Employees in roles with low autonomy, roles that have a low skill level and employees without union representation are at a higher risk of being monitored at work, the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR)'s Negotiating the Future of Work report has highlighted.
Black workers are more likely to be in low-autonomy and low-skill roles (26% of black UK workers are in low-autonomy roles; 42% are in low-skill roles). IPPR’s report also found that 73% of black workers are not members of a trade union.
We asked commentators how HR can implement employee surveillance safely and fairly.
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The best way to ensure surveillance is fair is to consult the workforce, stated Joseph Evans, an IPPR researcher who co-authored the Negotiating the Future of Work report .
He told HR magazine: “Transparency is key: when workers know or suspect they are being monitored, this can have a substantial ‘chilling effect’, sometimes holding people back from expressing their views. This can have a negative knock-on effect on business performance, since leaders often rely on the information provided by their workforce to manage the business effectively.
“Making clear the rationale for introducing new forms of surveillance can help mitigate this chilling effect. Consulting the workforce in practice can mean holding a staff forum when a new surveillance method is being introduced, or raising the issue with a recognised trade union, if there is one."
Organisations often turn to surveillance and monitoring without first tackling wider issues, explained Garin Rouch, cofounder of Distinction Consulting.
Speaking to HR magazine, he said: “Too often, surveillance is a shortcut. Instead of tackling poor systems, inconsistent leadership or unclear expectations, organisations reach for control. But monitoring can’t build trust or engagement – and without transparency and scrutiny, it risks reinforcing bias and deepening inequality.
“If leaders want to use surveillance fairly and safely, they have to go beyond compliance and ask harder questions such as: ‘What are we monitoring? Who is affected? What are the unintended consequences?’”
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Younger workers aged 16 to 29 are also more likely to be employed in low-autonomy (28%) and low-skill roles (47%), researchers at the IPPR found. Workers aged 60 and over are disproportionately represented in these positions too: 29% are in low-autonomy roles and 44% in low-skill jobs.
HR leaders should make a genuine commitment to equity when implementing employee surveillance and monitoring, added Rouch.
He said: “Fair implementation means transparency about what’s being collected and why, and clear boundaries on how data will be used. That includes reviewing whether certain groups or roles are being monitored more than others, and whether surveillance is being used as a stand-in for better management and setting clearer expectations. Monitoring can’t fix what leadership hasn’t addressed.”
Using the Institute for Social and Economic Research’s (ISER) UK Household Longitudinal Survey, the IPPR assessed whether gender, ethnicity or age increased the risk of surveillance for people in employment by identifying the percentage of employees exhibiting different characteristics who are low-skilled, low-autonomy and/or non-unionised. The sample size of people in employment in the 2023 ISER survey was 16,000.
