Your FLOCK, employee monitoring and data tools. What we believe…

Posted June 24, 2020

What we believe…is: “Employees who feel valued and supported will stay in their job”

Your FLOCK is a team engagement platform that uses individual responses. To understand the value of your team more. We use the answers of your team. To help create a company culture or team culture map. Which is then used to help your team align together more. Through our learning and development programme.

It is also used as the basis of your employee engagement survey. As this is then based on the values your team has. This use of values is a clever way of helping people feel happier at work. As they know they are being listened to. And they know that the data they are providing is being used by their team leaders. They also know they are being “recognized”.

Being recognized at work is a fundamental part of any positive employee experience. As Achievers rightly say in their Engagement retention report 2022.

“Employees who feel valued and supported will stay in their job”

This recognition is key to what we do at Your FLOCK. We let employees give their feedback to their team managers / leaders. And the platform allows both to recognise the input of this.

This INPUT is also put inside the system by keyboard and so the idea of data and data monitoring always comes up.

DATA IS IT OUR FRIEND?

Data monitoring is very different to employee monitoring. Which in many cases as we will see below. Goes from the legal but sneaky to the actual illegal depending on which country you are in.

Even basic employee monitoring software allows employees to find out what websites you have been browsing. Or the content of emails sent from your work address. So it is good practice to exercise caution when sending or accessing personal information on a work device.

More advanced surveillance technology includes features such as taking screenshots every few minutes. Which are then sent directly to curious bosses. This spyware is particularly invasive. And means that your employer can see what you send even via desktop apps for personal messaging services.

However, even if your boss is tracking your work, they are not obliged to tell you they do so. Most companies will have an internal privacy notice that informs employees of how their personal data is being processed. Where this is collected from. And what the purpose of processing is.

However on some occasions the information collected through monitoring may not qualify as personal data.

“Although bosses should tell you if they are using spyware technology, they do not have to obtain your consent to do so. Covert monitoring, whilst ethically questionable, is not necessarily unlawful. However, it is much more difficult for employers to justify.”

We at Your FLOCK – as a team engagement platform WANT your input and ideas to help your teams. And our software is not used for monitoring employees. It is also something that, by its very nature, employees MUST know about.

This is what helps employee engagement. And helps drive down employee churn rate and high staff turnover. It is made for people to give their feedback so things can change.It is based on trust. On both sides.

In fact, we believe using employee tracking software for other purposes exposes a lack of trust. And it’s this lack of trust that is damaging employee experience and employee engagement rates.

LIFE HAS TO BE BASED ON TRUST.

Kate Palmer, a HR advice and consultancy director at Peninsula. Believes that transparency is crucial for both employers and employees:

“Ideally, the employee will have been informed of the types of monitoring they are subject to when they started employment or when a new form of monitoring is implemented”

She says.

“If an employer has identified a series of employee breaches, such as using the internet for shopping after they have been expressly told not to, or scrolling through their phone rather than answering customer calls, then monitoring them may be a proportionate way of quickly identifying further breaches. But the clearer the explanation for the use of monitoring, the better it is for everyone involved.”

With Your FLOCK – your data is used to help your teams get better aligned. It is based on the input you provide. And the answers you give. If you have misled the system in the assessment. You should talk to your team leader.

If you feel that the report is not precise. As no system of self reported psychology ever is. Then have a chat with your colleagues about it. And Then please be in touch with us too.

However, on the darker side, if you suspect that your boss is using surveillance technology. Then it’s always best to be cautious when it comes to private conversations or personal data.

If reasons have not been clearly explained, then you may also be able to challenge your employer. Especially now, when most of us work from home and we schedule our work day ourselves. In this case, the employer just has to trust his employees, hasn’t he?

NOT ALL EMPLOYERS ARE TRUSTING.

And even worse, some employers might pick spying apps. Instead of employee monitoring solutions. With spying apps being completely undetectable in most cases. While offering some pretty extreme ways to spy on workers.

Again these are completely against the ethos of Your FLOCK. And our employee engagement surveys. And I personally would say if you believe your employer is using these. Then seriously consider why you are working for them.

And team leaders or business owners if you are using these apps then please use Your FLOCK first. Increase your employee engagement and trust levels and happiness levels so you don’t have to go to these extremes.

Now don’t get me wrong.

If you work in a call centre and your work is calling people then perhaps an employer can install software on each business phone. Before it is forwarded to workers. Giving those employers means to see what their employees do whilst using their business devices.

As long as they tell them and it’s a work phone.

And so many countries’ laws permit proprietors to completely monitor their workers during work hours. And all the time while workers are at their workplace.

The above idea is a tool that COULD increase productivity and efficiency. While at the same time providing companies means to locate their employees (but only during work hours.)

It’s a fine line…

But in this great article by https://turtler.io/ they list the most extreme tracking features.

Many of which are already used by companies that hire subcontractors. From places like upworx – as they come as part of that gig economy solution.

Yet as you go down the list – the more extra they become. If you find more than a couple are being done by your employer. We advise them to look into their company culture and policies a bit more…

WHAT DO YOU THINK? WHICH ONES ARE OK?

Technology has now moved on. And so some companies even go as far as implanting their staff with microchips! Or providing wristband trackers, PC webcam access and screen capturing.

These might be a part of the future of work. It’s worth thinking about…

As in late 2021, the trade union Prospect, carried out a poll that said:

“32% of remote workers are now being monitored, an increase from 24% in April 2021; with use of camera monitoring in people’s homes increasing from 5% in April 2021, to 13% in November 2021”

So much so that in Westminster. An All-Party Parliamentary Group has called for new legislation. To counter the negative impact of surveillance used to monitor workers.

The laws that cover the area of monitoring include:

The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPA) and 2016
The Telecommunications (Lawful Business Practice) (Interception of Communications) Regulations 2000 (LBP)
The General Data Protection Regulations 2018 and The Data Protection Act 2018. Employers must act in accordance with the GDPR and the DPA and its six key principles.

As CRUNCH reports:

“The implied legal obligation of trust and confidence that exists between an employer and employee is also relevant – employers shouldn’t act without reasonable and proper cause, in a way which is likely to destroy or damage the relationship of mutual trust and confidence between themselves and their employees. However, The Human Rights Act 1998 also plays an important role here as it gives individuals a right to privacy and the UK’s laws try to recognise that employees may feel that monitoring by their employer at work is intrusive. Therefore, employers need to find a balance between an employee’s legitimate expectation of privacy and the employer’s interests when they monitor their staff, in any way; there also must be a legitimate purpose for the monitoring.”

We feel at Your FLOCK that as a team engagement platform. And as a training development tool. That employees’ interests as well as employers’ interests. Are very much front and centre and aligned. In the end, we all want happier people at work and to work with or for.