The impact of electronic monitoring on employees' job satisfaction, stress, performance, and counterproductive work behavior: A meta-analysis

Abstract

Organizations all around the world increasingly use electronic monitoring to collect information on employees’ working behavior. To investigate the effects of electronic monitoring on employees’ job satisfaction, stress, performance, and counterproductive work behavior (CWB), we collected data of 70 independent samples and 233 effect sizes for this meta-analysis. Results indicate that electronic monitoring slightly decreases job satisfaction, r = −0.10, and slightly increases stress, r = .11, supporting the notion that electronic monitoring negatively affects employees’ well-being and work attitudes. Moderator analyses suggest that performance targets and feedback may further exacerbate these negative effects on workers. Furthermore, maintaining and improving the performance of employees is an important justification of electronic monitoring. However, the current meta-analysis found no relationship between electronic monitoring and performance, r = −0.01, but a small positive relationship with CWB, r = 0.09. These results question the benefits of electronic monitoring for organizations. Thus, decision-makers in organizations should pay attention to what ends employees are monitored. Beyond that, the current meta-analysis shows that laboratory studies probably underestimate the relationship between monitoring and employees’ job satisfaction, stress, and performance in field studies. In addition, current research on the effects of electronic monitoring lacks the examination of processes why organizations implement electronic monitoring and how electronic monitoring and work design are related to each other.