Monitoring Remote Employee Performance

🏠 "How do I know if remote employees are actually working?" Wrong question. Better question: "How do I know if the work is getting done well?" Too many leaders obsess over: • Screen time monitoring • Webcam policies • Check-in frequency And miss the obvious signals: ✅ Projects delivered on time ✅ Quality of the work ✅ Client satisfaction ✅ Team collaboration The shift: From tracking presence to measuring impact. One leader told me: “I stopped tracking when people worked and started tracking what they accomplished. Productivity went up 30%.” Here’s the reality: If you can’t measure someone’s contribution without watching them, you don’t have a remote work problem. You have a clarity problem. Trust the work. Measure the results. Design for outcomes, not hours. What matters more, where your team sits or what they deliver? #RemoteWork #Leadership #Productivity #Management #SavvyLeadership

If you're spying on your employees, congratulations! You've officially become their toxic ex. When I talk to leaders about remote work management, I hear one misunderstanding repeatedly: they think monitoring and surveillance are the same. They're not even close. Monitoring means:  • Setting clear expectations.  • Transparently tracking outcomes.  • Holding teams accountable for results. Surveillance means tracking every mouse click, reading private chats, and scrutinizing every minute. It breeds paranoia, not productivity. I understand why many organizations are anxious. Five years of remote work raised legitimate questions about productivity and accountability, but addressing uncertainty with invasive tactics only erodes trust and morale. Here’s what actually works:  • Setting explicit goals  • Checking in based on deliverables  • Trusting your team to perform Leaders build productive teams by creating clarity and trust, not by stalking employees online. What’s your strategy for balancing accountability without crossing into surveillance?

Is there a better way to do employee monitoring? I have a new piece in this Monday's edition of The Wall Street Journal: ‘Your Company Is Watching You. And Doing It All Wrong’ that answers this question. Following up on my LinkedIn post last week on some of the research showing why employee monitoring backfires, I now focus on what research studies have discovered about how to improve employee monitoring. In the WSJ article, I first highlight how research shows that in the majority of cases the negative consequences of electronic employee monitoring outweighs its benefits. Regardless, many companies will still opt to utilize employee monitoring tools. So the question then becomes if monitoring tools will be used, is there a better and more humane way to do so? In the article, I spotlight four research-backed best-practices: 1) Be transparent to employees both about what is being monitored and what is the purpose for the monitoring. Being secretive about monitoring is the easiest way for it to undermine trust and morale. 2) Give employees access to their monitored data. If the data is supposed to be relevant to performance/productivity in some way (if not, why is it tracked?), then why not let employees have access to their own data so they can see how they are doing? People view monitoring systems as more fair when they have access to their own data. 3) Make it about development and growth rather than punishment. Many companies use monitoring data as a “gotcha” to fire employees whose data doesn’t match expectations. However, this is missing a massive opportunity to use the information to help workers improve. When people perceive a monitoring system is there to help them improve rather than to punish them, they are more supportive of it. 4) Give employees control. Allowing employees to temporarily “turn off” monitoring when they want will both improve satisfaction and give them well-needed breaks which can consequently improve performance and creativity. When you start thinking about employees as individual human beings rather than just cogs in a huge machine, you will design systems that are more effective both for improving employee morale but also increasing the performance and innovative power of your organization. https://lnkd.in/g8DcHh-R #monitoring #productivity #technology #remotework

I have been thinking about performance a lot recently, especially as a remote company we struggle at times to identify and take clear action on underperformance of teams and team members. 🤔 One of the major challenges I find with remote work, is the lack of day-to-day context we used to get in offices. We would be together all day, having quick side-bar conversations, overhearing calls and lots of direct exposure to management. The lack of personal relationships makes it sometimes hard for people to reach out for support when needed and for managers to see when some team members may not be pulling their weight fairly. Having less of this traditional "office context", needed to be replaced by something else in order to ensure we have high performing teams. We found that we are leaning much more on data than ever before to help solve this challenge. It is of course less personal and less contextual, but very powerful when used effectively in measuring output. If the output isn't there, managers are pointed in the exact direction where to do further discovery. In the past year we have made serious investments in internal data teams and infrastructure that give us business insights into personal performance of different teams. That has lead us to defining a baseline expectation of "what good looks like" for different roles, specifically in the context of Mews. We are in the process of ensuring all roles have clear measurable standards (where possible) and holding managers accountable for those results. As we enter our mid-year performance review cycle I am excited to watch the evolution of feedback and insights compared to the last cycle. We finally consolidated all 1100+ Mewsers on a single performance platform (Culture Amp) so we can review this data across Mews and track career progression and where training is needed. I am still a big believer in the flexibility of remote work, however we do have to be more explicit in saying that increased levels of flexibility and freedom should result in increased levels of output. Mews is not always an easy place, but that is also what makes it so good, it is a place where hard working talent thrives. 💪

