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Will Productivity Surveillance Ruin Remote Work?

Drew Conry-Murray

This post originally appeared in Human Infrastructure, a weekly newsletter from the Packet Pushers. If you’d like to subscribe or read the back issues, go here.


Remote work feels like a victory for many people. It cuts down on frustrating commutes, supports greater work-life flexibility, and expands opportunities for those who don’t live in Silicon Valley, San Francisco, Boston, and Manhattan.

There’s an appetite among employees for remote work. For instance, SF Gate reported on an internal VMware survey that found nearly two-thirds of employees want more flexible work options. The other third want to make remote work permanent. CNBC cites a Monster.com survey that says 95% of respondents are considering changing jobs, driven in part by a search for better opportunities as well as a more flexible approach to being in the office.

At the same time, employers are trying to figure out whether and how best to support hybrid or distributed work. A McKinsey survey of 100 executives found that 68% “have no detailed plan communicated or in place” for a remote-work strategy. Only one in ten have begun communicating and piloting their vision for remote work.

Fear + Uncertainty + Doubt = Sales

There’s uncertainty among executives and managers who must ensure that individual and team productivity remains high, customer demands are met, and employees are engaged. How can they meet these requirements when their workers aren’t corralled in offices?

The anxiety percolating in middle managers’ armpits will waft into the scent receptors of startups and tech titans, activating Silicon Valley’s salivary glands. In response, I anticipate we’ll see a surge of software designed to monitor the productivity and engagement of remote workers.

I can imagine tech companies developing “AI-powered” eye-tracking systems for video calls; a dashboard for average keystrokes per day; time-in-chair reports; and other brute-force approaches to monitoring productivity.

We’ve already seen such capabilities begin to creep into business software. Earlier this year Cisco touted new Webex features that monitor user behaviors such as whether you turn on your camera in video calls, how often you speak up, and whether you multi-task during meetings. The intention behind these features is to help employees collaborate more fruitfully and tamp down on distractions. But it also hints at the vast opportunities for employee behavioral monitoring and data harvesting.

Destroy Remote Work To Save It?

Organizations can choose one of two paths as they grapple with hybrid work. The first is to experiment and innovate in how they manage employees and facilitate good work. The McKinsey survey notes that some companies made an effort during the pandemic to foster “small connections” among colleagues: brief engagements to share ideas, discuss projects, and mentor. These companies reported an increase in productivity.

The second path is to buy a bunch of software that promises to let managers and executives “keep an eye on things” like they did when people were forced to come into the office.

I predict a significant number of organizations will opt for the second path. Salespeople will lure managers with shiny, expensive dashboards that turn messy humans into neat columns of stats. It’s easier for a manager to tell an employee to raise their time-in-chair average by 5% than to learn how to run more effective meetings or adjust their own management style to the new realities of remote work.

I worry that productivity monitoring tools could poison the hybrid experience, making working from home even more unpleasant than being in the office.

About Drew Conry-Murray: Drew Conry-Murray has been writing about information technology for more than 15 years, with an emphasis on networking, security, and cloud. He's co-host of The Network Break podcast and a Tech Field Day delegate. He loves real tea and virtual donuts, and is delighted that his job lets him talk with so many smart, passionate people. He writes novels in his spare time.