Microsoft highlights 'productivity paranoia' in remote work research
- Reference: 1663939812
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2022/09/23/microsoft_highlights_productivity_paranoia/
- Source link:
This trend was highlighted in research by Microsoft, a company that found itself and the [1]Productivity Score feature in the Microsoft 365 Admin Center under the spotlight in 2020 when privacy campaigners decried the tool’s ability to track individual-level employee data via metrics such as meeting, emails, etc.
Microsoft also drew the ire of a [2]UK union that was most upset at workplace monitoring systems being increasingly used during the pandemic.
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According to the research, "Bridging the employer-employee disconnect", some 85 percent of biz leaders say they have a "hard time knowing for sure that their people are being productive." Yet whether working remotely or in a hybrid way, 87 of staffers say their corporate yield was just fine.
[4]
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Not perturbed by the flack the company has come in for for helping company bosses surveil their workforce, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said concerns about work rate was causing company bosses to have "productivity paranoia."
"Leaders think their employees are not productive, whereas employees think they are being productive and in many cases even feel burnout," he told Bloomberg. "One of the most important things for us in this new world of work and hybrid work is to bridge this paradox."
[6]
Microsoft won't build that bridge via Productivity Score, the creepy sounding tech was [7]wound back at the end of 2020 following the privacy backlash . "We've heard the feedback," corporate veep Jared Spataro said at the time.
In a [8]blog post published this week , Spataro says understanding the workforce is more important than ever for organizations as they need to "drive business impact" in the "face of economic uncertainty."
He said it's clear the world of work has changed and there's no going back to how it was pre-pandemic: staff value the freedom to work where they want but at the same time business leaders "crave the familiarity" of the traditional office setup where groups can huddle to brainstorm or "chance encounters in the hallways led to an unexpected collaboration."
[9]This always-on culture we're in is awful. How do we stop it? Oh, sorry, hold on – just had another notification
[10]Chin up, weary key workers: Google's pushing out a Workspace for frontliners
[11]Smells like Teams spirit: New platform Viva builds in all the tools Microsoft thinks staff need to succeed
[12]UK union pens letter to data watchdog on icky workplace monitoring systems like Microsoft's Productivity Score
[13]'We've heard the feedback...' Microsoft 365 axes per-user productivity monitoring after privacy backlash
[14]As if Productivity Score wasn't creepy enough, Microsoft has patented tech for 'meeting quality monitoring devices'
"In short, there's a disconnect between employers and employees. And in an unpredictable economy, that disconnect is only growing wider," says Spataro. "That fear [from bosses] has led some companies to institute digital monitoring, tracking trivial metrics to assuage their angst."
Indeed it has. And the solution? Rather than relying on a "productivity theater" – assessing individual metrics – leaders should give workers clarity on the work that matters and listen to their staff to truly hear their experiences at work.
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And vendor research wouldn't be vendor research unless it has a goal to sell more stuff. With this in mind, Spataro says Microsoft is "dialing up new ways to help leaders drive clarity and alignment, eliminate time-wasting busywork, and determine what is getting in the way of your people making a real impact."
What is this mystical service? [16]Viva Pulse , a new app that lets managers get regular and confidential feedback from staff on their team's "experience." This works with Viva Goals, launched earlier this year to bring "goals into the flow of work." New integrations include an enhanced Teams apps to inspect objectives and key results, a link to Azure Devops to update work items, connection to Power BI datasets to monitor KPIs and Microsoft Planner and Project for automatic product management updates.
There's more – including Viva Amplify; People in Viva; and Viva Connections home experience, which lets employees access Viva apps in one place.
So apps will solve this corporate hot potato, according to Microsoft. Let's just hope it has learned lessons from Productivity Score. ®
Get our [17]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2020/11/26/productivity_score/
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2020/12/10/ico_workplace_monitoring/
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offprem/saas&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2Yy3YGl7Hzpjfear9ZB2QswAAAMs&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offprem/saas&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Yy3YGl7Hzpjfear9ZB2QswAAAMs&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offprem/saas&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Yy3YGl7Hzpjfear9ZB2QswAAAMs&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offprem/saas&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Yy3YGl7Hzpjfear9ZB2QswAAAMs&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2020/12/01/productivity_score/
[8] https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2022/09/22/bridging-the-employer-employee-disconnect/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/30/feature_always_on_culture_notifications/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2021/03/01/google_workspace_frontline/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2021/02/04/microsoft_viva/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2020/12/10/ico_workplace_monitoring/
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2020/12/01/productivity_score/
[14] https://www.theregister.com/2020/12/01/microsoft_meeting_insight/
[15] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offprem/saas&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Yy3YGl7Hzpjfear9ZB2QswAAAMs&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[16] https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2022/09/22/empower-and-energize-employees-with-microsoft-viva/
[17] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Paradox
Feel free to pay yourself whatever you consider an appropriate bonus from whatever you find in your wallet.
