The Role of Surveillance in the Workplace

 
Numerous private business monitors their staff to measure productivity, increase efficiency, decrease risk, and maximise revenue overall. Workplace surveillance is the monitoring of employees by the employer using any method (Ball, 2022, p.12). Workplace surveillance dates back to when workers shifted to cities and laboured in factories during the industrial revolution, where there were paid hourly, and the employer monitored them to boost productivity. Surveillance’s fundamental purpose in both offices and factories is to prevent labourers from impairing or slowing the production process. In contrast to antic supervision, modern-day monitoring is more accessible due to the new technology enabling pervasive monitoring exercises such as email monitoring and frequent drug testing (Ball, 2022, p. 16). However, workplace boundaries are becoming porous as most of our communication and work content is mediated by digital devices and technology. Electronic surveillance can take place both on the job and when employees are accessible to employers outside of the workplace via their gadgets. This report aims to look at the role surveillance plays in the workplace.

Surveillance also plays a crucial role in the workplace as it can aid increase productivity. Employers may be able to redirect time that employees spend on emailing and other non-work-related activities to more productive ones with the use of the computer usage information that has been gathered (Alge and Hansen, 2013, para. 4). Employers can implement policies that concentrate on the issue thanks to specific insights obtained from computer monitoring programs. Management may expressly impose restrictions on these behaviours with the help of technological filters that limit access to particular websites if monitoring indicates that employees are engaging in online shopping or engaging in social networking on Facebook while at work (Alge and Hansen, 2013, para. 4). The AMA poll found that 65% of employers employ filtering software to curb distractions during working hour.

Surveillance also plays a significant role in preventing loss in the working environment. Employers can safeguard their business resources by keeping an eye on the workplace. Modern surveillance methods improve management’s capacity to protect firm assets from relatively petty theft, like an employee sneaking paper clips in their purse, to more severe occurrences, like an employee selling sensitive company data to a rival (Ball, 2010, p. 34). Even incriminating documents or emails that a worker erased from the company computer can be recovered and used as proof of misconduct, thanks to modern forensics. Using a video monitoring system can significantly reduce the likelihood of rogue employees engaging in unlawful activity (Jahagirdar and Bankar, 2020, p. 23). With video monitoring, investigations are also made simple.

Monitoring plays a significant role in communicating to employees which work to prioritise and are advised to be innovative by the employers. Using new monitoring technology at work alters power dynamics in various ways, and overall, the significances of surveillance are not uniform (Ball, 2010, p. 34). Similar to how workplace surveillance technology might “predict conformity” or “normalise discipline,” bystanders do not always perceive CCTV cameras as panoptic machines. The role of surveillance, however, does not always meet an organisation’s intended goal through monitoring approaches (Ball, 2010, p. 45). For instance, in the 1970s, the British police fitted CCTV cameras in an area where prostitute murders were rampant to scare prostitutes away. Instead, the sex workers gathered where the CCTV cameras could capture them and the license number of vehicles they would leave in to record if something happened.

Employers frequently employ the use of surveillance to uphold control and order in the workplace. Whereas Nanny Cams are a notable exception, CCTV cameras are typically noticeable in workplaces as a warning to employees that they are being monitored so that they act appropriately. Similar to how they were designed to alert Yorkshire’s prostitutes to surveillance by documenting their whereabouts and actions, cameras serve as a warning that their operators may have a record of inappropriate behaviour (Alge and Hansen, 2013, para. 6). Additionally, Precise and aggressive electronic surveillance can result in strict technical control over standardised job routines (Alge and Hansen, 2013, para. 6). For instance, Amazon warehouse employees’ movements are monitored during loading and offloading of merchandise from docks as well as the minutes and distance covered in the warehouse is recorded.

Employers use surveillance technology such as time and activity tracking systems to curb inefficiency, referred to as time theft, especially for workers working in warehouses, cleaning industries, retail, and food service. According to the law, time stealing is a crime. For instance, felonies such as false business records result from fudging time sheets (Ball, 2022, p. 22). Moreover, employees also use this time and activity system when pursuing legal solutions from their employers when they find themselves victims of salary theft. This occurs when workers are made to work overtime or supervisors shear time from employees’ time cards, resulting in wage theft (Ball, 2022, p. 22). For example, Wal-Mart was held accountable for millions in stolen pay. Tracking time and tasks helps employees hold their employers responsible for wrongdoing.