Employee Monitoring

In  the  last  decade  most  of  the  large  industrialized  economies  have  been  shifting from a heavy manufacturing base to an information management base. Along with this shift has been stiff competition resulting from globalization. Competition coming from not only large economies but also from upcoming developing countries. These developing economies with their cheap labor costs are making this competition more costly for a number of older, more established and mature economies. This  shift  in  the  economies  and  the  stiff  competition  have  resulted  in  a  shift  in management styles to bring more efficiency and quality in the established economies.

This is not the first time such management styles have shifted. Styles in management have  been  changing  with  shifts  in  economies  since  the  dawn  of  the  Industrial Revolution. In those early days, management followed a style now commonly known as Theory X, after Douglas McGregor. Theory X management, with all the trappings of the industrial era, was characterized by a top-down autocratic style of management in which the manager - literally from the top floor - commanded the activities of the factory workers on the factory floor with almost omniscient and demeaning power. As economies grew bigger and employees became more elite, a new management style started to evolve that became known as Theory Y. Theory Y put more faith and empowerment  in  the  hands  of  the  employees.  The  style  was  hierarchical  with  the employee  ranks  broken  down  into  small  semi-independent  units.  Each  unit  was headed by a supervisor. The supervisors themselves formed another top-down hierarchy ending with the top management. Theory Y, or scientific management, as this management  style  is  commonly  known  because  of  its  hierarchical  structure,  gave more flexibility and partial decision-making powers to employees at different levels of the management hierarchy. The workers themselves were more removed from the top management, but at the same time they were closer to management decisions and control from the smaller units. Scientific management has been in effect for years.

But with the recent shifts and globalization of world economies, scientific management  has  been  slowly  giving  way  to  a  new  style  in  which  management  is  trying  to wrest back control of the work process away from the workers and slowly bring back the techniques of Theory X. Given the technological advances of recent years and the abundance  of  educated  and  highly  skilled  workers,  though,  it  would  be  unwise  for today’s management to bring back these techniques. So a new technique in the works is called “fear management.” It is aimed at keeping workers in line, just like all other management styles, but with “voluntary” compliance by workers to company management policies and practices they would normally have questioned or challenged. Unlike theories X and Y, which achieved worker control through autocratic and supervisory unit means, fear management uses both worker surveillance and control  as  enforcement  means.  Fear  is  transmitted  to  workers  through  policies  like “downsizing,” “contingent work force,” and “outsourcing.” To workers these poli-cies spell disaster and fear of losing job security and being replaced by part-time, temporary,  and  contract  workers.  According  to  Karen  Nussbaum,  temporary workers now make up one-third of the U.S. work force less than one-half are covered by any pension, and many have no health insurance.

Management is using a wide array of surveillance gadgets and techniques. These include, among others, employees taking polygraph tests if they are suspected of a breach of any kind. Although in the United States compulsory use of the lie detector is banned, it is still used on a voluntary basis. Drug testing is widely used by many companies  and  required  by  all  U.S.  government  employees  in  some  categories. Handwriting  analysis,  the  honesty  test,  electronic  monitoring,  mind  control,  and many other techniques are also being used.

Source :

Kizza, Joseph Migga., Ethical & Social Issues in the Information Age, 4th Edition, Springer, 2010. Page 147-148.