Do you need to monitor employees working from home? Yes, but not for the reasons you might suspect.
According to a recent New York Times report, 8 of the 10 largest private sector companies in the US are using software and other technology to track the productivity of their employees in the office and at home.
A large insurance company has installed software that measures how long employees are logged on to their computers and how much time they spend doing work-related activities. A Harvard Business Review researcher found that a Florida social media company ran software on employees’ work computers that “takes a screenshot of the desktop every 10 minutes and records the time spent in various activities.” claim to be.
why? So that companies can use data to “determine productivity levels and identify rule breakers.” The same report claims that Amazon “tracks delivery drivers’ smartphone data to monitor their efficiency and identify unsafe driving practices.”
Surveillance is booming. Products like Teramind, ActivTrak and Hubstaff offer everything from tracking the applications remote employees are using and the websites they are visiting to providing screenshots of their activities and monitoring keystrokes. The sales of employee monitoring software are booming. The industry is expected to grow from about $488 million in annual revenue to $1.7 billion by 2029.
Wow. Companies seem to spend a lot of time measuring how much time their employees spend at work. So should employees be monitored too? Yes. But not for what you think.
You shouldn’t be monitoring their productivity, attention, keyboard clicks during the day, whether they’re doing actual work, or watching YouTube. Waste of time and resources. It creates a toxic culture. If below-average employees are dedicated to wasting their employer’s time, they’ll come up with ways to do it without you knowing.
Employees are adults. They get paid for doing what they promised in their job description (and they get paid even more if they’re good at what they do). So please: treat them like adults and let them do the work. To ensure that you are meeting certain quantifiable deliverables given, you need to have good metrics. that’s it.
But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t monitor them while they’re working from home. Because remote employees (even your best ones) are still causing problems. security issue.
According to various sources, the FBI has confirmed a 300% increase in reported cybercrime attacks since Covid-19, and cybersecurity projections predict that the US will see half of cybercrime attacks in the next five years. It became clear that it would be a “soft target” above. The main reason is that you and I and our employees are working from home more and more, making the environment at home very unstable.
I have an older version of Windows or Apple iOS. Our router probably comes with the same security code that it shipped from the factory (easy to find online). Our password is weak. Our security software is outdated. Our computers are infested with viruses and malware. Lack of training. We lack patience. We click, download, browse and install all sorts of things without a second thought. Oh, we probably share computers with our kids. what are we thinking
For this reason, it should be monitored. No, it’s not our activity. But if you run a small business, you should hire an IT company to closely monitor each and every remote employee. The company ensures that remote workers (and you) run up-to-date operating systems, download the latest security software, are securely configured on your home network, and use (and change regularly) strong passwords. must be verified.
So my advice is: Don’t worry if your employees are working on that project plan or buying shoes on Zappos. Instead, worry that your employees are doing something that causes serious security problems at your company. For this reason and this reason alone, they should be monitored.
Comments
Post a Comment