I had a consulting firm that was doing ok from 2021-2022, but ended it do to personal circumstances. At the peak of it I had 10 small business clients. About half of them were absolutely paranoid about their employees slacking off. They would just constantly be worried their employees weren’t working and would try to figure out ways to monitor them.
When I stopped my business, I only kept an ongoing relationship with my biggest client. He is the worse for this. He puts cameras all over his warehouse, production facility and office. There are three office employees, and everyone of them has a camera pointed at their computer screen in the front corner of their office. He also makes it very clear to them that he has “bossware” which monitors every activity on their screen and constantly takes screenshots.
I don’t get this at all. I worked as a financial professional for 10 years prior to starting my consulting company. I only had one company that had this type of software and it was really offputting. I didn’t like it all. I do my thing, it makes me really uncomfortable knowing everything I’m doing on the company computer is strictly monitored in detail.
While I had my consulting firm, I had two employees. I had a private office in a co-working space, and whenever they worked a shift, I would let them in to the office and just let them do their thing. I would often not even be present. I knew I could evaluate them based on the results they provide. If I pay them for a 4 hour shift and they get done what I want to get done, I don’t give a shit if they spent half the shift browsing their phone or even social media on my laptop.
Since I’m getting back in to it, I’ve had a meeting with a client that owns some properties and he is the exact same way. He insists on installing this bossware on his employee’s computers. He pays $700 a year for it. He is a very small property manager that only does about $1mm a year in revenue. I told him it was a waste of money, but he said he needs it to make sure his employees aren’t slacking.
I guess I just don’t get this attitude and find it counterproductive. You either have people you can trust, thus you don’t need to monitor them, or you have people you don’t and they should be fired. I’m interested in hearing other entrepreneur’s perspectives.
Simple answer: Because they can.
Not enough people have quit to effect bottom line and new applicants keep rolling in regardless of surveillance policies. Many companies (cough cough - banking…) continue exerting as much control as legally possible as long as turnover and hiring impact doesn’t throw the business off course.
They will take as much control as the employees will allow, just like what governments have been doing for THOUSANDS of years to their people.