HERE'S LOOKING AT YOU: Employers using high-tech ways to monitor staff

BY ANDREW HERRMANN AND HOWARD WOLINSKY
Chicago Sun-Times
Nov. 14, 2006

From monitoring computer use to installing cameras in the office to equipping workers with global positioning system satellites, the bosses have big eyes.

By and large, looking is legal.

"To a certain degree, as long as it's the employer's tools you're using, the employer rules," said Leslie Ann Reis, a workplace privacy expert at John Marshall Law School.

Watch what you say
Three out of four companies say they monitor Web site connections, according to a 2005 survey of 526 companies by the American Management Association. Half of firms reported that they review employees' computer files.

Phones, too. About half of the firms say they monitor the amount of time spent on the phone and track numbers, up from just 9 percent in 2001. Camera use jumped to 51 percent in 2005 from about 33 percent in 2001.

GPS is used by 8 percent of companies to track vehicles but is expanding rapidly to include workers too.

The boss means business: 26 percent of the firms said they have fired employees for Internet misuse. Six percent have canned a worker for misusing office phones.

At Twin Oaks Landscaping in Oswego, 18 crews are equipped with Xora Inc.'s TimeTrack GPS software, which allows the southwest suburban firm to monitor start and finish times on the site, lunch breaks and the routes the employees take to get to the assigned job.

"Part of the reason was that [some of the crews] felt the need to stop for refreshments before the job," company comptroller Paul Zabel said. "We've seen a great deal of curtailment in that regard."

Since installing the devices last year, "we're getting the labor we're paying for," Zabel said.

The employees "weren't too excited about it," Zabel said. "They felt it was kind of like Big Brother looking over them." But putting in a full day's work "is part of their responsibilities."

Customers love it, because it ensures that jobs start on time, Zabel said.

Jim Fuentes, founder of Clarity Communications Systems, an Aurora-based developer of GPS software called Fleet Tracker that works with cell phones, said the product paid off for one restaurant supply company on the first day. When one of the delivery drivers was late, the company owner called the driver who insisted "he was on his way."

"But the employer could see the driver was in a park," Fuentes said. The employee was fired.

In the wake of reports of city building inspectors killing time on the clock, then-Commissioner Norma Reyes equipped 175 employees with GPS devices. Now head of the city's Consumer Affairs Department, Reyes uses the technology to monitor 40 investigators there.

"When you supervise any staff that is outside the office, and you can't be with each person, you need something to ensure accountability," she said. The devices have also helped set baselines of how much time an inspector should spend at an assignment, she said.

'Management by fact'
While the spying aspect of these devices gets the attention, employers find they also help distribute work more evenly among employees and dispatch them more efficiently, said Dan Gillison, national director of state and local public safety at Sprint Nextel, which, with the Mountain View, Calif.-based Xora Inc., has the city building inspector contract.

Hardworking employees should welcome monitoring, he said, because it can quantify who is "busting their butt and not being recognized." Technology can also create what Gillison called "bread crumbs" -- proof that a job was attempted, or a worker was at his assignment. "It's management by fact," Gillison said.

Chicago Police this year installed GPS in the citywide Special Operations Section, which drew fire in September when four officers in the unit were charged with invading homes and robbing people. While police officials said GPS could be used as a disciplinary tool, they also said the devices help ensure officers' safety in case they're lost or injured.

Morale issue?
Reis, of the John Marshall Law School's Center for Information Technology and Privacy Law, said legal concerns are also fueling such spying. An employee using the office computer to look at porn sites or sending harassing e-mails could put an employer in legal jeopardy.

The flip side is that too much watching could affect morale -- whether the level of looking "is conducive to happy employees," Reis said.

Under federal law, when employers monitoring phone calls realize the call is personal, they must stop listening. However, the employee can be fired if company policy prohibits personal calls, Reis said.

Even with all the high-tech surveillance methods available, many employers still catch errant workers the old-fashioned way: "Seven out of 10 times, when a company wants to get rid of someone, they will find something in their cell phone bills or travel expenses," said one former human resources manager, who recently left corporate America after more than 30 years with major companies.

aherrmann@suntimes.com

hwolinsky@suntimes.com

75% OF COMPANIES MONITOR WEB SITE CONNECTIONS

50% REVIEW EMPLOYEES' COMPUTER FILES

50% MONITOR TIME SPENT ON PHONE AND TRACK NUMBERS

8% USE GPS TO TRACK VEHICLES

26% HAVE FIRED EMPLOYEES FOR INTERNET MISUSE