Although duties and responsibilities of all employees are outlined stringently in the job description section, workers ought to enjoy a degree of autonomy. Current studies exploring practices employed by employers to monitor workers but compromise the privacy of the employees, have determined that establishments have lost millions of dollar for litigation that could have been otherwise avoided. Although a plethora of studies cover the subject of employee privacy in the workplace, this essay focuses on the article written by Mahmoud Moussa. Moussa in his article entitled “Monitoring Employee Behavior Through the Use of Technology and Issues of Employee Privacy in America,” encroachment on employees privacy has far-reaching ramifications on the productivity of the workforce.
According to Moussa (2015) despite the inclination of the American populace to enjoy privacy, an endeavor that enhanced creativity, cases of encroachment on the privacy of American workers has been noted across the board. The development in technology in the contemporary age has accorded employers a vast assortment of technology solutions that can be used in monitoring and performing a vast assortment of functions. Nonetheless, scholars, as explored by Moussa (2015) have posed the question; to what degree does the use of such technologies threaten the privacy of the employees. The article covers the legitimacy and illegitimacy of monitoring technologies in the workplace setting, exploration of viable alternatives to electronic performance monitoring, and why employee monitoring may be counterproductive.
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On the flipside, monitoring of employee is a necessity in some settings. However, regardless of the need for monitoring the article asserts that no monitoring should be done of locker rooms, restrooms, and employee lounges because such activities would infringe the privacy of some workers. Furthermore, companies should not engage in offsite monitoring and employees must be made aware of the equipment that would be used in monitoring them. Typically, in a bid to make monitoring less distressful for the personnel, companies should ensure they adhere with monitoring policies so as to avoid litigation and legal wrangles that result in fines that could have been otherwise avoided.
In context of the modern-day workplaces, studies have determined that workers are more satisfied and motivated through intrinsic means such as the feeling that they are making an impact in the company. In this accord, if employees are closely monitored and their autonomy is threatened, then they feel less important to the organization and are bound to give less than their best in ensuring that the company succeeds. Once employees feel that the company values them less, then they will be less motivated, an endeavor that results in a relatively lower motivation. Also, other monitoring procedures that encroach on the privacy of the personnel may result in an increase employee turnover (Determann & Sprague, 2011). The surge in the employee turnover rate is detrimental for the company since it contributes to the loss of experience employees, which ultimately results in the plummeting productivity in the company. Furthermore, not all technologies designed to allow the employers to monitor the personnel are not bad and a threat to the privacy of the workforce. To be precise, some technologies are particularly useful in ensuring workers perform their designated tasks in a manner that is acceptable and stipulated in the manual, especially for technical tasks.
In conclusion, employers should ensure they adhere with policies surrounding monitoring of employees in a bid to ensure that search procedures do not infringe the right to privacy of the employees. Although employee monitoring can be beneficial to the company and the wellness of the employees, employers should proceed with caution to warrant the wellness of the workforce and ensure workers stay motivated.
References
Determann, L., & Sprague, R. (2011). Intrusive monitoring: Employee privacy expectations are reasonable in Europe, destroyed in the United States. Berkeley Tech. LJ , 26 , 979.
Moussa, M. (2015). Monitoring employee behavior through the use of technology and issues of employee privacy in America. Sage Open , 5 (2), 2158244015580168.
