If you work, do you think you have a right to privacy at your job? What can your employer find out about you and your work? You might be surprised at the answers! Employers can (and do), among other things, read your e-mail (even those marked “personal or confidential”), tap your telephone, monitor your work by computer, store and review computer files, monitor you in an employee bathroom or dressing room, and track your whereabouts in a company vehicle. And these actions aren’t that uncommon. In fact, some 30 percent of companies have fired workers for misusing the Internet and another 28 percent have terminated workers for e-mail misuse.32

Why do managers feel they need to monitor what employees are doing? A big reason is that employees are hired to work, not to surf the Web checking stock prices, watching online videos, playing fantasy baseball, or shopping for presents for family or friends. Recreational on-the-job Web surfing is thought to cost billions of dollars in lost work productivity annually. In fact, a survey of U.S. employers said that 87 percent of employees look at non-work-related websites while at work, and more than half engage in personal website surfing every day.33 Watching online video has become an increasingly serious problem not only because of the time being wasted by employees, but also because it clogs already-strained corporate computer networks.34 If you had to guess the video site viewed most often at work, what would you guess? If you said YouTube, you’d be absolutely correct!35 However, as innocent as it may seem (after all, it may be just a 30-second video), all this nonwork adds up to significant costs to businesses.

Another reason that managers monitor employee e-mail and computer usage is that they don’t want to risk being sued for creating a hostile workplace environment because of offensive messages or an inappropriate image displayed on a coworker’s computer screen. Concerns about racial or sexual harassment are one reason companies might want to monitor or keep backup copies of all e-mail. Electronic records can help establish what actually happened so managers can react quickly.36

Finally, managers want to ensure that company secrets aren’t being leaked.37 In addition to typical e-mail and computer usage, companies are monitoring instant messaging, blogs, and other social media outlets and are banning phone cameras in the office. Managers need to be certain that employees are not, even inadvertently, passing information on to others who could use that information to harm the company.

Because of the potentially serious costs and given the fact that many jobs now entail computers, many companies have workplace monitoring policies. Such policies should control employee behavior in a nondemeaning way, and employees should be informed about those policies.

Would you be surprised to find that up to 85 percent of all organizational theft and fraud is committed by employees, not outsiders?38 And it’s a costly problem—estimated to be about $4,500 per worker per year.39 In a survey of U.S. companies, 20 percent said that workplace theft has become a moderate to very big problem.40

Employee theft is defined as any unauthorized taking of company property by employees for their personal use.41 It can range from embezzlement to fraudulent filing of expense reports to removing equipment, parts, software, or office supplies from company premises. Although retail businesses have long faced serious potential losses from employee theft, loose financial controls at startups and small companies and the ready availability of information technology have made employee stealing an escalating problem in all kinds and sizes of organizations. It’s a control issue that managers need to educate themselves about and be prepared to deal with it.42

Why do employees steal? The answer depends on whom you ask.44 Experts in various fields—industrial security, criminology, clinical psychology—have different perspectives. The industrial security people propose that people steal because the opportunity presents itself through lax controls and favorable circumstances. Criminologists say that it’s because people have financial-based pressures (such as personal financial problems) or vice-based pressures (such as gambling debts). And the clinical psychologists suggest that people steal because they can rationalize whatever they’re doing as being correct and appropriate behavior (“everyone does it,” “they had it coming,” “this company makes enough money and they’ll never miss anything this small,” “I deserve this for all that I put up with,” and so forth).45 Although each approach provides compelling insights into employee theft and has been instrumental in attempts to deter it, unfortunately, employees continue to steal. What can managers do?

The concept of feedforward, concurrent, and feedback control is useful for identifying measures to deter or reduce employee theft.46 Exhibit 15–7 summarizes several possible managerial actions.

