It’s Monday morning. You’re at your desk, coffee in one hand, a massive water bottle near the other. As you glance at your to-do list, a name lights up on your messaging app. They’re online—your palms sweat. While there’s a lot on your plate, what really worries you is whether they know you’re here, hard at work.
Flip the coin. You’re the boss or team leader, wondering if the green icon means your employee is working or just keeping up appearances. Sound familiar? Either way, if this strikes a chord, you may be besieged by productivity paranoia, a current crisis in employee experience.
Productivity paranoia and its equally corrosive twin, productivity theater, can increase mistrust, miscommunication, and misplaced effort in the workplace. Let’s explore what these terms mean, the harm they can cause, and what are the antidotes.
What is productivity paranoia?
Productivity paranoia is a massive disconnect between employees and employers. It’s an overwrought worry about productivity, to the point that it starts negatively affecting the employee experience.
For company leaders, it’s the nagging fear that employees aren’t as productive as they appear. For employees, it’s the feeling that their hard work goes unnoticed, no matter how much they produce.
The difference between these two perceptions creates distrust in the workplace, which breeds productivity paranoia. Fear is the uniting factor—a fear of failure for the business, the management, and the employees.
The term “productivity paranoia” first gained popularity post-pandemic, particularly with the rise of remote and hybrid work. In a 2022 survey by Microsoft, around 85% of employers said it was difficult to believe employees were productive in a new hybrid environment. Is that fear founded? Do employees sacrifice productivity when working from home? Unsurprisingly, research remains divided.
One study from Standford found fully remote work is associated with a 10% decrease in productivity. Another study by the IZA Institute of Labor Economics reported a 20% drop when comparing pre-pandemic levels to those during COVID-19. Though, it’s important to consider that the international pandemic likely influenced these results beyond just the shift to remote work.
On the other hand, the Harvard Business Review found at-home workers had higher job satisfaction, while another from Stanford showed that the hybrid business model had no impact on productivity. Another study of a Chinese company from Standford Business showed performance increases, fewer sick days, and lower attrition rates.
Perhaps the lack of data is part of why companies have been pushing for return-to-office (RTO) policies. Companies mandated a return to the office, and even penalized workers who failed to show up in the office, as attested by Social Europe. In 2022, companies like Boeing, UPS, and JPChase Morgan started embracing these policies.
More recently, Amazon has had one-on-one conversations with workers they believe aren’t spending enough time in the office. Ultimately, while productivity in the U.S. is growing, it grow less than estimated in 2024. Perhaps most concerning is the drop in employee engagement, which dropped to only around 22%, leading to an $8.8 trillion worldwide cost, according to a recent Gallup survey.
Productivity paranoia can erode trust. The Visier case study found that surveillance increased anxiety over KPIs, and tightening regulations about how and where employees work all contribute. Ultimately, productivity paranoia is both a cause and consequence of a lack of trust.
When trust is eroded, it gives rise to another but very related problem: productivity theater.
Productivity theater: the art of looking busy
Coined around the same time as productivity paranoia, productivity theater is a set of tasks that don’t appear that keep employees appearing busy without actually accomplish anything meaningful. This behavior often stems from a fear of being labeled “lazy” and an intense pressure to impress peers.
A recent Visier report revealed that 43% of employees dedicate more than 10 hours a week to productivity theater tasks. It could look like rearranging files on your desktop, loudly discussing a workload or any other nonspecific task you can find a stock photo office worker completing. Other examples include staying late or attending unnecessary meetings.
While productivity paranoia is often lined up with remote work, it isn’t exclusive to it. The Visier report discloses that 37% of office workers engage in productivity theatre, compared to 28% of hybrid workers, and only 25% of remote employees. This makes sense, after all, the need to perform necessitates an audience.
Well, so what? Bosses have always been concerned with productivity, and workers have always worried about appearing productive. A few things make this especially relevant right now.
Once again, let’s return to the idea of mistrust. When employers don’t trust employees, workers don’t feel their jobs are safe. As a result, they strive to prove that they’re doing their best in the most public and obvious way possible, i.e., productivity theater.
Productivity theater is a pantomime for the benefit of those who are watching. Once that cycle is in motion, HR software can feed as the stage for that theater.
