Employee Monitoring Software

Or, in other words: more than 40% of work time is wasted. Let that sink in.

It’s an eye-watering figure for any company executive, founder or manager trying to run a productive and profitable business.

When you’re in charge of a team, it’s easy to feel powerless to do anything about wasted employee time. Because, the reality is, in the modern workplace it’s impossible to watch employees’ every click, scroll and tap.

Left unchecked and unmonitored, today’s digital working environments quickly turn into the Wild West. Endless hours are wasted on social media, timesheets are fudged, budgets get out of control, and “looking busy” and actually working look identical to the naked eye.Here’s where employee monitoring steps in.

Capable of monitoring almost 100% of employee activity, employee computer monitoring software delivers insights into exactly what your employees are up and how they use their time via clear, powerful data.

Sounds like a no-brainer, right?

But, before you buy and download monitoring software, there’s a lot you need to ask yourself, like…

‍What features do you need?
Do you need customization?
How much will it really cost?
How simple is it to install and use?
How will your employees react?

‍And that’s just the start…

Good thing for you, just by taking a few minutes to read on, you’ll have all the answers (and more!). It’s everything you need to make a smart decision about choosing the best employee monitoring software for your team.

First, it’s important to get your head around what the best PC monitoring software does - and what it doesn't do. Because there’s often some confusion. At times, both managers and employees think of it as nothing more than basic employee surveillance. But, as you’re about to see, it’s so much more than that.

With the best PC monitoring software, you’re able to identify unproductive workers, discover which apps, websites and software your team uses most, track every minute of time and attendance, and so much more. Best of all, a team monitoring software delivers this data as actionable insights and trends that you can use to constantly enhance team performance.

Imagine having an all-seeing, all-knowing manager on your team. You’ve just imagined modern work monitoring software.

We get it. In business, it all comes down to numbers, data and results. So, if you’re discussing computer tracking software with your team, or weighing it up in your own mind, you need data to make a smart, informed decision.
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Here’s just some of the data-backed results a worker tracking app like Insightful brings to in-office and remote teams...

With the flexibility of today’s computer monitoring software, teams from every industry imaginable rely on it as a way to conduct employee productivity monitoring...
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Millions of businesses track, analyze and optimize their daily work with employee PC monitoring software. But what exactly would it look like in your business? Here are three real-life examples of companies using Insightful that show how flexible, easy-to-use and effective workplace monitoring can be.

‍An International Architect Firm Saves 23% Time with Automated Employee MonitoringA large architect firm in Malaysia had an ongoing problem monitoring time and activity on projects. Being a team of 500+, this had a big impact on company-wide productivity and profitability. A better way to monitor work was needed. Enter Insightful.

At Insightful, we know architects, like engineering and construction companies, have a structured way of doing things. This includes the way they name the CAD files they use to design their projects. The architect firm was no different, using Building Information Modelling (BIM) files to create real estate designs.

Knowing this, the Insightful team configured an automated tracking and monitoring solution based on the company’s file naming methodology. Simply by knowing the naming convention of files, Insightful now tracks and monitors the work of hundreds of workers across the country - without them having to start a program, manually input activity or log time. It’s estimated this will save the company $3.24 million each year.

What’s more, given the sensitive nature of architect data, Insightful installed the tailored solution on the company’s own infrastructure, ensuring all data is securely kept on premise.

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Digital Agency Experiences More Profitable Client Work with Tracking SoftwareWhen you’re a digital agency in a sea of competition, how you bill – and get billed – time can define your success. It’s a financial juggling act of pricing projects, allocating time and paying – often freelance – workers.

Most agencies know the importance of getting billing right. One such agency turned to Insightful because of the software’s flexible functionality that allows monitor and time tracking on the project, campaign and client level.

With Insightful installed, the digital agency is now able to make sure they aren’t getting overcharged by freelancers; better calculate rates to charge clients to prevent going over budget; and optimize campaign time and resource allocation to maximize profitability.


Managing Large Call Center and BPO Teams with Monitoring SoftwareCall centers and business process outsourcing are the backbone of large-scale business. However, due to their size and often remote locations, it’s unrealistic to effectively manage hundreds – if not thousands – of employees. That’s why Insightful has become a popular choice of large call centers and BPO teams.