Exhibit 15–7

Controlling Employee Theft

In January 2015, a cardiologist at Boston’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital was gunned down by a man whose mother had been operated on by the doctor and subsequently died. After killing the cardiologist, the man shot himself. In September 2014, a man who was recently fired walked into the UPS he had worked at and killed two individuals and then took his own life. In April 2014, an individual who worked as a baggage handler opened fire at a FedEx facility near Atlanta, injuring six employees. In August 2010, a driver about to lose his job at Hartford Distributors in Hartford, Connecticut, opened fire, killing eight other employees and himself. In July 2010, a former employee at a solar products manufacturer in Albuquerque, New Mexico, walked into the business and opened fire, killing two people and wounding four others. On November 6, 2009, in Orlando, Florida, an engineer who had been dismissed from his job for poor performance returned and shot and killed one person while wounding five others. This incident happened only one day after a U.S. Army psychiatrist went on a shooting rampage at Fort Hood Army post, killing 13 and wounding 27.47 These are just a few of the deadly workplace attacks in recent years. Is workplace violence really an issue for managers? Yes. Despite these examples, thankfully, the number of workplace shootings has decreased.48 However, the U.S. National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health still says that each year, some 2 million American workers are victims of some form of workplace violence. In an average week, one employee is killed and at least 25 are seriously injured in violent assaults by current or former coworkers. And according to a Department of Labor survey, 58 percent of firms reported that managers received verbal threats from workers.49 Anger, rage, and violence in the workplace are intimidating to coworkers and adversely affect their productivity. The annual cost to U.S. businesses is estimated to be between $20 billion and $35 billion.50 And office rage isn’t a uniquely American problem. A survey of aggressive behavior in Britain’s workplaces found that 18 percent of managers say they have personally experienced harassment or verbal bullying, and 9 percent claim to have experienced physical attacks.51

What factors are believed to contribute to workplace violence? Undoubtedly, employee stress caused by job uncertainties, declining value of retirement accounts, long hours, information overload, other daily interruptions, unrealistic deadlines, and uncaring managers play a role. Even office layout designs with small cubicles where employees work amid the noise and commotion from those around them have been cited as contributing to the problem.52 Other experts have described dangerously dysfunctional work environments characterized by the following as primary contributors to the problem:53

• Employee work driven by TNC (time, numbers, and crises)

• Rapid and unpredictable change where instability and uncertainty plague employees

• Destructive communication style where managers communicate in excessively aggressive, condescending, explosive, or passive-aggressive styles; excessive workplace teasing or scapegoating

• Authoritarian leadership with a rigid, militaristic mind-set of managers versus employees; employees not allowed to challenge ideas, participate in decision making, or engage in team-building efforts

• Defensive attitude with little or no performance feedback given; only numbers count; and yelling, intimidation, or avoidance as the preferred ways of handling conflict

• Double standards in terms of policies, procedures, and training opportunities for managers and employees

• Unresolved grievances due to an absence of mechanisms or only adversarial ones in place for resolving them; dysfunctional individuals protected or ignored because of long-standing rules, union contract provisions, or reluctance to take care of problems

• Emotionally troubled employees and no attempt by managers to get help for these people

• Repetitive, boring work and little chance for doing something else or for new people coming in

• Faulty or unsafe equipment or deficient training, which keeps employees from being able to work efficiently or effectively

• Hazardous work environment in terms of temperature, air quality, repetitive motions, overcrowded spaces, noise levels, excessive overtime, and so forth; to minimize costs, a failure to hire additional employees when workload becomes excessive, leading to potentially dangerous work expectations and conditions

• Culture of violence perpetuated by a history of individual violence or abuse, violent or explosive role models, or tolerance of on-the-job alcohol or drug abuse

Reading through this list, you surely hope that workplaces where you’ll spend your professional life won’t be like this. However, the competitive demands of succeeding in a 24/7 global economy put pressure on organizations and employees in many ways.

What can managers do to deter or reduce possible workplace violence? Once again, the concept of feedforward, concurrent, and feedback control can help identify actions that managers can take.54 Exhibit 15–8 summarizes several suggestions.