Did you know that social media diverts the attention of workers, with Facebook being the number one distractor? Sixty-five percent of millennials, Gen Z, Gen Z, and baby boomers are saying so. Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat fall behind with 9%, 7%, and 7%, respectively, according to the 2018 Workplace Distraction Report by Udemy for Business.
Facebook is the main culprit for work distraction
While some companies are content to leave their workforces to their own devices and allow them to apply self-monitoring, 70% of workers actually believe that they need training to veer away from distractions. As such, organizations arrange such training sessions for the benefit of their employees.
Meanwhile, there are organizations that rely on employee monitoring software. But what does such application really do and what value can it provide for your organization? We have listed five reasons why you should add it to your technology stack below.
To track employee activities comprehensively
Emails, social media networks, and smartphones–these are technologies that boost operational efficiency but they can also be detrimental to the productivity of employees at work. While companies can implement mobile device policies that disallow the use of personal smartphones and tablets during work hours, it is difficult to stop employees from using emails and social media platforms for non-work-related conversations.
You can overcome this issue by coming up with email and SNS guidelines and by monitoring employees in the workplace. There are plenty of applications that can help you in this regard. They can even look at employees’ activities silently so that they do not get disturbed by the monitoring agent. On top of that, you can configure the solution to take screenshots every five minutes or at a custom interval. This way, you can make sure that each worker is making good use of their time at work. Plus, the screenshot feature can help you hold employees accountable for their workstation activities.
To promote higher productivity levels
A study conducted by the University of California, Irvine revealed that once an employee gets distracted from a task, it would take them more than 23 minutes to focus again. This is costly for a company because those are minutes that a worker could have spent completing a job.
To resolve this, you can rely on an employee monitoring system. It is capable of telling you what employees are doing on their workstations at a given period. This gives you data that you can use to come up with optimization strategies to improve the productivity of your workforce.
Moreover, the same application would allow you to set restrictions and time limits on app usage to motivate your staff to focus on the work at hand.
To increase the organization’s overall efficiency
Employee monitoring is now an integral part of a company’s operations to ensure their efficiency and productivity in the workplace. This also lets commercial entities set a precedent in the industry, which can help in attracting more business. But to get there, they need the help of an employee monitoring software to track workers’ performance.
You can do the same in your own business, too. You can start by generating in-depth reports regarding employees’ work performance and compare them with those of other staff in the organization. This way, you can identify the things that make certain people productive and find a way to implement those for employees that are falling behind.
With this, you can bring your productivity up to par, or beyond, the current industry standard so that you can show prospects that your employees can work hard and deliver quality outputs to them.
To watch out for insider threats
CA Technologies presented the Insider Threat 2018 Report that revealed 90% of organizations feel that their systems are vulnerable to insider threats. They confessed that their concerns stem from barely inhibited access permissions, the increasing number of devices that can access confidential information, and the rising complexity of IT.
Robust enterprise-grade security software can help detect, prevent, and deter such risks. However, for small and medium businesses with modest incomes, the price tags that come with such a solution are too steep.
There is a way to mitigate insider risks without the hefty price tag though and that is via remote employee monitoring. There are examples that offer comprehensive activity tracking features complemented with reporting tools that are budget-friendly for SMEs. These help you identify employees who are potential security risks via their computer activities. And by monitoring them, you can be confident in preventing them from taking further actions that can harm your company.
Apart from that, employee monitoring platforms have digital asset monitoring capabilities. These aids you in controlling how members of your workforce utilize your digital resources, such as your websites, databases, and social media accounts. As such, you can place a barrier between risky users and sensitive information.
To streamline data accessibility
Employee monitoring applications can integrate with other platforms like Google Drive. This allows them to save their activity tracking data to prevent any information loss. That is because you never know when you need to scrutinize old logs in case you encounter security or compliance issues.
Furthermore, synchronization with cloud storage systems allows you to disseminate employee monitoring information to your partners, consultants, and other stakeholders, in the same way you make employee scheduling accessible. With the help of this feature, you can collaborate with other parties to improve employee productivity further.
Getting the best out of employee monitoring
Employee monitoring can be effective when used in the right way. If you deploy it silently, you can maximize it because you can really see how your workforce spends their time on their workstations. As a result, you can gain a comprehensive view of their work performance, which can yield insights into how you can improve their focus at work.