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Negative Effects of Workplace Net Monitoring
Masem writes "Business2.com reports that while many corporations have monitoring tools and restrictions on Internet usages for non-work related activities, these can have negative effects on the productivity of the workplace. The report notes that people have to take days off from work to deal with personal business that could have been done in a few minutes or hours from a work net connection, and that employee morale is generally down when net controls are in place." A related study suggests employees spend more time doing work from home than playing at work.
Dear Father Spazntaz.
Yes, I do have something to confess.
I come to you now, my heart heavy and my outlook on things around so sad.
I...
It feels like such a terrible thing to say.
I'm a dirty, rotten Troll.
A filthy, garbage mouthed spouter of bile and other inanities.
Where I go I cause pain.
Where I write I leave anguish.
The World Wide Web was large so they said.
Large enough for everyone to grab a space to make their own.
Why Father!?
Why do these people with their VAC servers and home LANs congregate on Slashdot,
Kuroshin and The Linux Game Tome?
Is it to taunt meeeeee!?
They know I'm weak - that I can't resist.
"Fool," they say! Not one of us he is.
And now they have a Troll amongst them.
I will have my revenge I say!
I will WIPO my ass with the very discussions they seek to enlighten themselves with!
We all know that the Macintosh is for the homosexual elite.
Only a half-man could enjoy the sight of pastels and beige.
What kind of people rally around a man who is afraid of his own true name - this RMS?
Or hold aloft a fucking bird from the Antarctic?
William Gates is the only truly respectable figurehead for an operating system - nay a
computing movement.
His glasses and suit say - I did this!
I changed the world and I'm proud of what I did...
I am proud of what I do Father!
I find myself in their filthy twisted jaws. Teeth turned this way and that!
Onwards I say!
Father - only you can help me.
I need ablution.
Tell me I am doing right.
I am not a dirty fucking animal - am I?
This was an excerpt from Ablabla.org.
Your support is needed. Ablabla.org is a registered Troll aid charity.
Cases like this one are a frequent reality at Ablabla.org.
Father Spazntaz and his team of Troll support workers work hard to give time to each Troll
that comes to them in need of support - but time and supplies are limited.
Just one comment or reply a day at Ablabla.org could give hope to as much as eight bottom-feeding
troll posting scumbuckets.
Thank you.
At my current job, nearly all the geeks run Windows 2000. Unfortunately for them, the corporate "watchdog" software, as its called, connects directly to one of their ports and can be used to view the graphick environment and whatever their working on.
Instead of using the corprate Windows image, I simply put Gentoo on the box and they've yet to find out. This way, I ensure that all ports are secure (via %netstat) and retain my privacy.
Use Linux -- its' a great tool!
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
Jews are much better workers.
You will just have to do it the oldfashioned way, using a checkbook and bills that arrive in the mail. Should the company pay for your access? No fucking way! Ante up or get a life. Pussies! Yes the library is an alternative. We fire folks who abuse the system weekly, and these jokers signed a paper stating that they understand the company policies on Internet/computer usage. What a bunch of babies.
Looking to get fired... come on down, we will fire you slackers in heartbeat!
Why Spy?
Technology that monitors employees' Web usage sounds like a smart way to keep them focused on work. Wrong. Let 'em surf.
By Jeffrey Pfeffer, February 2003 Issue
It's no secret that plenty of workers use their company's high-speed Internet access to shop, make travel arrangements, or just surf the Web. Research firm ComScore Networks, in fact, found that, excluding auctions, 59 percent of all 2001 Web purchases in the United States were made from the workplace. Another study, by Vault.com, found that 47 percent of employees spend at least half an hour a day cruising the Web for personal reasons.
Despite this interesting fact, slashdot's editors are colossal dickheads. In fact, they engaged in a conspiracy to secretly ban moderators who modded up a certain post that was critical of them. Asked to expalin this behavior, Michael attempted to reply, but was unable to due to Cmdrtaco's penis being inserted in his throat.
In light of this, it would seem to make sense for managers to keep track of their workers' Web habits. Shouldn't employees conduct personal business on their own time? Think of all the lost productivity!
Not so fast. There are problems with this logic. First, while employers have increasingly been taking the Big Brother approach, thanks to software that tracks Internet usage and even lets the boss read a worker's e-mails, the proportion of absenteeism attributable to personal needs has also been on the rise -- almost doubling in 2002 to 21 percent. Notice the lesson here: If you don't want your people missing work to take care of personal business, maybe it would be better to let them take care of some of that business at work. Losing a few minutes here or there -- or even a couple of hours -- is cheaper than losing entire days.
Other unintended consequences of electronic monitoring are more difficult to measure but potentially worse for business. Studies show, for instance, that electronic monitoring results in lower job satisfaction, in part because people begin to believe the quantity of their work is more important than the quality. Monitoring also induces what academics call psychological reactance: the tendency of people to rebel against constraints. Tell people they can't shop, they can't use corporate networks for personal business, they can't make personal phone calls, and their desire to do all those things goes up. Another worrisome consequence stems from the self-fulfilling prophecy, which simply means that people behave as they are expected to. So if you expect an employee to do a good job, he or she probably will. Act as though you distrust people, and you create employees who are, in fact, less trustworthy.
This is the thinking at SAS Institute, the world's largest private software company and a place consistently ranked in the top 10 on those "Best Places to Work" surveys. Other than flagging for porn sites, SAS doesn't monitor its workers' Web use. The company tells its people to use company resources responsibly but doesn't mind if they, say, check sports scores or use the Web for shopping.
That sounds about right. Management literature is filled with books that use the word "trust" in their titles, and most people at the top claim to understand that cultures based on trust work better than those based on distrust. Yet even as companies say they want strong relationships with their people, they unwittingly undermine those relationships by following their employees' every keystroke.
The prescription is simple. Before you implement the latest technology to monitor your workers, ask yourself, "What does this say about how I think about my people?" If you really don't trust your employees, maybe you should get different ones. If you do trust them, or want to, treat them accordingly.
Slashdot 's editors are dickheads