Software’s role in productivity paranoia and productivity theater
If we consider software as a digital stage where productivity paranoia and theater are performed, employee monitoring software can help feed this cycle. Employee monitoring can track when people are online, log keystrokes, quantify how long projects take, and provide general productivity tracking that many businesses rely on.
The demand for productivity tracking has surged, as evidenced by G2’s review numbers in Employee Monitoring Software category. It’s worth noting that as of August 2024, there are already 48% more reviews this year than last. This trend highlights the growing demand for employee monitoring, perfectly following up with the concern around productivity skyrocketing in the last few years.
Similarly, reviews for G2’s category Productivity Bots, the AI-driven apps designed to boost user productivity, have increased nearly 105% overall since 2019.
Despite the rise in productivity tracking software, public reception remains largely negative. A survey from Raconteur in partnership with Attest found that around 63% of workers consider employee tracking software a reason to quit. Another survey from 15Five revealed that while 68% of managers believe productivity software improves performance, 72% of employees think it has no impact or even harms performance. This growing disconnect between workers and managers might lead to employees searching for other opportunities.
A more holistic approach to evaluating employee performance and sentiment analysis involves examining data from G2 employee experience software. This software streamlines communication and consolidates multiple systems, helping organizations analyze and improve how employees feel about their work.
Employee experience software includes elements of performance management, employee engagement, team building, and people analytics. These robust solutions are largely concerned with retention, turnover, and other metrics that aim at understanding employee happiness.
We examined all reviews for the Employee Experience Software category in July 2024, focusing on responses to the question about what business problems were solved and the benefits addressed by these solutions. Here’s what the data showed:
By far and away, the biggest issue people discussed was employee recognition, mentioned in 31% of the reviews. Rewards, like money, gift cards, or other presents, came in at nearly 19%. It makes sense that in a world obsessed with workers showcasing their value, workers would want an acknowledgment of their contributions. Managers and administrators also appreciated having tools to showcase top performers.
Motivation, performance and development, and collaboration followed closely, each appearing in roughly 13-14% of reviews. Staff from all roles were desperate to find a way to connect with team members, understand their career paths, and feel motivated to continue to do good work.
Communication and engagement were also big priorities at around 13% and 11%, respectively. What’s interesting to note here is that while productivity showed up, it was at a much smaller percentage, only around 5%.
The data suggests that the intense focus on productivity might not be as significant as it’s often made out to be. When it comes to solving problems, managers are looking for ways to motivate, reward, collaborate with, and engage employees.
What do we do about productivity paranoia?
Business thrives on competition; it’s no wonder leaders are obsessed with creating lean business. However, while the challenges have evolved, employee needs haven’t. If you don’t invest in your employees, they won’t invest in you. Here are a few strategies that can help overcome productivity paranoia.
Transparency
Transparency around any software is a must. As an employer, if you’re using employee monitoring software, that information must be clear to anyone who joins the company. Ask your employees:
- Do they feel stressed about the software’s usage?
- Is that stress compromising the ability to do their job?
- Is the piece of software you're using helping or harming that relationship?
Realistic Expectations
It’s important to set realistic expectations for workers and provide a safe, open place to voice feedback If you’ve been increasing workloads incrementally over time, the breaking point isn’t always apparent until your top performers jump to new opportunities.
Employee Check-ins
Prioritize checking in on employees rather than fixating on employee net promoter scores (eNPS). Work is just one part of life. If work becomes unmanageable on top of a personal crisis, things turn unbearable very quickly. If you’re getting clear signals from staff that not all is well, the slight increase in productivity won’t offset the costs of burnout, low engagement, and turnover.
Tracking metrics essential in designing a good business, but numbers don’t make a company—people do. The second you take the “human” out of the “human resource” business, everything falls apart.
Breaking the cycle
An exceptional employee experience is built by people who build trust. Do your workers feel like they’re being spied on or do they feel supported? Are you getting caught in the vicious cycle of panic that leads to productivity paranoia that leads to productivity theater in an ouroboros of KPIs and public responses to meetings attended unnecessarily?
While the demand for employee monitoring software skyrockets, the true needs of managers and employees lie in the demonstration of investment and trust. Navigating remote, in-office, and hybrid policies will always be tricky, but one thing remains clear: employees need strong, visible support from their leaders.
Before you fall into the trap of productivity poisoning, remember that once the damage starts, an antidote may not work fast enough to prevent the loss of top performers.
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