USA 
United Kingdom
Recent months have seen a swathe of big-name employers call staff back to the office full-time.
Amazon’s five-day return-to-office (RTO) mandate made major waves as employees hit back at the policy; other tech giants like Dell and Salesforce similarly ditched previous remote or hybrid-friendly policies; and those adept at reading between the lines of corporate-speak would say that while Google and Microsoft leaders reassured workers there were no plans to ditch their hybrid model, they gave themselves a healthy amount of wiggle room by including vague caveats of continued productivity for remote staff.
True, many employers remain more committed than ever to remote working, citing the importance of flexibility and trust in a productive and engaging work environment. But while the headline-hitting RTO mandates may feel like a drop in the ocean, research shows they could be indicative of – or even contributing to – a change in hybrid heart in American CEOs.
A KPMG survey recently revealed that 79% of US corporate CEOs predict office-based work will fully return within three years. Moreover, this number has more than doubled in less than a year, jumping from 34% earlier in 2024.
Regardless of your stance on RTO mandates, this change in momentum has implications for HR technology and how employee behavior and productivity is monitored.
How are RTO mandates impacting monitoring technology?
As remote work exploded (by necessity) in 2020 and the years following, so did the monitoring of employee behavior. Owl Labs’ State of Hybrid Work 2023 report found that 66% of respondents said they were in the office full-time. However, with only 22% of surveyed employees “wanting” to be in the office, 58% of respondents admitted to ‘coffee badging.’
With this trend came the growing use of technology-enabled monitoring to crack down on the issue. The data shows it’s working. Owl Labs’ 2024 report found that employees admitting coffee badging dropped to 44%, and 70% admitted they had been caught by their employer.
“The number of employees coffee badging dipped by 24%, due in part to more company-wide RTO mandates being put into place,” Owl Labs CEO Frank Weishaupt tells HR Grapevine.
Although the same survey found that in-office work has not increased since 2023, with increasing executive plans for calling staff back to the office, it’s worth considering how full-time in-office work may impact employee monitoring.
Whether or not employees are no continuing to work from home, is it still necessary to track badge scans or other types of ‘check-in’ data? Should monitoring instead focus on how employees spend their time in the office? Or will employers ditch surveillance in favor of monitoring that can deliver meaningful insights on productivity improvements?
Employees and some HR professionals may hope for the latter, but the research suggests this not yet taking shape. “Nearly half of employees (46%) said their employers added or increased the use of employee tracking software to gather data about various activities in the past year,” Weishaupt notes.
For the time being, at least, the monitoring software industry lives to fight another day. However, employee monitoring will continue to be met with resistance by employees, and HR teams should consider this when rolling out such technology whether used to surveil in-office or remote working activity.
Trust versus monitoring: Finding the right balance for productivity gains
With such obvious resistance to employee monitoring, many HR professionals are pushing for their organization to explore alternative technologies to reach the holy grail of productivity gains.
Holly Grogan, Chief Experience Officer at Appspace, is one such leader. “For us and many of our Fortune 500 customers, HR technology is not about tracking every move—it’s about empowering employees with tools that keep them connected and informed, whether in the office, on the frontlines, or working from home,” she explains. “So, the focus isn’t about increasing surveillance, but rather increasing access to the right information and support they need to remain productive.”
'Happy Amazon Employee' | SNL sketch nails Amazon over worker wellbeing
This productivity conundrum is one facing employers across the US. The temptation for many employers when tasked with improving productivity or efficiency is to rely on control, as evidenced by the high-profile RTO mandates – or caveated promises for hybrid work – that reference productivity.
Many HR professionals like Grogan argue that employers should resist this urge and instead place a greater demand on different types of HR software.
“While it may be tempting for business leaders to rely on these surveillance tools to measure employee productivity, they are often imprecise indicators and a trust breaker,” argues Amy Zebrowski, Senior HR Director at Wrike. “What’s more, RTO mandates aren’t always the answer to improving workplace efficiency and productivity.”
The future of HR tech: Workflow management over employee monitoring?
Instead of RTO mandates or invasive employee monitoring technology, Zebrowski suggests employers should instead map workflows using management software applications to give greater visibility over processes and identify where bottlenecks or efficiency issues lie.
“Teams need a single source of truth to work productively. It’s important that organizations are investing in visibility and workflow tools to remedy less impactful work,” she adds.
Grogan also believes that employers should focus on HR technology that can do more than simply “monitor who is working,” indicating that some employers may place a greater emphasis on technology that promotes productivity through communication or shared knowledge rather than check-ins. “If we’re just using technology to see if people are sitting at their desks, we’re missing the point,” she concludes.
Of course, many employers will continue to rely on employee monitoring technology. Where control is preferred over trust – either by influential stakeholders and leaders or HR professionals themselves – coffee-badging tools and beyond will not disappear any time soon.
In those cases, employers should emphasize disclosure and communication about any employee monitoring technology in use. “86% of employees agreed that it should be a legal requirement for employers to disclose if they are using these tools,” says Weishaupt. “Otherwise, it breaks down the trust barrier and employees feel like they are being watched. The trust an employee has with their supervisor or employer is critical and impacts productivity as well as their wellbeing."
