In attempts to lessen the blow of COVID-19, companies are closing the doors to their office spaces. Instead, they are now having employees isolate from one another by working from home. Although pandemic aside, working from home has increased in popularity over the years. According to Flexjobs, there’s been a 91% increase in individuals working remotely over the past 10 years.

With this in mind, it’s important to note that for many, this transition is an unfamiliar stomping ground. Within the government sector, there are very few jobs that usually operate from home. For example, customer service and marketing positions can operate from home, but most of these positions still operate in the office. Adjustments on both the employer and employee side are needed for an effective work routine during these unprecedented times.

As remote workspaces become the new “norm”, the question of how management should check on employees from home lingers across the room. Without everyone present in the office, it’s very hard to regulate what your employees are doing while on the clock. Take a further look to learn about the benefits and setbacks of monitoring remote employees, as well as the best practices to follow when doing so.

Basics of Monitoring Remote Employees

The way one company monitors its employees will vary from the way another company does. The reason being is that companies operate differently from one another, with their own unique values. The necessity that employers feel to watch over their employees is a result of many things, but the most common is productivity.

Monitoring is also done to make sure employees are held accountable for their actions and to prevent malpractice from occurring. Malpractice can be a major concern when it comes to careers in government. With classified material and protected information exposed to employees’ eyes, regulation needs to be enforced to minimize the associated risk.

Pros to Monitoring Remote Work

Time efficiency can either make or break a company’s level of productivity. While it’s easier to monitor this more closely in the workplace, there are still many ways to do so from home. By using time tracking systems, employees are held accountable for their projects and getting tasks done under a reasonable amount of time. If your employee is taking a longer amount of time to complete a certain project, it’s usually a good indicator that something is off.

Likewise, tracking time efficiency also holds employees to the same high work standards from before. Working from home can be very comfortable, meaning it’s also quite easy to subconsciously end up distracted. Being aware that they’re monitored, it’s less likely that your employee will slack off. This helps limit the abuse of freedom that may happen when working from home versus in an office setting.

Employers should no longer feel the need to poke their heads left and right, to make sure that tasks are completed according to company standards. The time saved can help in carrying out more productive tasks when it comes to advancing the company and the team.

Monitoring also keeps security a priority when working from home. During the workday, government employees have access to an excessive amount of protected documents and files. While it’s important to have good faith in employees, you also need to work preventatively since you never know what someone’s capable of.

Unfortunately, there’ve been instances where employees are caught in fraudulent acts with company assets.

In June of 2019, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported that the Desjardins Group suffered a data breach of about three million individuals and businesses.

The credit union company was blindsided that the leak came from an internal employee and as a result, didn’t catch the suspicious act for quite some time.

Some situations are also out of your employee’s control. For instance, let’s say that an employee’s personal computer and devices get hacked or stolen. A situation like this runs the possibility of exposing company files that ought to be protected and secure. This can happen in the office as well, but it’s worth noting that there’s a higher risk when working remotely with unprotected personal devices. 

Cons to Monitoring Remote Work

Excessive monitoring on a manager’s part can create a hostile work environment. While an automated monitoring system gives full transparency to managers, it’s not always a good thing. This can lead managers into being more nitpicky with their employees on issues such as, break frequency or inactivity that they wouldn’t have normally noticed as an issue in the office.

Whether working from home or in the office, employees are only human and don’t operate like robots. At first glance, inactivity may seem alarming to managers. The reality is your employee could’ve momentarily stepped away from the screen for a snack break, or is simply thinking of their tasks and what to do next. Not only does the manager lose valuable time by worrying about such things, but it also instills the lack of trust and confidence they have in their team.

Employers also need to be careful with how much they invade their employees’ privacy. It can be easy to cross the line between effective management and employee privacy.

In 2018, Dtex systems’ Harris Poll found that 77% of employees would feel less uneasy if their higher-ups were transparent in the ways they’re being monitored.

In all actuality, if employers aren’t careful and transparent with how they monitor employees, the company is at risk of some high authority legal issues.

Increased monitoring could decrease employee productivity. Monitoring to a high degree can bring lots of unneeded stress to the table. This takes up a lot of room in an employee’s headspace when they are working, as they always feel watched with every move they make. As a result, the stress they feel could reflect in their work, which can be a setback for the company.