59% of UK workers say employers use monitoring software

A study by Owl Labs found that 59% of UK workers say their company uses monitoring software to track their activity. The tracked activity can include attendance, mouse movements, keyboard use and meeting participation. In the survey, 82% said employers should have to disclose that they use monitoring software, which the source says is not currently required by law.

The most commonly monitored activities were login and logout times (32%), the number of meetings attended (22%), screen and mouse movement (17%) and keyboard use (15%). The report argues that these measures do not provide meaningful insight into work. Some workers also reported ways of appearing to meet the metrics: 28% of UK workers said they had marked a meeting as attended, or attended without paying attention, then caught up using notes or summaries. Managers were more likely than non-managers to report doing this (33% versus 15%).

Interest in AI avatars that attend meetings on someone’s behalf was reported by 50% of managers and 21% of non-managers. Separately, 73% of UK workers said technical problems had cost them time during hybrid meetings, with audio problems generally the most significant. Teams took an average of six minutes to start a hybrid meeting.

Owl Labs CEO Frank Weishaupt called for employers to be open about what they track and why, as the Government reviews how workplace monitoring should be regulated. The report suggests better audiovisual technology could improve hybrid meetings more than tracking attendance.