Here’s the situation: some of the staff at a retail store are spending an inordinate amount of time off the shop floor and on the company computer. the Manager has discovered that the internet browser history keeps getting “mysteriously” deleted.
It’s pretty obvious that they’re screwing around when they should be working but it’s hard to prove, so how would you conclusively bust them? Granted this is something best solved with people management skills rather than a technological “gotcha”, but let’s just image for shits and giggles that we want to bust the guilty parties so righteously that there’s nothing left of them but a pair of smoking trainers - how would you go about proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that they’ve been using company time and property to futz around on Facebook, surf porn or run an international drugs cartel?
Is everything getting done? Is the business profitable/growing?
My employees update Facebook, read news, send email and texts openly throughout the day. But they also work hard to create time for extracurricular activity. As long as shit’s getting done, I’m happy. Remember when “smoke breaks” used to be a thing? “Internet breaks” has taken its place.
It’s not difficult to set up monitoring software on the computer. You could also require each user to have their own profile on the machine that they’re required to log into prior to using the machine.
Let’s assume for the purposes of this thread that it’s an issue - things are not getting done. What’s a conclusive, relatively easy way to bust 'em to kingdom come?
What sort of monitoring software would you recommend? Is there anything out there that’s free and reliable? Avoiding added expense for the store would be useful…
I think a good manager would not try to bust them, yet. I think the first step would be to tell them, informally, to knock it off or dial it back and warn them that if it continues, there will be consequences. Why do you need to prove it to them anyway? If they deny it, just repeat it again: dial back the goofing off or there will be consequences.
After that, you can log in to the router and pull up a history; at least you can on some routers. On simple consumer routers like what most people have at home, you simply go to an IP address while on the network, typically something like 192.168.0.1, and you can log into the router. I would bet you could do something like this but it may be more complicated. I could ask the IT folks at my office, but I am sure someone more knowledgeable will be along shortly.
[quote=“L. G. Butts, Ph.D., post:9, topic:670085”]
I think a good manager would not try to bust them, yet. I think the first step would be to tell them, informally, to knock it off /
[QUOTE]
This is my attitude, too. But if you want to be a real meany, how about putting a nanny cam on the wall above the computer?( I’ve seen lots of cameras about cash registers, for example.)You don’t even have to hook it up…just place it in a conspicuous location.
But after you do that…well, … if I worked for you, I wouldn’t want to stay for long…
by the way…why bother erasing the history? Doesn’t using “in private” mode accomplish the same thing, without drawing attention to the missing history?
[quote=“L. G. Butts, Ph.D., post:9, topic:670085”]
I think a good manager would not try to bust them, yet. I think the first step would be to tell them, informally, to knock it off /
the computer is, alas, a laptop, so they can simply move it around, out of sight of a prying camera. Also, i doubt the picture would be sharp enough to capture exactly what’s up on the screen, even if the camera were pointed at just the right angle over their shoulder.
Not sure about the “private” thing though - maybe they’re not savvy themselves, or just lazy
I’ve suggested to the manager that he simply tell staff they aren’t allowed to delete the history, and if he finds it’s still happening then someone’s going to get their ass handed to them. However I realise this is a poor solution at best. Not only does it not address the behaviour, it’d be very simple to circumvent that by deleting individual pages from the history (if using Chrome), or using the “private browsing feature”.
Can you set up Chrome, IE or Firefox to require a password? Seems a bit cumbersome to assign one to each staff member and require them each to log in and then assiduously log out again every time they want to check our Intranet system or check a price of a product on our website…
I don’t think I’ve ever worked in an office where each person didn’t have to have their own password and sign in and out regularly throughout the day.
My solution was going to be to take computer privileges away from the employees, so they could only sign in and check proper business emails once a day or something. At my last job, I needed the internet to do my job, and I still wasn’t given internet access. For retail workers, I’d just yank the computer.
OP, are there performance issues with stuff not getting done on time or not getting done to the expected quality?
One of the things that annoys me about a lot of companies is that they think in terms of work time, even if you are salaried. Even salaried employees aren’t really expected to “Accomplish X”, they are expected to “Work 40 hours” and what you get done isn’t nearly as important as the fact that you worked 40 hours. Imho, when you do that, you are treating your workers like hourly workers and not salaried professionals.
^Agree. As long as we get accomplished everything that needs done, I’m happy. My business is open every other Saturday. We used to have a paid lunch hour on those Saturdays. My employees suggested working through lunch, getting out and enjoying the weekend. It has worked out well.
And if anyone wants to update Facebook when all is quiet, I’m happy that they are comfortable doing it out in the open.