Organizations engage in employee monitoring for different reasons such as to track performance, to avoid legal liability, to protect trade secrets, and to address other security concerns.
Tracking data may include typing speed, mistakes, applications used, and what specific keys are pressed.
"This is a benefit because it provides an unbiased method of performance evaluation and prevents the interference of a manager's feelings in an employee's review" (Mishra and Crampton, 1998).
Management can review an employee's performance by checking the surveillance to detect and potentially prevent problems".
Monitoring in the workplace may put employers and employees at odds because both sides are trying to protect personal interests.
For instance, in Canada, it is illegal to perform invasive monitoring, such as reading an employee's emails, unless it can be shown that it is a necessary precaution and there are no other alternatives.
Other states, including Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Colorado and New Jersey have laws relating to when a conversation can be recorded.
"[8] Businesses makes employee monitoring a known tool that supervisors use to avoid any potential legal issues that may arise.
On May 7, 2022, employers in the state of New York will be required to provide prior notice for the monitoring of employee internet, telephone or email usage.
The follow is a list that includes, but is not limited to:[citation needed][10] In January 2016, European Court of Human Rights issued a landmark ruling in the case of Bărbulescu v Romania (61496/08) regarding monitoring of employees’ computers.
[11] It held that a sales engineer had a 'reasonable expectation of privacy' against personal messages being read (including those to his fiance and his brother), even though he was told not to use a workplace Yahoo messenger for personal reasons, because "an employer’s instructions cannot reduce private social life in the workplace to zero.
A year later, in July 2017, German court ruled that computer monitoring of employees is reasonable but the use of keylogging software is excessive.
As new laws have been enacted dictating the bounds of these practices, employers have been forced to change their monitoring protocols.
The suggested solution to this problem is a time tracking software to monitor the number of hours a client spends with an employee.