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I don't agree. There are some things that are just never appropriate in a work environment. Using a company's computer to check your facebook or post things on your myspace, etc is IMHO never appropriate (unless it is part of your job-- I suppose there are some where a facebook presence or posting on a facebook is appropriate).
There are times that a Facebook posting during company hours is appropriate--I needed a referral for a local vendor one time, posted the query to Facebook, and had two suggestions within 30 minutes. There's a difference between posting drunken photos of yourself from teh night before and using social media in a responsible manner in way that is useful to an employer.
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Checking your bank account, paying bills, looking up a doctor's address, checking a school page, news site, etc-- I have never worked ANYWHERE where that is not allowed.
Monitoring is not about the inherent personal uses of the internet that employees end up using during the day, but monitoring is for those who have no concept of what is appropriate at work or do it ALL day long.
In my opinion may be talking about two types of employers, but you are also talking about two types of employees: those who use the internet every once in awhile for incidental uses and those who basically try to find anything to do that is not work related.
Personally I don't see a difference between paying your bills and posting something to Facebook on your bosses time, provided what you are posting to facebook is something you wouldn't care if your boss saw.
There are times that a Facebook posting during company hours is appropriate--I needed a referral for a local vendor one time, posted the query to Facebook, and had two suggestions within 30 minutes. There's a difference between posting drunken photos of yourself from teh night before and using social media in a responsible manner in way that is useful to an employer.
Personally I don't see a difference between paying your bills and posting something to Facebook on your bosses time, provided what you are posting to facebook is something you wouldn't care if your boss saw.
Just happened to read this article (http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/career-articles-psssst_your_boss_is_spying_on_you-1265 - broken link) about the ways companies are monitoring their employees. Emails, phone conversations, text and IM messages, social networking accounts, files on phones and cameras, and location/time via key badges.
Does paranoia not know any limits? Employees don't become robots just because they pass the company entrance. Sounds all very much like Orwell to me...
It's their place of business and they are paying you for your time.
Unless they start putting cameras in locker room/rest rooms,there's not much you can do about it.
The best sign that a company is monitoring you is that it's a bad place to work.
Good companies MAY monitor employees,but bad companies always will.
Welcome to the computer age! As things become easier to do, the more companies will waste their time on things which really don't matter (internet usage). If an employee can do the job just as well as others and they are on the internet more than those, what difference does it make? As long as the person is viewing PG material, I don't see the harm.
This is just another reason why I hate office work.
I can see both sides of the story. However, I worked for a company that the managers questioned us on where we were going (when getting up to go to the bathroom). They also wouldn't allow any internet usage at all, unless you were a trader (making the company big bucks) and those got to look at porn. No lie, they did it right beside me.
There would be days were we had absolutely 0 work to do. Everything was caught up. After cleaning out my keyboard, dusting off my desk, rearranging my desk, and changing my screensavers for an hour, I was about to claw my eyes out. I would have loved to check my bank account, check FB, or do anything that didn't involve slamming my head on my desk for 8 hours.
I'm human too, and you can't expect me to just sit staring at a blank screen for 8 hours because there is no work to do.
I understand this but I don't like it. And I'm one of those who always made sure I did extra... I was never a slacker.
I think part of this is because of poor management. People put in supervisory positions who don't know how or aren't willing to confront poor performers. It's not an easy task but it's the job when you manage others.
I have a friend who worked for a tech company that took all of this to the extreme. You were audio and video recorded everywhere but the bathroom. They tracked every keystroke and phone call. Every website visited. You couldn't clock in early or leave late without written permission. You had to email the CEO of the company every day with a 15 min interval report of what you had done that day. They kept track of how much time you spent in the bathroom and how many trips you made. And you should have seen the dress code....... You were only allowed to use a conference room with management approval and your supervisor was supposed to escort you to the location. Pretty extreme, huh?
Consequently, this company found it impossible to attract and keep the people they hired. It was quite common for a new hire to go to lunch and never come back. Even in this poor economy they couldn't keep people. I still see their ads all the time. It was and is a sorry place to work.
You have to find balance. Employees expect to be monitored and managed but you don't have to be draconian about it. People still expect to be treated like human beings and with common human decency. There has to be give and take. Yes, I may take 10 min out to make a dental appointment but I will give it back to you 10 times over. Trust me. But I guess that's the point of this whole thing. You have to trust your people until or unless they prove themselves not deserving of that trust.
I understand this but I don't like it. And I'm one of those who always made sure I did extra... I was never a slacker.
I think part of this is because of poor management. People put in supervisory positions who don't know how or aren't willing to confront poor performers. It's not an easy task but it's the job when you manage others.
