Why the Pros of Monitoring Employee Computer Use Outweigh the Cons

Employee monitoring in the workplace is a sensitive subject. There are definite downsides to monitoring your employees’ use of computers, many of them having to do with employee satisfaction. If employees feel that they’re not trusted or respected, it can hurt morale and decrease loyalty to the company. And with unscrupulous use of user data making headlines, employees have legitimate reasons to be concerned. But there are also good reasons to monitor employee computer use, and if approached the right way, the pros can definitely outweigh the cons. Take a look at what you need to know about employee monitoring and how it can help your business.

Improve Data Security

Make sure that your employees aren’t putting sensitive information at risk with their internet habits.

Employees who spend the most time doing non-work-related browsing on their work computers and devices are also the most likely to be lax about security measures. This can result in serious problems for your business and clients. You don’t want sensitive client data or proprietary company information to fall into the wrong hands.

Monitoring employee computer use can help you keep an eye on your company’s data security and make sure nothing is falling through the cracks. With careful monitoring, you can identify employees who need increased security training before a breach can occur and tighten up any weaknesses in your security protocols.

Prevent Time Theft

It’s to be expected that employees will take some breaks along the way during their shift. Employees aren’t robots and won’t work for hours on end continuously without taking some type of break. Plus, every job has some downtime. But when employees spend too much time browsing social media or shopping online, it begins to cross the line from a harmless break into time theft that damages your workplace’s productivity.

Monitoring your employees’ computer use allows you to put a stop to time theft before it becomes a problem. Knowing when and where to encourage employees to stay on task will help keep productivity levels where they belong.

Catch Problems Early

Keeping everyone’s screens focused on work-related tasks creates a more comfortable work environment for everyone. 

Employee monitoring can allow you to find and correct problems while they’re small. There are many instances where inappropriate computer use can result in bigger problems for the company than productivity loss.

For example, an employee who uses a workplace computer to view offensive material or engage in offensive behavior online could create a hostile work environment for other employees, which not only lowers morale, it creates a liability problem for the company. Discouraging this kind of behavior and putting a stop to it early on when it does happen can prevent a small problem from becoming a serious headache.

You can avoid some of the downsides of employee monitoring by crafting a carefully-worded company internet use policy, limiting your monitoring to employer-provided devices, not personal devices, and making sure that your employees are made aware that they will be monitored from the start. To find out how employee monitoring can help your company, Take an online test drive.