I had a consulting firm that was doing ok from 2021-2022, but ended it do to personal circumstances. At the peak of it I had 10 small business clients. About half of them were absolutely paranoid about their employees slacking off. They would just constantly be worried their employees weren’t working and would try to figure out ways to monitor them.
When I stopped my business, I only kept an ongoing relationship with my biggest client. He is the worse for this. He puts cameras all over his warehouse, production facility and office. There are three office employees, and everyone of them has a camera pointed at their computer screen in the front corner of their office. He also makes it very clear to them that he has “bossware” which monitors every activity on their screen and constantly takes screenshots.
I don’t get this at all. I worked as a financial professional for 10 years prior to starting my consulting company. I only had one company that had this type of software and it was really offputting. I didn’t like it all. I do my thing, it makes me really uncomfortable knowing everything I’m doing on the company computer is strictly monitored in detail.
While I had my consulting firm, I had two employees. I had a private office in a co-working space, and whenever they worked a shift, I would let them in to the office and just let them do their thing. I would often not even be present. I knew I could evaluate them based on the results they provide. If I pay them for a 4 hour shift and they get done what I want to get done, I don’t give a shit if they spent half the shift browsing their phone or even social media on my laptop.
Since I’m getting back in to it, I’ve had a meeting with a client that owns some properties and he is the exact same way. He insists on installing this bossware on his employee’s computers. He pays $700 a year for it. He is a very small property manager that only does about $1mm a year in revenue. I told him it was a waste of money, but he said he needs it to make sure his employees aren’t slacking.
I guess I just don’t get this attitude and find it counterproductive. You either have people you can trust, thus you don’t need to monitor them, or you have people you don’t and they should be fired. I’m interested in hearing other entrepreneur’s perspectives.
I’d guess these types of managers/bosses just don’t get the bigger picture. They think this is what bosses are supposed to do and if workers aren’t actively working, they take it personally. And/or they get greedy. They want to maximize labor to get more profit.
I don’t think this works because some use downtime (on their phone, breakroom, etc.) as a reward for getting their work done. If given more work, they’re no longer motivated work quickly or efficiently.
Have you ever heard of the concept “the world is your mirror”. It’s where everything in life reflects back your inner beliefs, doubts, anxieties etc.
The business owners you describe have trust issues. It doesn’t matter whether it’s in business or other areas of their life, their ‘poo coloured glasses’ will show them the worst in people.
Their attitude will attract the worst behaviour in people, which will then confirm their view of life. And “Ha-ha! They are right!” And people who can be trusted will leave those companies because they won’t put up with that shite.
Frankly people want to right, more than challenging their own distorted views of people and the world
Because their business sucks and they think it helps
The reason you feel this way is because you’ve never had to reach into your own pocket to cover a payroll.
I think it depends on the type of bussiness and “ type “ of employee . Educated employees working in a corporate environment should not need this degree of monitoring and should be measured on performance . Blue collar workers unfortunately need more management and rules and respond better to strict monitoring/procedures - in my experience and in our country this is the case
To be honest isn’t it pretty standard now with tech that u can monitor and see every keystroke and everything someone does…
We should assume even the smart devices are recording everything being done
Cruelty
I run a company… the largest productivity driver is giving employees total freedom and letting the lazy employees go, hear me out until the end. I would guess not firing enough bad employees causes employers to punish everyone with micromanaging tasks and efficiency. Because bad employees are lazy and try to do the minimum which creates a bellcurve on what you get forcing productivity monitoring.
I honestly don’t have the faintest clue what my employees are doing at any given time unless there is an issue and they need my help or input.
It sounds heartless but some people were meant to be door greeters are Walmart, they should not be working with people who are professionals in their field and keeping then deteriorates their co-workers mental health and motivation that drives what most people enjoy about work… accomplishing goals. Remove people that stand in the way of goals and get rid of people who are lazy…. You will end up with 10x more productivity than monitoring task based milliseconds because you bring you average work up by keeping smart people who have their shit together.
I would rather hire someone who can accomplish 5x as much because they are good… and have them waaaay underworked than employ someone who milks the clock because they know the maximum acceptable time before it becomes a problem. I encourage screwing off at work… i encourage things that are inherently bad for productivity. Monitoring people who are lazy forces the 5x’ers to be monitored into burn out and ruins the whole thing.
Also… most business owners are absolutely insane… they had to be to start a business :) we are all just crazy in different ways.
It shows how batshit crazy most managers are that you think the first sentence needs explained.
I can tell you by doing this, you will create a culture of fear and your company will be awful. The top performer will be demotivated and won’t want to work here. The management of bad performers can be done very differently.
I reread my comment and agree with you. I missed a very important detail and revised my comment.
I have 100% employee retention after people make it past their 90 day probationary period. This is for a 10 year old business. I have never once had anyone fear for their job and my employees love their jobs…. I make sure they know how appreciated they are and i leave them alone… i buy lunches, snacks and unless we have an issue that affects the business i just make sure the systems we have in place enable them to spend as much time as possible on the meaningful parts of their jobs.
They are all salary and none work over 40 hours a week. They have unlimited time off (they organize this per department to make sure we do ‘t have to many people out which has never been an issue). Anywho, i revised my original comment which reads much differently now :)
When I joined my current company, my manager was like that. It was fantastic. I spent all my time doing my job, or trying to improve my job.
Then the bastard got promoted. Now I’m being micromanaged by the new manager, and my initiative is completely dead. Any ideas I come up with are shot down. Anything I start working on is blocked as I’m yanked from one issue to the next. They’re not even emergencies.
An owner of a private company is always gonna care more than a corporation doesn’t mean it has to be crazy like you described but where as a manager may buy everyone 200 dollar office chairs because its not their money an owner mayne will shop for a decent but economical chair and this extends to all areas of the business.
I’ve also worked at several companies where employees were ordering expensive ink cartridges and such and reselling them on eBay.
While surveillance doesn’t need to be intrusive and crazy there is a reason for it
because, at heart, people are lazy and will do an absolute minimum that can get away with. some of these lazy people have even convinced themselves that they work extremely hard.
Because the biggest threat to an organization is employees, intentional or unintentional.
A lot of entrepreneurs are bad at hiring and managing employees. Having leadership and money doesn’t make anyone a good boss just because of that. Even having a degree in management doesn’t guarantee you know how to handle everything like hiring, employees conflicts, although it gives you the basics on how a professional work relation should be.
Furthermore, protecting their own bad behaviors on their employees is also something recurring, which make some entrepreneurs treat their employees like they are kids, and then becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Ewww does he watch his employees take a shit too?
Chances are he already has tools he is paying for that he can monitor what employees are doing, emailing, etc.
The IT company I own helps get all that in place
Because every penny they pay you is their money and they don’t want to part with it.