Introduction
In recent times, the advancement of technology has brought with it numerous changes to the manner in which business is transacted and the way people communicate. Several decades ago, any ordinary office had employees such as messengers and errand persons who would be employed for the sole purpose of taking information from one office to another and from one organization to the next. Operations largely depended on human effort to be completed and much of the work was done manually without the use of even the simplest machines that would make this work easier. However, with technology, many inventions have been made so as to aid in producing work that is more accurate and presentable. There are disadvantages that came along with these machines in that they are subject to monitoring since they can end up being misused if not used for the right reasons.
This paper will focus greatly on the use of workplace e-mails and to the extent to which they affect the privacy of the individual or employee who is mandated to use them. As much as employees need privacy, employers on the other hand are of the opinion that if not monitored, office equipment and facilities could end up being used for all the wrong purposes and hence leading the organization to incurring losses. Employees within any organization, just as any other human beings are entitled to a certain level of privacy at their places of work. This however goes as far as the organization or the employer is concerned and hence a clear distinction must be drawn between the private issues of the employee and those that are in connection to the organization that they work for.
Reasons for concern
Many employers focus on the effort made by the organization and its developers for it to get to the level at which it is currently. It is out of sacrifice and hard work that many organizations manage to stand firm and remain afloat despite the many challenges that face the business world especially when we put into consideration the harsh economic times being faced globally. As such, managers and business owners are never willing to risk all their efforts and sacrifices due to the incompetency of a few staff that may ruin all the work that has been done through the careless usage of facilities allocated to them for use in the workplace (Wallace, 174-175).
Communication and technological facilities are the most prone to this kind of misuse since they are readily at the disposal of almost all the staff within an organization. Facilities such as telephones, computers, fax machines and the internet are the most common casualties of these misappropriations and as such can lead an organization to suffering losses if not checked. The e-mail is one of the most sensitive facilities that one can have in the office since many organizations have resulted to the monitoring of the e-mails of employees in order to make a follow up of how it is used. Many employees however do not know that the e-mails could be a source of a row that could see them either fired or facing penalties from their employers depending on how they use them.
Although many countries across the world have made measures to protect employee’s rights from being infringed, the employees also need to understand that the law provides for a limited or an unlimited level of employee e-mail monitoring provided that the employer does so for a reason that is related to the organization. For example, an employer may want to follow up the billing procedure used by their internet service provider. As such, it would be impossible to make a clear determination of the billing system unless the employer monitors the individual computers or e-mail addresses that are used by the employees. This means that the employee has no right to deny the employer permission to inspect the computer or the e-mail (Quigley, 89-90).
Employers may also want to monitor the efficiency of individual employees and hence may result to making follow ups on the computers and e-mails that the employees use. This may be an effective way of determining which employees are utilizing the facilities as required and those who are misusing them. Employers have resulted to using various methods of monitoring their employees and these include the installation of closed circuit cameras within the offices, the use of software that allows employers to access information that employees accessed earlier, the use of micro-chips that are installed either within the office or on the employees themselves and the use of backups that store data as the employees work.
The law has tried to protect the employees to all lengths possible by ensuring that devices such as micro-chips and other such devices are not installed against the personal wishes of employees. It has been termed as infringement of the basic human rights that guarantee privacy for every human being and as such no search or monitoring can be done on either a person or their property without their consent. This has left many employers in a tight spot over what methods they should actually use to ensure that organizational resources are safeguarded against use that could have negative impacts on the organization (Steingold, 179-180). According to employers, some of the most closely guarded information is that directly related to trade and the trade secrets used by an organization, confidential letters and books as well as other documents whose disclosure to outsiders may lead the organization to suffer some form of loss. It was noted that some employees within organizations are directly used by rival organizations in order to reveal information that is considered vital to the organization’s success and this may be done for a fee or as just mere sabotage. As such, managers must constantly review the communication lines used by the employees in order to verify what information gets out of or into the organization.
