Gig workers have been primarily characterized in previous research as independent workers who are experiencing social isolation and depersonalization, with customers being portrayed as sources of monitoring and control over their behaviors. However, it is important to recognize that gig workers also have meaningful interactions with customers (i.e., customer appreciation). This research adopts a customer interaction perspective to examine how gig workers’ interaction with customers in their side jobs (i.e., receiving customer appreciation) can influence their behaviors towards customers in their full-time jobs. Drawing from theories of status, we propose that gig workers who receive high levels of customer appreciation in their side jobs may lead them to engage in both proactive and unethical pro-organizational behaviors towards customers in their full-time jobs. A four-wave and an eight-wave weekly studies revealed that customer appreciation in side jobs was positively related to proactive behaviors in full time jobs through perceived status and status motivation, but also related to unethical pro-organizational behaviors in full time jobs through perceived status and entitlement feelings. In addition, we found that when gig workers’ perceived status in full-time jobs was low, the negative effect of customer appreciation on unethical behaviors was eliminated. This research contributes to a deeper understanding of the meaningful customer interactions experienced by gig workers and sheds light on the complex dynamics between side jobs and full-time jobs in the gig economy.
