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How did tracking your employees' attendance become controversial? Am I the only one here who ever punched a time clock?

tantalor 3y ago
Time tracking is highly unusual for full-time employees. It's only needed if you are paid by the hour. Time tracking for pay has nothing to do with "tracking attendance".
- gmd63 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - johnbellone 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - ryandrake 3y ago
      Assuming the employee is performing his duties and producing the expected output, and not sharing confidential company info, then how is this a problem? CEOs lead multiple companies, and often sit on the boards of other companies, and it's OK. Retail workers can work two or three jobs to hustle and make more money and that's admirable, but somehow when a white collar office worker manages to do it successfully, it's a huge problem?
      - johnbellone 3y ago
        In my cases, the employees weren't performing the expected output, which is what led to the discovery that they were working multiple jobs. Retail workers aren't working multiple jobs at the same time. In general, it is a straightforward transactional relationship with hours worked. That's not the case with a salaried job.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- ryandrake 3y ago
  Anecdotal, but I've found from multiple jobs that the quality of the working environment seems to be inversely proportional to how strictly time is tracked. I worked for a tech company that had us clocking in and out (even for restroom breaks) like fast food workers, and by coincidence it was by far the worst job I've ever had.
  - buffington 3y ago
    I've also seen this. I think when a company trusts its employees to get the job done, a few really good things happen. High performers (where "performance" is directly tied to revenue, or goal completion, or actual metrics and not "ass-in-chair" fluff) produce quality work quickly. Middle performers do fine. Terrible performers, if you have any, stick out - instead of having a hard conversation with them about how many hours they put in, you can have a hard conversation with them about how they need to improve. What I think is fascinating is how frequently, when working in an environment that gives someone room to be creative, or less stressed, or even given more responsibilities, middle performers often become high level performers. I'm sure there are lots of reasons as to why, but I've seen it happen a lot. I suspect that when you trust someone to do what they're good at, they have room to get even better at it. At least that's been my experience. I have also seen insanely pedantic levels of tracking and reporting and dogma at companies, and those are miserable places. High performers leave. Everyone else spends their time figuring out how to juice their numbers and play within the system so they look like high performers. Tracking everything builds a new, unspoken system that, when you're in it, becomes your first concern above all else, and even pits you against your coworkers.
- NikkiA 3y ago
  It's often done as a security measure too. I've worked 3 professional jobs where I was salaried and still had to check-in/out, one was due to the security need to know exactly who was in the building at any one time, the other two were overzealous micromanagers.
TrackerFF 3y ago
Depends to what degree. Punching in and out? Seems completely reasonable to me. Tracking anything more than that, seems pretty invasive. In the dystopian future employers will track every second of your movement, and see what you've been doing. Not typing enough? And they dock ya! Visiting the toilet too often? And they dock ya! Moving away from your desk too often? And they dock ya! Eyes deviating from your screen too often? AND THEY DOCK YA!
- NikkiA 3y ago
  Be easier to do that with facial recognition watching the office CCTV feeds, tbh, far less visible to the workers too.

Time tracking is highly unusual for full-time employees. It's only needed if you are paid by the hour. Time tracking for pay has nothing to do with "tracking attendance".

gmd63 3y ago
[flagged]
- johnbellone 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - ryandrake 3y ago
    Assuming the employee is performing his duties and producing the expected output, and not sharing confidential company info, then how is this a problem? CEOs lead multiple companies, and often sit on the boards of other companies, and it's OK. Retail workers can work two or three jobs to hustle and make more money and that's admirable, but somehow when a white collar office worker manages to do it successfully, it's a huge problem?
    - johnbellone 3y ago
      In my cases, the employees weren't performing the expected output, which is what led to the discovery that they were working multiple jobs. Retail workers aren't working multiple jobs at the same time. In general, it is a straightforward transactional relationship with hours worked. That's not the case with a salaried job.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
ryandrake 3y ago
Anecdotal, but I've found from multiple jobs that the quality of the working environment seems to be inversely proportional to how strictly time is tracked. I worked for a tech company that had us clocking in and out (even for restroom breaks) like fast food workers, and by coincidence it was by far the worst job I've ever had.
- buffington 3y ago
  I've also seen this. I think when a company trusts its employees to get the job done, a few really good things happen. High performers (where "performance" is directly tied to revenue, or goal completion, or actual metrics and not "ass-in-chair" fluff) produce quality work quickly. Middle performers do fine. Terrible performers, if you have any, stick out - instead of having a hard conversation with them about how many hours they put in, you can have a hard conversation with them about how they need to improve. What I think is fascinating is how frequently, when working in an environment that gives someone room to be creative, or less stressed, or even given more responsibilities, middle performers often become high level performers. I'm sure there are lots of reasons as to why, but I've seen it happen a lot. I suspect that when you trust someone to do what they're good at, they have room to get even better at it. At least that's been my experience. I have also seen insanely pedantic levels of tracking and reporting and dogma at companies, and those are miserable places. High performers leave. Everyone else spends their time figuring out how to juice their numbers and play within the system so they look like high performers. Tracking everything builds a new, unspoken system that, when you're in it, becomes your first concern above all else, and even pits you against your coworkers.
NikkiA 3y ago
It's often done as a security measure too. I've worked 3 professional jobs where I was salaried and still had to check-in/out, one was due to the security need to know exactly who was in the building at any one time, the other two were overzealous micromanagers.

TrackerFF 3y ago

Depends to what degree. Punching in and out? Seems completely reasonable to me. Tracking anything more than that, seems pretty invasive. In the dystopian future employers will track every second of your movement, and see what you've been doing. Not typing enough? And they dock ya! Visiting the toilet too often? And they dock ya! Moving away from your desk too often? And they dock ya! Eyes deviating from your screen too often? AND THEY DOCK YA!

NikkiA 3y ago
Be easier to do that with facial recognition watching the office CCTV feeds, tbh, far less visible to the workers too.