IME, employees are on committees and boards (though not public company boards all that often) all the time. The issue here taking multiple full time positions. A CEO being the CEO of multiple companies at once is not common, and when it does happen it tends to draw a lot of scrutiny. CEO is considered a full time job, showing up to a board meeting every quarter is not.

The second part of this is disclosure, which was not done in this case.

Incidentally, why aren't there more part time positions?

Probably because said leadership would then be unable to keep their employees in meetings since they're supposed to do some actual work once in a while.

The difference is pretty explicit in the terms and conditions? By the way, there are also leadership positions with similar limitations on your ability to take outside roles.

You've answer your own question. If you are hired to work full-time you are expected to do that (as per your contract). If you are on a board or committee the expectation is a number of hours per month.

> when their senior leadership often manages their time between the affairs of many companies in their purview?

This is extremely rare; generally a CxO is a full-time job. Elon Musk is a notable exception, and, ah, it doesn't seem to be going _great_. Being a _board_ member isn't usually a significant time commitment.

>What is the difference between this and leadership being in the committees

That this involved lying to your employers. There is no social expectation that you only work one job, plenty of people work multiple jobs, but there is a social expectation that you do what you said you'd do, and it turns out you have a bit of a mathematical problem if you try to work 4 eight hour jobs in a 24 hour day.

Which is, as per the article, how he was caught. Turns out if you call in sick at one place and then push code to github for your other jobs most employers aren't paying you for that.

He is not in their social class. The rules for the peasants don't apply to the lords.

when their senior leadership often manages their time between the affairs of many companies in their purview

It is kind of tiring for me to read people equating "Elon Musk" with "all those rich guys being CEOs".

When you really are a business owner OFTEN you have to devote 120% of your time and energy for running the company and single one.

People you see on TV flying private jets to expensive holiday destinations are not your average business owners. Elon and the likes are the exception not the norm.