Some employees also have the tendency of using organizational facilities for their own gains. In a case filed by a police officer who had been dismissed from service for example, it was established that he had been using the communication facilities allocated to him for duty for his own personal interests. As such, he was unable to sue for infringement of his privacy since it was established that his boss had just asked to check on how the officer had been using the facilities for official duty only to realize that the officer had been using them for other non-official purposes. Employees must therefore realize to what extent they can use facilities meant for organizational use so as to avoid instances of contravening the rules of the organization (Lane 107-108).
Employers may also be interested in monitoring the use of e-mails and other facilities in order to plan effectively and make better allocation of resources. This can be made possible through identifying areas in which employees may be facing difficulties while carrying out their duties. Through effective monitoring of e-mails, employers can identify weak points and hence take the necessary action that can help correct the situation before it gets out of control. As they do this, employers have the obligation to ensure that they do so in a manner that does not violate the privacy rights of employees as this may lead to the demoralization of employees once they feel that their weaknesses are known to the employers or other employees.
Another necessary precaution that employers must take is the use of the communication facilities in a manner that could be humiliating or discriminative towards some employees. In order to avoid liability for the misuse of facilities, employers or managers must take responsibility for the information sent within the organization such as threats, harassments and even discriminative messages. E-mails and text messages have been used to harass employees sexually or otherwise and even discriminate against some employees. Cartels formed within the organization may use coded language to discriminate or harass others and this may have repercussions on the organization or even on the employers if not checked. In one suit that had been filed by a group of four employees in an organization in the U.S, their attorney produced evidence in court of a middle manager trying to solicit for sexual favors in exchange for promotions within the organization. The manager had been sending explicit e-mails to each of the four complainants demanding sexual favors after which he would be able to have them pushed up the managerial ladder. After the four declined, the manager threatened to make allegations of sexual advancements on him by his accusers after which he would have them sacked. It was only after a close follow up of the e-mails sent between the manager and each of the four that the truth was discovered. The company was later forced to pay an amount of $2.2 million in damages to the four ladies. This serves as an example of the losses that organizations may suffer due to lack of a sound system that ensures that all communication within the organization is monitored. Had the e-mails been intercepted earlier by a senior manager, the company would have taken appropriate action and hence avoid paying the hefty fine (Nash & Samuel 148-150).
The monitoring of emails has not only caused damage to organizations but to employees as well. At times, it is possible to find that the technical nature with which computers are handled may be challenging for some employees. This has led to employees being caught on the wrong side of things even without their knowledge or intention. The computers may be difficult to handle especially for those employees who are not fully conversant with the various applications or programs that are used on the computer. This may lead to employees doing the wrong things without knowing and later on end up in trouble with the management for reasons they cannot understand or things they cannot explain (Wallace, 136-137).
At times, users of computers within the organization may opt to use different computers from those allocated to them for various reasons. Later on, they may be required to explain their activities on a particular computer and end up not knowing how to excuse them out of a difficult situation. Such common mistakes may lead to employees finding them in a tight spot unable to provide any information that can be helpful to the organization in efforts of pursuing the offenders in case a mistake is discovered within the organization. Employers must therefore have a sound system that can make a follow up of all the users of any computer or any other facilities within the organization so as to enhance liability.
The monitoring of e-mails has led to employees being suspected for wrongdoing and thereafter being treated unfairly on grounds of suspicions that had no foundation. In extreme cases, an employee’s reputation within the organization may suffer immensely to such an extent that they are no longer comfortable working within that same organization. Others have had their careers cut short or damaged due to the monitoring of information sent on e-mail and other media since no organization would be willing to hire employees who have been dismissed from other organizations on basis of misconduct. This was the case for one gentleman who had been fired from work on allegations of having engaged in some inappropriate communication via e-mail while on duty using the organizations e-mail address allocated to him. After a long court battle that nearly brought his career to an abrupt end, it was established that someone else had used the same computer allocated to him and thus he was reinstated to his former post. It is important therefore to have a system that can easily identify any users of facilities within the organization so as to avoid cases of misrepresentation and impersonation (Bidgoli, 138-139).
