Managing employees working remotely can be such a daunting task. Decreased collaborations, jumbled communication, and distractions may affect the effectiveness of staff members.
Having a computer monitoring software tool can help resolve these and more challenges that come with dealing with a remote workforce.
In this quick guide, we help you understand what computer monitoring entails and show you how you can use these tracking tools to transform your remote workplace. We will also highlight three crucial issues to consider before using one in your organization. Let’s dive in!
What is a computer monitoring software tool?
Computer monitoring software is a simple and cost-effective way to view and monitor employee online activity. The premise behind implementing this tool is to protect devices used on and off company networks while following compliance and data security regulations. The software tracks your employee’s online activity by:
- Scan logging
- Browser and web page tracking
- Monitoring downloads and uploads
- Putting blocks and alerts based on website, keyword, or category
- Tracking time usage
- Idle/active session tracking
How to use computer tracking software to transform your remote workplace
Enhance attendance tracking
Monitoring your employees’ attendance while they work remotely is never easy. A computer tracking software tool gives you detailed information on employees’ working times. It ensures that employees obey work ethics and resist the temptation to slack during work hours.
Moreover, this tool can come in handy in helping you remunerate your employees more accurately especially if you pay hourly.
Protect company data
Employees working remotely can knowingly or unknowingly endanger a company’s data. Oftentimes, this happens when they visit unsafe sites using work devices.
A computer tracking software tool can help you set up warnings according to the site’s employees are visiting or keywords they are searching for. The tool can also help you check work USB and emails for malware and alert you in case someone copies data from the company’s system.
Improve employee efficiency
Proper and dynamic workforce management is one of the most crucial steps towards growing any business. Employees are more likely to put more effort and do their work professionally when they know they are being monitored.
Also, a computer monitoring software application enables you to identify when your employees encounter challenges at work. This allows you to make appropriate decisions on how to support them.
Enhance customer service
One of the quickest ways to lose your clients is through inconsistent and late responses. Prompt responses and engagement make your customer feel valued and more likely to purchase from your business at a later date.
A computer monitoring software tool helps you identify regular tasks that can be automated or removed to create more time to attend to customers and gather the information that can be used to better customer experience.
More engagement for managers
One of the main reasons managing remote workers gets difficult for managers is because they are physically separated from them. Lack of physical supervision, a lack of clear communication channels, and social isolation are some of the challenges that arise in such situations.
A good computer monitoring software enables you as a manager to better interact with employees and projects. Besides, you can offer encouragement and step in when necessary.
Factors to consider before using computer monitoring software for a remote workforce
Having explored the various benefits of implementing computer monitoring software at your workplace, let’s now take a look at precautions to take while at it.
Privacy
Ensure you don’t sacrifice your employees’ privacy when monitoring them. Ideally, avoid tracking your employees’ personal devices and also discuss privacy concerns before using computer monitoring software. Publicize the extent of employee monitoring during onboarding.
Misuse of data
It is important to understand that raw internet is not sufficient grounds to measure an employee’s productivity. A decent employee monitoring software tool incorporates other aspects when evaluating productivity.
Legal issues
Generally, it is legal to use computer monitoring software on your employees. However, legislation pertaining to data security, employee privacy, and other compliance issues differ according to jurisdiction.
To ensure you don’t get on the wrong side of the law, we highly recommend consulting with lawyers that specialize in your organization’s jurisdiction and industry.
Also read: What are the benefits of digital transformation?
Ready to transform your remote workplace this year?
Remote work is slowly becoming the new norm and research shows that organizations that use computer monitoring software with transparency benefit immensely. Overcome the challenges that come with remote work by implementing a proven monitoring application in your company. Also, don’t forget to let us know about your experience. Good luck!