Take one call center for instance that installed Insightful. Like other similar companies, the nature of their workloads has uniform processes during working hours. The company integrated Insightful into these processes, seamlessly making it a part of standard operations.

Installed system-wide in the call center, Insightful monitors user activity of each team member as they provide support and service. By collecting, analyzing and structuring data from day-to-day processes, Insightful then delivers individual and team performance, productivity and activity reports. Even delivering customized reports for management so their team can provide better support, service and feedback to customers.

Like any business decision you make, it pays to really know the pros and cons of employee monitoring. There’s a lot to think about before you buy. You need to consider your goals, expectations and employee work. To help weigh things up and make the right decision, we’ve clearly broken down the pros and cons of employee monitoring software.

Pros of Employee MonitoringBusinesses of all sizes experience major benefits from the simple decision to install employee tracking software. Let’s take a look at just some of what you can expect.

Less Time Wasted
89% of employees admit wasting time during the workday. More plainly, if you’re a team of 100 employees, only 11 of them don’t waste time at work (or, more likely, don’t admit it).
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What’s more, these employee waste anywhere between 30 minutes and five hours a day. This all adds up for employers, who are stuck with a bill of more than $40b in wasted time every year.
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Using a staff monitoring tool like Insightful, you can plug the leaky hole of wasted time. With every action monitored and every minute tracked, employees are only paid for when they’re actually doing work.

Enhanced Productivity
Whether it’s browsing the internet, scrolling social media or checking personal email, there’s an endless number of non-work-related tasks that destroy productivity. In fact, it’s estimated non-work-related tasks cost companies $134b a year.
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Employee activity monitoring software answers the question how to increase productivity with real-time monitoring and insightful, up-to-the-minute charts that measure individual, team and organizational productivity.

Less Admin
Few things put a handbrake on productivity and performance like painstaking admin. It’s a plague that afflicts all businesses. Just how badly? 59% of managers say they spend more than three hours a day on admin.
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Every minute spent on admin, is a minute that could be better used elsewhere. Insightful removes all time and attendance admin with pinpoint accurate clock-ins and clock-outs via computer activity monitoring. More than that, Insightful employee tracking connects to payroll to calculate costs automatically - right down to taxes, currency and preferred payment method. It does this via simple functionality that tallies only hours of active work.
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Plus, with its unique Automatic Time Tracking feature, Insightful monitors project and task work based on file name. Say, for instance, you’re an architect or design firm, as soon as your employees open a CAD file, Insightful automatically monitors what they’re working on, calculates time and then bills it to the right client. No manual timesheets. No hitting stop and start on a timer. Pretty nifty, huh?

‍A More Engaged Team
Just 15% of employees claim they’re engaged at work. This is for a whole host of reasons, like working environment, allocated projects and lack of support, just to name a few. Without some way to know for sure, though, it’s all just random guesswork to figure out what makes your team tick.
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With the Insightful employees tracking app, productivity trends and reports provide a definitive answer to what keeps your team engaged.
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For instance, let’s say Greg from marketing claims he works best remotely three days per week. But you have your doubts. With Insightful’ productivity trend data, you can track Greg’s output based on his time and location of work, then make a clear decision about whether to keep Greg in the office, or give him the freedom of teleworking. This extends to the projects your employees work on, the apps and software they use, and the support they’re getting on the job.

‍Prioritizes Focus
‍Often, what an employee chooses to work on isn’t what’s most important to the business. And typically, it isn’t until after hours of misdirected work that a manager realizes time’s been put into the wrong task. By then, it’s too late.
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With real-time employee monitoring, misplaced focus gets picked up in an instant. All it takes is a glance at your real-time activity dashboard to see who’s working on what that very second. Then, to correct course, you can ping your team members to say, “The deadline for Project XYZ is tomorrow, stop what you’re doing on Project ABC…”

‍Clearer Direction
‍“If everyone is moving forward together, then success takes care of itself,” Henry Ford once said. But the larger your team gets, and the more remote or freelance workers you have, the harder it is to live up to Ford’s mantra.
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Even when your team is under one roof, getting everyone going in the same direction is a challenge - let alone for remote teams. If your head office is in Montreal, marketing team is in Miami and support team is in Manila, ensuring everyone’s going in a unified direction is like juggling blindfolded.
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Remote employee monitoring is like a directional beacon that can guide your whole team - no matter how far apart you are. By calling on the real-time dashboard of Insightful, you can instantly see what every team member is working on, identify bottlenecks, and align employee focus.
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Cons of Computer Monitoring SoftwareFor any manager or leader, the advantages of employees monitoring software are clear. But there are some potential downsides. Here’s what to consider - and how to deal with them.

