Control over the Work of Employees: Types and Errors
Any manager wants to work in the company on time, employees make fewer mistakes and all resources are used optimally. This can not be achieved without competent control over the work of staff. The question is how to implement this system correctly?
The work of the personnel is monitored through various means and techniques. In general, it can be divided into internal and external impact. The external impact further stimulates the work of personnel through difficult tasks, helping to avoid manipulation by the staff and showing the relationship between the employee’s achievements and his remuneration. But it is worth considering that with external control over the work of the staff, the subordinates will strive to improve the final indicators, but not the optimization of the process itself. They will perform, if possible, only what will bring them a concrete benefit, while keeping silent about the mistakes made in the course of the task.
It is for this reason that internal control over the work of staff is considered more effective. In this case, each employee has his own specific goals, errors are identified in the course of the tasks, but when they are detected, radical measures (dismissals, salary cuts, etc.) are not applied, rather the process is corrected, and the quality of the work is taken into account. Such control over the work of the staff is gentle, but no less effective: employees begin to orient themselves towards the common goal and specifically their own, it is no longer sensible to withhold information about misses and mistakes in work. However, mistakes can not be ruled out: the manager may lose the possibility of operational control, and the employee begins to follow only his own interests, forgetting or ignoring the general.
Internal control over the work of staff can be accomplished via employee time tracking system. It shows the productiveness of each employee, providing the manager with the needed information – what websites the employee visits during working hours, how much time he spends on personal activities, how focused he is on work, etc.
The main mistakes in the control of the work of staff:
1. Control is carried out sporadically: from case to case, which, of course, leads to disorientation of employees, and this contributes to the appearance of more errors.
2. Total control over the work of personnel, which does not allow employees to make even a step freely, of course, will kill any independence and initiative. When the manager is observing the results from employee time tracking system, he should not control the work of the employee too much.
3. Hidden control in some cases is prohibited by law, but in any case harms the relationship in the company: it degrades both employees and the employer. When using employee time tracking program the employer must inform the employee about the use of this software.
4. Particularly close monitoring of the work of employees of one particular department. This is extremely demotivating the selected observation site and undermining the basis for interaction between subordinates and the leader.
5. Imaginary or conditional control, when the manager is deliberately lazy or afraid to control his subordinates, so as not to lose their location or spoil their personal relations with employees.
6. Control, the reason for which was distrust of the team, would worsen the psychological climate and aggravate the situation even more.
7. When there is no feedback in the control of the work of the staff, it is difficult to understand its effectiveness, to evaluate it and to find possible ways to improve control.
8. Surface control over the work of staff will never give a full picture of what is happening and will not bring appreciable benefits.
9. Disorienting control introduces the employee into a state of ambiguity, bias and significantly worsens his productivity index.
Monitoring the work of the staff has never been a simple task, but one thing is clear: the ways to make it really useful for the company, for employees, and for the head are many, it is only necessary to approach this issue consciously and solve it competently.
Author SlavyanaPosted on Categories Productivity, Project management, Time management & Time Tracking, Work Process