Hybrid and Remote Team Performance Evaluations – Traditional performance evaluations don’t work for hybrid and remote teams. Relying on “time in the office” or quarterly reviews leads to frustration, misalignment, and concerns about career growth. – A better approach? Frequent, structured check-ins. Weekly or biweekly reviews keep employees engaged, provide real-time feedback, and ensure continuous professional development. Employees submit a short report on accomplishments, challenges, and goals, and managers provide timely feedback before a brief meeting. – This system prevents surprises in quarterly reviews, strengthens communication, and keeps employees accountable without micromanaging. It also helps supervisors guide professional growth, ensuring that remote and hybrid employees don’t feel overlooked. – The future of performance evaluation is clear: data-driven, frequent, and focused on impact—not just hours logged. Companies that embrace this shift will see higher engagement, better retention, and stronger results. Read more in my article for Quality Digest https://lnkd.in/gVGmNtHv

Remote teams don’t work? Here’s the truth: If your team needs constant watching... You’ve hired the wrong people. I've managed a remote team for 3+ years. Here’s what I’ve learned: 1/ The best people don’t need babysitting → They deliver results, not excuses. → Micromanagement kills trust. → Ownership drives real performance. → Accountability beats oversight. 2/ No commute means more growth → Extra hours for learning, not traffic. → Time spent on skills, not sitting still. → Work-life balance fuels productivity. → Efficiency replaces exhaustion. 3/ No office means no politics → Results matter more than appearances. → Ideas win, not egos. → Collaboration over competition. → Culture thrives without drama. Here’s how you can make it work: → Set clear KPIs that actually matter. → Monitor outcomes, not hours. → Document your process with Tango. → Give freedom to work where, when, and how. → Focus on impact—not desk time. Remote success isn’t about location—it’s about results. I started using Tango myself to streamline our workflows, keeping everyone aligned. For our remote team, it’s a game-changer. Why? Less explaining, more doing. ♻️ Repost and follow Justin Bateh, PhD for more.

3 adjustments to lead a remote team. Remote performance management relies on manager-employee touch points - deliberate, intentional, and trained interactions. Assuming OKR's or SMART goals are in place, here are my top 3 departures from traditional management process: 1️⃣ Shift to a frequent feedback model These are ongoing, scheduled, frequent one-to-one check-ins. They support goals and create space for intentional discussions. ⌚Twice per-week (depending on employee self-leadership maturity) 🚰Structured but fluid: broad topics using trained searching questions. 2️⃣ Move from "output" to "outcome" performance evaluation It's not the hours worked, it's the goals they hit. The key here is to assess on value-creation. What was the outcome of their effort? As a leader, you become the companies eyes and ears. Lean on technology to track and record your observations. If you can't afford professional systems, use excel. 3️⃣ Adopt to an "Anchored appraisal" model Traditional businesses use an annual appraisal model. Remote worker management requires a greater degree of guidance. That's why quarterly anchored appraisals work better for all involved. Like an annual appraisal, they go beyond the day-to-day to assess the employees personal development and career aspirations. Anchored appraisals help detect and prevent early signs of "drift" or "disengagement". They also allow both parties to align regularly on broader perspectives and company culture. All 3 of these adjustments rely on the quality of a leaders TRAINING. Without visual cues, the skill of asking searching questions and listening for the unspoken response should be top priority for leaders. Happy Tuesday, lead well! Rob #leadership #softskills #listening #thoughtfulquestions #management #remotework #remoteoffice #remote #remoteworkforce #remoteworkers