For all of you have a double life (or multiple lives)... How do you manage running a business besides a normal job? Is it a good idea to tell your employer? Any legal liability to be aware of?
EDIT for clarity: The contracting invoice was for a moonlighting gig. I had just come back from a business trip and meant to send the flight expense to my employer.
Yassine --
I sent my boss my contracting invoice instead of my flight expense. Oops, my bad.
My position was something like this:
I do it off hours and it doesn't affect my work
It isn't in the same industry (NDA, non-compete)
I have three mouths to feed and nothing is inexpensive anymore
The outside work keeps me sharp and I bring what learn to my day job.
As far as my actual side-project/wish-it-were-an-income-providing-side-hustle, most of my coworkers have them. I have a feeling that it shows drive and creativity as long as it doesn't compete with your current roles and responsibilities. And it must not impact that work.
I am old enough to remember a time in the software dev industry where recruiting blog articles were saying: "don't hire an engineer who isn't doing something on the side" under the assumption that the side-hustlers were driven. I think that era is over. I believe it died along with the MBA student's pitch to engineers: "we will offer you 1% of our startup in 'sweat equity' if you build our project...it's the next Facebook." I digress.
Personally, no. But if anybody asked me a direct question, I'd have no problem talking about it. My employer doesn't know about any of my hobbies. It's not hidden; it's just not known.
It's a pretty broad question, and most of the answer is, "It depends where you work." I've worked for some rather insecure jerks in the past; something like a side-hustle would have sent them into orbit. Today, I'm a little luckier (I think).
Is a side-hustle different from freelance work? Are either of those different from a second job at 7-11?
As for the legality, again; it depends on where you work and what you do. Are you working on personal business during company time? Are you building a direct competitor to your employer? Are you siphoning leads and contacts out of the company database? Well... your employer might take issue with that.
Are you coding a crappy little tip calculator in your spare time that has nothing to do with your day job? Probably a different story.
I am joining a big tech company that is publically trading so competing with them is not the issue.
I have heard they don't like it when you are not fully focused on the job'... I hope they are not assuming I will be working weekends for them.
I have been open about my side projets/hobbies during interviews, and I think they liked it. But I think they didn't understand fully that I want to make them big profitable businesses on the side.
My employer knew about my side business before they even hired me. And I specifically asked to not sign certain legal documents because of that (which they allowed).
But my situation is a bit unique because my dad is one of the most influential engineers there. I had known the company for years before they hired me.
I don't know where you live but I guess you are not a slave. You can do whatever you want after work time is over.
Now if you have a good relationship with your boss, sure why not share it with him/her.
EDIT for clarity: The contracting invoice was for a moonlighting gig. I had just come back from a business trip and meant to send the flight expense to my employer.
Yassine --
I sent my boss my contracting invoice instead of my flight expense. Oops, my bad.
My position was something like this:
As far as my actual side-project/wish-it-were-an-income-providing-side-hustle, most of my coworkers have them. I have a feeling that it shows drive and creativity as long as it doesn't compete with your current roles and responsibilities. And it must not impact that work.
I am old enough to remember a time in the software dev industry where recruiting blog articles were saying: "don't hire an engineer who isn't doing something on the side" under the assumption that the side-hustlers were driven. I think that era is over. I believe it died along with the MBA student's pitch to engineers: "we will offer you 1% of our startup in 'sweat equity' if you build our project...it's the next Facebook." I digress.
Hey @ted_at_stacksimpleio how did your boss take it?
He completely understands and is fine with it.
Personally, no. But if anybody asked me a direct question, I'd have no problem talking about it. My employer doesn't know about any of my hobbies. It's not hidden; it's just not known.
It's a pretty broad question, and most of the answer is, "It depends where you work." I've worked for some rather insecure jerks in the past; something like a side-hustle would have sent them into orbit. Today, I'm a little luckier (I think).
Is a side-hustle different from freelance work? Are either of those different from a second job at 7-11?
As for the legality, again; it depends on where you work and what you do. Are you working on personal business during company time? Are you building a direct competitor to your employer? Are you siphoning leads and contacts out of the company database? Well... your employer might take issue with that.
Are you coding a crappy little tip calculator in your spare time that has nothing to do with your day job? Probably a different story.
I am joining a big tech company that is publically trading so competing with them is not the issue.
I have heard they don't like it when you are not fully focused on the job'... I hope they are not assuming I will be working weekends for them.
I have been open about my side projets/hobbies during interviews, and I think they liked it. But I think they didn't understand fully that I want to make them big profitable businesses on the side.
I will keep quite for now I think.
I don’t talk about it in detail, but they know that I earn online with my projects
My employer knew about my side business before they even hired me. And I specifically asked to not sign certain legal documents because of that (which they allowed).
But my situation is a bit unique because my dad is one of the most influential engineers there. I had known the company for years before they hired me.
My client doesn't but my direct manager (lead back-end dev) does and I think (and hope) that he's okay with it.
I don't know where you live but I guess you are not a slave. You can do whatever you want after work time is over.
Now if you have a good relationship with your boss, sure why not share it with him/her.
I agree @Cosme12... I was more thinking of non competes and NDAs agreements and if happened before where those were a problem...
This comment was deleted 2 years ago.