Electronic Surveillance of Employees

Assignment #1 – Electronic Surveillance of Employees

Law, Ethics & Corp. Governance

January 22, 2012

Explain where an employee can reasonably expect to have privacy in the workplace.

An employee can reasonably expect to have privacy in the workplace within their office and within the bathroom. Employees should feel comfortable while they are at work in their personal office. It is important to make sure that the employees are performing their job properly but it is also important that the employers give the employees their own personal space. There are other ways for companies to make sure they are doing their jobs correctly. Companies should have a system installed to check their productivity to make sure they are working. Employers should trust that they trained their employees enough to properly do their jobs.

Instead of using electronic surveillance to supervise employees, having monthly training sessions on how to properly perform the job would be more effective. This would actually inform the employee's of what is expected of them instead of reprimanding them once something is wrong and no one has knowledge of it. This would also inform the employees of how important their job is and how important it is or the company to have employee performing the job properly. As long as employees are trained properly, there should be no need for employers to want to listen to their employees conversations unless it is simply for improvement purposes to make the company better at what they do.

In the office workplace there are typically two types of workspaces, an open area, in which there are several desks and where conversations can be overheard, or an enclosed office, in which – when the door is closed – conversations cannot be heard and where one would expect virtually total privacy. Explain whether it makes a difference if an enclosed office.

It does not make a difference if the employee has an open office or an enclosed office, employees should still have privacy. It is understandable that having an open office, conversations may be overheard but there should not be electronic surveillance placed in either office. Employees should be careful as to how they conduct themselves at work regardless of the situation. Employers should trust their employees enough to be productive on their jobs without having to electronically surveillance them. Even though an office is not the same thing as someone's bedroom at home, an employee is given an office to perform their job in privacy meaning that the company has chosen this person in confidence. Not being under electronic surveillance gives the chance for the employee to perform the job more comfortably.

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