I have a friend who worked for a tech company that took all of this to the extreme. You were audio and video recorded everywhere but the bathroom. They tracked every keystroke and phone call. Every website visited. You couldn't clock in early or leave late without written permission. You had to email the CEO of the company every day with a 15 min interval report of what you had done that day. They kept track of how much time you spent in the bathroom and how many trips you made. And you should have seen the dress code....... You were only allowed to use a conference room with management approval and your supervisor was supposed to escort you to the location. Pretty extreme, huh?
Consequently, this company found it impossible to attract and keep the people they hired. It was quite common for a new hire to go to lunch and never come back. Even in this poor economy they couldn't keep people. I still see their ads all the time. It was and is a sorry place to work.
You have to find balance. Employees expect to be monitored and managed but you don't have to be draconian about it. People still expect to be treated like human beings and with common human decency. There has to be give and take. Yes, I may take 10 min out to make a dental appointment but I will give it back to you 10 times over. Trust me. But I guess that's the point of this whole thing. You have to trust your people until or unless they prove themselves not deserving of that trust.
Im surprised they are still in buisness, unless this is a goldman schacs type of buisness you are talking about where they derive their income from thoes people viewing porn and setting up scams. Better to not be associated becuase you dont want to be burning with them later on.
I understand this but I don't like it. And I'm one of those who always made sure I did extra... I was never a slacker.
I think part of this is because of poor management. People put in supervisory positions who don't know how or aren't willing to confront poor performers. It's not an easy task but it's the job when you manage others.
I have a friend who worked for a tech company that took all of this to the extreme. You were audio and video recorded everywhere but the bathroom. They tracked every keystroke and phone call. Every website visited. You couldn't clock in early or leave late without written permission. You had to email the CEO of the company every day with a 15 min interval report of what you had done that day. They kept track of how much time you spent in the bathroom and how many trips you made. And you should have seen the dress code....... You were only allowed to use a conference room with management approval and your supervisor was supposed to escort you to the location. Pretty extreme, huh?
Consequently, this company found it impossible to attract and keep the people they hired. It was quite common for a new hire to go to lunch and never come back. Even in this poor economy they couldn't keep people. I still see their ads all the time. It was and is a sorry place to work.
You have to find balance. Employees expect to be monitored and managed but you don't have to be draconian about it. People still expect to be treated like human beings and with common human decency. There has to be give and take. Yes, I may take 10 min out to make a dental appointment but I will give it back to you 10 times over. Trust me. But I guess that's the point of this whole thing. You have to trust your people until or unless they prove themselves not deserving of that trust.
I also think those measures only lead to unhappy employees, and that is the last thing a company needs, one might think. They make so many extra hours, so one can expect something in return.
My mother is working off her last few years before retirement and she writes me emails from the office regularly, just small talk to keep in touch with me (she lives in another country) and have some pleasant minutes as her company is all about money and productivity and she hates it there.
I also think those measures only lead to unhappy employees, and that is the last thing a company needs, one might think. They make so many extra hours, so one can expect something in return.
My mother is working off her last few years before retirement and she writes me emails from the office regularly, just small talk to keep in touch with me (she lives in another country) and have some pleasant minutes as her company is all about money and productivity and she hates it there.
Yea but not money for the employees, money to greese the hands of the board members and CEO's. Most people dont have a problem working 50-60 hrs a week for a short time if the pay check is ultra fatty or actually if they are getting a solid percentage of the profits from what ever project they are on but that would take some of the greese away from the board members hands and they cant have that.
Mine is set to private, thanks for the tip. I'm just saying that it really sucks that it's not enough to provide an excellent cover letter, resume, interview, etc that is all work based, but employers also feel the need to intrude on a person's personal life.
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Originally Posted by annerk
I disagree. You can find out a lot about what type of employee a person will be by looking. DO they constantly complain about their employer? Post things about the companies customers? Talk about calling in sick because they were too hungover to go in? There are a number of things that a social netowrking profile can reveal about what type of employee you'd be.
If you put it out there for the world to see, it's well within a hiring managers right to look--they are part of the world as well.
I agree that it's stupid to make a profile public, but I still think it's ridiculous that people can't have privacy from work anymore, and some companies think it's a good idea to intrude. I've heard about employers creating fake profiles and adding candidates who have profiles set to private just to spy on them. I think that's way, way WAY overboard.
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Originally Posted by lovetheduns
You are right, it is NONE of my business.
However, if someone sets their social networking pages to open and allows anyone to see them-- that does make me question their decision making.
Or as my company believes, your personal life is your personal life, but if you bring attention to where you work or have a very open lifestyle then it needs to be something that many of our customers would not cringe over-- (i.e. think about the kind of information that a bank or a large financial services company could have about you---)
I agree with this. I just wish that companies respected their employees' private lives a bit more. The work/life balance in this country is so messed up.
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I'm just saying that it really sucks that it's not enough to provide an excellent cover letter, resume, interview, etc that is all work based, but employers also feel the need to intrude on a person's personal life.
I think that's way, way WAY overboard.
The work/life balance in this country is so messed up.