‍Impact on Team Culture
‍According to Deloitte, 94% of executives say team culture is critical to success. There’s no doubting that. And, as leaders know, culture is a delicate ecosystem that takes years to build.
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It’s easy to fear that even the mention of employee monitoring might negatively impact team culture and morale. But, positioned correctly, computer monitoring software can in fact bolster team culture by identifying top performers and workers dragging the team down.

Perceived Lack of Privacy
Concerns about workplace privacy and employee monitoring are not uncommon. Employees often worry that every detail of their private daily lives will be exposed to management. With a proper explanation of what exactly is being monitored and how the data is used, these privacy concerns can be quickly allayed.

‍Elevated Stress Levels
You know what it can be like when someone is standing over your shoulder watching you work. It’s easy to become a little stressed, flustered and the work just doesn’t flow. Now, some employees will get this feeling just knowing that cloud based employee monitoring is installed in your workplace. Transparency is one way around this. There’s also Stealth Mode functionality that monitors discreetly, which is one of Insightful’ many unique features.
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Perceived Lack of trust
‍We get it. Even asking someone what they’re working on can give the perception of lack of trust. So, things like monitoring employee email or screenshots can trigger alarm bells that you consider an employee untrustworthy. Explaining it’s all to do with productivity, not trust, is the starting point for handling this type of concern when you start using a computer monitoring software.

‍Legal Ramifications
‍Monitoring laws vary across the world. Places like California have some of the strictest laws around employee surveillance, which can expose an employer to litigation. Whether you’re in The Golden State, or elsewhere, it’s absolutely vital to know the legal landscape around employee monitoring. Typically, you’re well within your rights to keep monitor what your employees are up to. But it pays to be sure.

So, if you make the smart decision to install employee computer monitoring software. Before you buy, you need to answer five questions about which employee tracking solution is best for you:

Need a little help answering these? Then read on….

Monitoring goals differ from company to company - even between internal teams. For instance, a large tech enterprise could be looking to stop the Dev team wasting hours on Facebook and Reddit. While an advertising agency might want to use a computer monitoring software to reign in client hours going to the wrong project or being missed altogether. Or, you could simply be looking to enhance your team’s productivity by understanding work patterns and trends while monitoring computers.
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Whatever they are, make sure you’re clear on your goals. To help, here a the most common goals companies have when choosing to install a worker tracking app:

Remote and freelance workers are becoming increasingly common. If, like most modern workplaces, you’re leading the charge of this new way of working, monitoring remote employees will be important to you.
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Monitoring is less of a challenge in an office, where your IT team can visit every desk and access every computer. But, when your employees are thousands of miles away, making sure they’re working and not watching Netflix or doing housework is a challenge. So, you need a dedicated virtual employee monitoring software, like Insightful.

If all you need is off-the-shelf, basic activity and computer monitoring, there are plenty of options out there. On the other hand, you might be looking for a highly customizable solution for monitoring computer activities with advanced features, like Insightful.
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Now, often customization comes with a price. So, be sure to factor that into your thinking when you compare side by side. Like with any top employee monitoring software, it’s always smart to start with a free trial.

The costs involved in employees monitoring software are more than just how affordable it is. There’s setup time, training, hardware, installation requirements and ongoing support to think about. Here’s what to include in your calculations…

Pricing Model – Employee monitoring licenses usually fall into two categories. One, large lump sum tiered pricing which leaves smaller companies paying for way more than they actually need. Or, two, ‘per user’ pricing which, if you’re a large enterprise, can quickly go through the roof. Insightful starts at just $6 per user and offers a discount at scale to large enterprises and fast-growing companies.

Hardware & Installation – Does is it require the installation of complex hardware on site? If it does, this will come with a financial, space and time cost. Plus, often to employees tracking software needs to be installed individually on every single device or takes a team of IT experts, which your company may not have. This doesn’t have to be the case though. Insightful offers one-step system-wide installation that even teams without a single IT person can quickly and easily setup.

Training – Your monitoring software shouldn’t be so complicated it takes days (or weeks!) of training just to get your head around it. If it does, this slow learning curve and difficulty-of-use will cost your team time and money.

