Thinking about a employee monitoring program?

Shel Holtz doesn’t think it’s a good idea:

Tech Republic offers up an article on issues to consider when launching an employee monitoring program. The article starts out with a list of reasons to monitor, including ensuring employees aren’t abusing communication systems, limiting employer liability for employee misconduct, and assessing productivity. Most of the article is a guide to sidestepping issues that might arise in the development of such a program.

Wouldn’t it be nice, if one of these articles—and there have been hundreds, perhaps thousands, of them—also included reasons for not implementing employee monitoring programs in the first place?

Word to the wise, I used to work for a labor union. They had a saying, the union doesn’t organize the workers, the company does. An employee monitoring program is what union organizers call a dignity issue, the kind of issue that moves workers to action.