Encouraging staff to use their time well is a popular justification. The Merits and Pitfalls of Staff Surveillanceīosses who use EM software do so for a variety of reasons. One report found that searches for ‘Hubstaff’ were up 79% between March 2020 and June 2021 searches for ‘Teramind’ increased by 116% in the same period.

But the mass move to remote working as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic saw more businesses turn to this type of software than ever before. Warehouse, hospitality, and GPS-tracked delivery workers are also used to being watched closely.

Hubstaff, one of the most popular monitoring software programs, celebrates its 10th birthday in 2022.Īccording to New York Times correspondent Adam Satariano, Wall Street firms have been using software of this sort for some time now to mitigate security threats – the same threats that inspired Isaac Kohen to create Teramind, another leader in the employee monitoring space. Surveilling on-shift staff is by no means a pandemic-era phenomenon – software like this has actually been around for years. Other products are more invasive, with the ability to log keystrokes, take screenshots, detect mouse movement, monitor websites, and even take over employees’ devices remotely. The least intrusive types of EM software – sometimes called staff surveillance software, ‘bossware’ or ‘tattleware’ – offer tools that allow employers to carry out task-based time tracking.

What Does Employee Monitoring Software Actually Monitor? We spoke to the companies that use them, and the employees that are being watched by them. Millions of office employees across the globe were sent packing – along with their laptops – and told to work remotely.įor many bosses and business owners, this prompted the question: can we trust employees to carry out their duties with minimal oversight from their managers?įor those that answered “no”, employee monitoring (EM) software – programs that are used to surveil staff whilst they work – became a common yet controversial solution.

In the spring of 2020, the world of work changed forever.

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