‍Integrations – How friendly will your monitoring software play with the other software in your tech toolkit? If they don’t integrate and aren’t compatible, you risk data leaks, slow system performance and may even need to buy a whole new suite of apps to connect your workflow.

Data Delays – How long does it take for your monitored data to arrive? If employees are working on the wrong task, allocating time to the wrong client or browsing websites they shouldn’t but you don’t find out until hours or days later, this data loses much of its value and utility. Always look for real-time monitoring, which ensures no data delays.

‍System Performance – Installing employee tracking software shouldn’t make your system feel like you’re driving with the handbrake on. Opt for a lightweight, small footprint worker tracking app that doesn’t clog system performance – a free trial will help you check.

It’s not just initial costs you need to consider. Be future-focused when choosing your screen monitoring software. It’s got to become a seamless part of your team today, and grow with you tomorrow. Just like a model employee, really.

‍Data Storage – Once all that data starts getting collected, how’s it stored, processed and secured? Before you install a software for monitoring computer activities, find out what servers are used, data limits and processing volumes. There’s nothing worse than finding out you reached your data limit down the track and you’re up for a huge bill or, worse still, your data hasn’t been stored! Also, look for the options of secure cloud or on-premises data storage for convenience, security and capacity.

‍Scalability – You’ve got big plans to grow, no doubt. Will your work tracker grow with you? It needs to be able to handle spikes in activity, high volumes and more users. And, as your data builds, your software should be able to rapidly store, process and analyze it.

‍Support – Once you’re all setup, what kind of support will you get? A 1800 number with a crackling line to a call center on the other side of the country? Stock answers from a customer service handbook? Nothing at all? Choose a team that’ll provide 24/7 support.

‍Customization – What your team looks like today won’t be the same as in months or years. Maybe you’ll add a new division, build out your remote team or take on different projects. However you change, the best system monitoring software needs to be customizable to fit your needs. There’s no one-size-fits all for monitoring, so the ability to customize has a long-term impact on your team.

For leaders, employers and managers, the decision to install employees monitoring software is pretty plain to see. And, after all, it’s your call to install it. But, this doesn’t mean you should go it all alone. It’s important to get your team involved and informed from the outset.

Be Transparent

Like anything introduced to your team, it’s best to be transparent with your communication around it. When you decide to install a monitoring software for employees, start by clearly communicating your plan to use it to improve performance. Researchers Bartels and Nordstrom, found that when a monitoring system is clearly explained and directly linked to rewards or consequences it is highly effective.

Talk About the Benefits (To Them)

‍Sure, as the boss or owner, you know what you’ll get out of screen monitoring software. But, for wary employees, it might not be so clear. There’s a simple answer to this: show them how it’ll benefit them. For instance, the hundreds of thousands of employees monitored companies using Insightful experience.

Make them a Part of the Process

‍Bring them into the tent early and team buy-in will surge. This starts with asking key team members to help make a decision about which worker tracking app to buy. Gather the minds to help you make the buying decision, for instance if you’re deciding between Insightful vs ActivTrak, Insightful vs Hubstaff, Insightful vs Time Doctor, or Insightful vs Teramind.

With your leaders on board from the outset, getting the rest of the team behind it becomes easier. It’ll still take some savvy communicating on your part though, including:

Have a Policy
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Yes, we know. Another workplace policy is the last thing you need - and employees want to read. But, unlike the one for how to stack the office dishwasher, having one for employee monitoring and employee privacy is a must-do. Makes sure it’s in clear language that doesn’t take a Harvard Law graduate to understand. Once it’s drafted, it can be easily inserted into your team’s onboarding process.

By now, you know the productivity, performance and saving benefits of employee monitoring software, like Insightful. As monitoring technology has evolved, it’s become simple to install, use and customize. Even so, the decision to start monitoring employees in the workplace depends on your team’s structure, goals and what priority you put on productivity and performance.
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This guide will help you make a clear decision about employee monitoring tools. Still, the only way to really buy the best computer monitoring software for your team, is to trial it first. That’s why at Insightful, we invite you to try a free 7-day trial. Install Insightful on every device, monitor every activity, try every feature… then, make the smart decision about whether it’s right for you.

To claim your free Insightful trial, click here.
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Need a little extra help? Book a free 1-on-1 demo here.