By VIRGINIA
GALT
Monday, September 2, 2002 – Print Edition,
Page B10
People who telework might have added reason to get out of Their pyjamas
and comb their hair, as experimental monitoring technology now allows
employers to capture photo images of employees in their home offices.
However, just because such monitoring can be done does not mean it
should be done, say researchers from the University of Toronto and Queen's
University. Employees would regard such surveillance as a gross violation
of privacy, they say.
"Awareness monitoring systems have been implemented in organizations
such as Nynex and Xerox [in the United States] and have been embraced by
the computing community as one of the most important design features of
collaborative work," researchers David Zweig of the U of T and Jane
Webster of Queen's wrote in a study published in the August issue of the
Journal of Organizational Behaviour.
"The overriding assumption appears to be: 'If we can get the technology
right, people will accept it.' [Yet] this stance overlooks some of the
fundamental psychological issues," their report said.
The new technology, which allows employers or colleagues to literally
look in on distant co-workers to see if they are available, is not yet
widely used. It's "hard to say" whether any Canadian employees are
currently being monitored in this way, but it is safe to assume the
technology "will not go away," Prof. Zweig said in a recent interview.
The goal of the technology is to improve communications between
employees by knowing when a distant worker is available. Prof. Zweig said
there is nothing wrong with sending an e-mail or making a phone call to
see whether a distant colleague is available, but video-surveillance
"crosses the line."
The researchers surveyed 1,200 university students and alumni working
in various organizations across the country and found that their reaction
to such a concept was overwhelmingly negative. Employees would not agree
to such monitoring even if there were so-called privacy safeguards such as
"blurred photo images, control over who would see the images and
infrequent image capture," said Prof. Zweig, "and they would not work for
a company using this type of monitoring technology."
He said there is no evidence that awareness monitoring actually
enhances performance. One survey respondent, who had experience with a
monitoring system at work, told the researchers that once the novelty wore
off, "I just turned it off so Big Brother
couldn't see me."
Some said it sounded too much like a system designed to catch people
out rather than improve communications; one respondent said employers
could use this surveillance method as sort of a "new millennium time
clock."
Others challenged the assumption that anyone sitting at his or her
terminal is free to be interrupted at any time. As one participant told
the researchers: "The time I don't want to be interrupted is when I am
doing research or doing something right at my terminal. I'd rather be
interrupted if I am talking to a colleague. The assumption here is that if
you are sitting at your terminal it's time to be interrupted and that may
not be valid, that may be the time that you are trying to do some deep
thinking."
Employers should not become so enamoured of new technology that they
neglect the impact it has on their employees, Prof. Zweig said.
"There is a delicate balance in the line between benign and invasive,"
the researchers wrote. "People form expectations about the degree of
personal information they will communicate with others in their daily
lives."
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