In order to maintain a monitoring system that is effective within an organization, it is important for both the employees and the employers to discuss the most important issues that are to be monitored as the employees work. This can go a long way in eliminating the instances of suits being filed by one party against the other. In some instances, employers have been noted to ask for too much details that are not even related to the work that is going to be done and this has a negative impact on the employees who may feel that they are been uncovered beyond the required standards. Information regarding ones sexuality, religion and other personal interests should be omitted while monitoring employees provided it does not affect the employee’s performance at work. Some activists also argue that in the case the case of monitoring conversations over the telephone or e-mail, the employer or manager should quit following the conversations the moment they realize that the conversation is of a private nature and does not involve the organization (Lane, 132-133).
This brings about the question of whether the employees should use organizational facilities such as the telephone and e-mails for personal use. While some organizations allow employees to receive calls or e-mails of a private nature while at work on their personal phones, others insist that any calls made from family or for private purposes during work hours must be made through the organizations facilities. This has been used by some employers as a means of spying on their employees and going to the extent of intruding into their personal affairs. According to the Fourth Amendment to the U.S Constitution, there is a guarantee for the people to be secure in their person’s, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures. This ensures that no U.S citizen can be subjected to unnecessary searches in the name of organizational interests. For workers however, this benefit has only been enjoyed by those working for the government since the government does not carry out searches and seizures on its employees. For those in the private sector on the other hand, things have been different since employers have their own different means of ensuring effectiveness in the workplace. While some employers monitors their employees to arrest cases of misappropriation of resources, others do so with the intention of keeping check of employees who are lazy while at work and those who spend more time doing nothing. Some organizations have installed systems that are so located as to automatically notify the manager whenever the employee gets out of their seat or even tries to access some website that is not related to the work being done within that organization. This makes sure that employees cannot misuse the internet or telephone lines and neither can they walk around the office aimlessly (Quigley, 93-94).
In an effort to relieve employees from such rules, several labor movements have pushed for the amendments in the provisions of national constitutions and even the laws that govern labor in different regions. Within the EU for example, Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights provides for the right to respect for private and family life. This means that no employee should be subjected to unfair treatment in the name of monitoring the job that they do as long as they are not comfortable with how the monitoring is done. Courts have also been called upon to interpret clauses that had remained contentious for long following the realization by employees that they actually have a right to refuse such monitoring that they feel could be infringing on their privacy. The most important thing at the moment is to ensure that all employees are fully aware of their rights so that none is molested or dehumanized in the name of ensuring that organizational property is safeguarded against misuse. Employees on the other hand have the responsibility to ensure that all organizational facilities or equipment in their care is utilized as purposed or directed by the organization so as to avoid conflicts that may arise later on grounds of misuse of resources (Nash & Samuel 139-140).
Outcomes
The cooperation between employees and their employers can be enhanced through the mutual understanding of the organization’s goals where the employees especially must understand that the organization exists due to an individual’s sacrifice and hard work and as such it would be necessary to safeguard the interests of the organization and this can only be achieved through respect for property and resources. Employers on the other hand must also allow employees to work within an environment that is conducive and one that does not make them feel dehumanized through constant and excessive monitoring to a point where they feel uncomfortable while working (Bidgoli, 150-151).
Conclusion
Although monitoring of employees may be important to ensure that they are efficient and they utilize the resources allocated correctly, it would be equally important to ensure that the monitoring does not get to extents where employees no longer view it as a means of ensuring efficiency but rather a sort of spying. This way, both parties can benefit from each other since there would be some ease between their interactions rather than the tension felt when employees know that their every move within the office is closely being monitored.
Works Cited
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Lane, Frederick S. The Naked Employee: How Technology Is Compromising Workplace Privacy. New York: AMACOM, 2003. Print.
Nash, Jonathan R, and Samuel Estreicher. Workplace Privacy: Proceedings of the New York University 58th Annual Conference on Labor. Austin [Tex.: Wolters Kluwer Law & Business, Kluwer Law International, 2010. Print.
Quigley, Marian. Ict Ethics and Security in the 21st Century: New Developments and Applications. Hershey, PA: Information Science Reference, 2011. Print.
Steingold, Fred. The Employer's Legal Handbook: Manage Your Employees & Workplace Effectively. Berkeley, Calif: Nolo, 2013. Print.
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