company for which they moonlight, even though they are not employed with it. In Biswas’s case, he is given access to a company employee’s computer to complete his work. One thing that has helped all of these moonlighters is the ‘work from home’ mode. All say that WFH made it easier for them to continue the dual lives they lead professionally.
For all the latest business News Click Here
Denial of responsibility! TechAI is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.
