10/09/2023

Many Employers Use Tools to Spy on Their Employees

Here's a more effective approach to track their productivity

Seventy-eight percent of employers use software to spy on employees. But the research — and common sense — shows that this tempting practice does far more harm than good. And 83 percent of employers acknowledge that it is ethically questionable. When you spy on your people, you trade trust, culture and morale for sketchy data and productivity theater.

Work-from-home and hybrid models are here to stay. Companies everywhere are investing millions in digital employee experience (DEX), which reduces IT friction and makes employees happier and more productive. Separately, the same remote and hybrid shift has encouraged companies to deploy so-called productivity surveillance technologies. These have the opposite effect and even punish those who allegedly waste company time.

DEX and productivity surveillance are very different. DEX helps employees and their companies, while surveillance harms both. What's more, data from productivity surveillance is, ironically, a terrible measure of productivity. Many companies have good justifications for specific, security and compliance monitoring practices. But we shouldn't let productivity surveillance hide in the shadow of necessary measures that prevent disasters like data breaches.

Please select this link to read the complete article from Entrepreneur.