How should organizations monitor employee productivity for an increasingly remote workforce?

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Fractional CIO in Services (non-Government)5 years ago

It will depend on the kind of work they do for you.

If they're in an area of the business where throughput is obvious (call centre, payroll, ticket management) then productivity measures remain easy and visible.

But for knowledge workers, Those whose work is intangible anyway, how did you measure productivity before - was it simply presenteeism?

CIO in Services (non-Government)5 years ago

Manage your employees.  Monitor your metrics.
To manage:  Have conversations and other forms of communication, both synchronous and asynchronous communication. Check in only as often as makes sense for their role, the project, and their work-style. 
To measure: Make sure your KPIs are in place and measured. Hold people accountable, but if you trust people and the metrics still aren't satisfied, it's the metrics that are wrong, not the employee. Ask them why. Ask them what targets make sense. Or even ask them which measurements should be thrown out.

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CIO in Education5 years ago

Outcomes, same as on-prem. We assume our employees are professionals and don’t require any more monitoring than that.

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Group IT Manager in Travel and Hospitality5 years ago

There are several well written responses by people more experienced than me so

My two bits are my opinion on how i see and operate my team:

Give maximum freedom. Only question on deliverables and timelines. Productivity should only be evaluated by final outcomes and not by number of hours on clock.

Clearly defined deliverables and the corresponding timelines should be communicated first.

As long as they are getting the job done on time and as required; let them be in control of how and when they do it. You will have a happy team!
Thanks.

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Board Member in Healthcare and Biotech5 years ago

Employee productivity is based on results and outcomes (new but not so often used old measures) rather than activity (old measure of busy and productive). And that is a shift that Managers and Enterprises need to make in the new paradigm.

When people were physically present at workplace, what were Managers achieving in their monitoring ? A person spending 11 hours at work with low productivity was deemed a better employee versus someone who was visible at the workplace for 8 hours (exceptions existed then and they continue even now).

So Organizations need to collaboratively define the measures which will indeed allow for measurement of productivity. Not difficult but requires a significant change in mindset

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