Simple solution:Fire the managers, insecure, paranoid snowflakes can’t possibly be good for any company...
Let's start with Musk and Jansson.
What gets in the way
Microsoft is "dialing up new ways to help leaders drive clarity and alignment, eliminate time-wasting busywork, and determine what is getting in the way of your people making a real impact."
Hey, I can tell you the answer to that bolded part myself, free of charge: it's the higher ups. It's always the higher ups
Re: What gets in the way
It's not only higher-ups. Idiots, schemers, and empire-builders at one's own level can be time-sucks and blockers.
Have Microsoft not heard of Goodhart's law, or are they pretending they haven't heard of Goodhart's law?
Goodharts’s law (paraphrased: “any statistical measure will become inaccurate once used as a target”) doesn’t apply to the particular solution they’re hawking here, as it appears to be primarily a business communications system, rather than something that measures productivity itself.
I don't get this
I mean, this should be a very simple flow chart for managers. Is the work getting done? If yes, there's no problem. If no, then schedule a chat with the person(s) who aren't delivering their deliverables, and find out what the problem(s) is/are. I mean, as long as the work is getting done, do you really care if someone is working midnight to 8am or four separate two-hour shifts scattered throughout the day? White collar workers are hired for what they know, so we need to stop thinking of them like blue collar workers who may need to be on a production line to physically assemble goods.
Re: I don't get this
Or whether someone does a two day work in half day, while some others need three days for the same work or never get it done with fingerpointing excuses.
Some customers even KNOW they are paying two days work being done in a half day, since they already dealt with the three-or-more-days-fingerpointing-never-get-it-done type often enough.
Re: I don't get this
You'll never be a manager, far too much common sense there!
Exactly how my management team operates, "Here's a bunch of porjects. Are we delivering what we promied and on time? Can we deliver anymore if we have space time/capacity?" If the answers are "yes" and "possibly", then all is well with the world and carry on.
Here's the kicker, the dept heads all meet up once a week go through the work in progress listings from every team, if anyone can help fill in for other teams ad-hoc basis just to help get things done then they offer up any free resources for a limited, agreed time just to help make up. Not only does it help get things done it also ensures that lots of knowledge gets shared about what people in different teams actually do, so there's less "chucking over the wall" and less excuses for ignorance. It's not perfect but it certainly makes things slightly more pleasant.
Re: I don't get this
The question, "Is the work getting done?" has to be viewed in light of possibly-unreasonable (managementspeak: "aggressive") schedules. Not all schedules are bogus, but some do become that way due to feature-creep and management dictates ("Oh, we want it to use The Cloud." "Boss, it's a stopwatch feature in an embedded device which has no external connectivity." "Whatever, just make it happen.").
Groan.
"Not perturbed by the flack the company has come in for..."
Not again!
Please, if you want to use a cliche, get it right.
It's flak , short for "fliegerabwehrkanone", aircraft protection cannon or anti-aircraft artillery if you prefer.
The modern use of the word flak is used to describe to attacks made on behaviour or statements by comparing the damage done by flak against allied aircraft when they attacked German held territory during the Second World War. So if you are getting flak for something you have said or done then you have done something to upset or annoy other people.
[1]See .
[1] https://www.histclo.com/essay/war/ww2/air/eur/sbc/gd/flak.html
"In short, there's a disconnect between employers and employees"
There always has been. In a competitive 'economy', the employer wants as much work as they can get for their money and the employee wants as much money as they can get for their labour (or to trim their labour to the money they can get). So both sides are squeezing each other and the larger the enterprise the stronger the squeeze pressure. The alternative is cooperation but it's a cardinal sin for capitalists. Forty-odd years ago Alvin Toffler suggested a collaborative model for work [The Third Wave, Collins 1980] but it hasn't happened yet except in very rare small scale instances.
Paradox
""Leaders think their employees are not productive, whereas employees think they are being productive and in many cases even feel burnout," he told Bloomberg. "One of the most important things for us in this new world of work and hybrid work is to bridge this paradox."
There is no "paradox", this is known: most humans think their surrounding environments (home, owned business, etc) are their personal fiefdoms. The paranoia is from not being able to micromanage everyone, and everything, around them - these people are not very good "leaders", they do not and can not assign responsibilities and walk away with trust that their instructions will be followed to completion. These are proto-authoriarian Karens, people who need a finger in every little aspect of everything possible that surrounds them, they must feel absolute control or have input in every possible activity.
They are control freaks who got into positions of power and exercise their own inability to believe, to trust, in the abilities of others - everyone is incompetent except *themselves*, so everyone must be overseen otherwise they'll screw up!
Because, of course, management never screws up. It's *always* the workers' fault.
Now where is my bonus??