‘Big Brother’ managers should turn the lens on themselves
Blue-collar workers are used to being monitored 24/7. Lean manufacturing facilities often have productivity screens right by work stations to see progress in real time — and gauge whether staff should get a bit extra at the end of the day or be docked for not working hard enough.
Likewise, low-wage service staff working in restaurants or retail chains often have their lives upended by algorithmic software that co-ordinates their schedules to customer demand, making it difficult to look after children or plan very far in advance. Upper-level white-collar workers have historically enjoyed more humane evaluation methods; but now, thanks to surveillance capitalism, their progress is being tracked minute by minute, too.
The number of employers using data surveillance software to monitor employees has doubled since the start of the pandemic. Nearly two-thirds of medium to big companies in the US (and many elsewhere) now use such systems, which do everything from monitoring email and web browsing, to tracking workers’ location and movement, to recording what keystrokes and eye movements they make, or when their screens go dark.
This story originally appeared on: Financial Times - Author:Rana Foroohar
