Monitoring employees makes them more likely to break rules

As remote work becomes the norm, more companies have begun tracking employees through desktop monitoring, video surveillance, and other digital tools. These systems are designed to reduce rule-breaking — but new research suggests that in some cases, they can seriously backfire.

In this story published June 27, 2022, in the Harvard Business Review:

We found that monitored employees were substantially more likely to take unapproved breaks, disregard instructions, damage workplace property, steal office equipment, and purposefully work at a slow pace, among other rule-breaking behaviors.

– David Welsh, associate professor of management and entrepreneurship