Friday, October 15, 2010

Be Aware Of Your Workers With A Desktop Remote Monitoring Service

When left unsupervised, many employees who have desktop access to the internet spend hours each day surfing the web. They waste countless hours that could be devoted to working do everything but work. Because of this, your business may be loosing considerable amounts of profits due to lost productivity. But there is an effective way to get that productivity back up, and that is through a desktop remote monitoring service.

Chances are that you have already tried various tools and methods to encourage your employees to not use the internet for personal reasons. However, they did not help and you just ended up wasting your money. You might run a business where internet access is vital and cutting service is not an option. Furthermore, blocking websites with filtering software can have negative results when your employees are also blocked from sites they need to be able to access.

With a desktop remote monitoring service, you can have specialists monitor the productivity of your employees without restricting their internet accesses. You can ensure that their internet activities are work-related and not just for pleasure. Furthermore, employers can use these services to verify that employees are not accessing websites that can be harmful to their networks or make sure that confidential data is not being leaked.

There are a wide variety of remote monitoring tools and software packages available. You will need to determine how much you want to spend on monitoring software, what you want it to monitor, and how you want the data to be monitored. Furthermore, monitoring internet usage is time consuming, so you may also need to consider hiring specialists or subscribing to a monitoring service.

Cost is an important factor in the quality and services offered by monitoring programs. Nevertheless, do not let this deter you because as technology has become cheaper, these programs are a lot more affordable. In fact, basic monitoring programs can be found free of charge online. Other, more advanced programs can be fairly costly. Choosing an online remote monitoring service gives you the flexibility to have top of the line software support without having to pay for costly licenses or worry about upgrades.

You will also have to consider how in depth you want the monitoring to be. Basic monitoring programs keep lists of what websites your employees viewed without much additional data. More advanced programs can capture detailed information about their internet activities, such as how much time was spent on each website or what was downloaded or uploaded to and from the website. Other programs even log employee keystrokes, capture emails, and can even record voice.

There are two primary ways that data is remotely monitored. The most secure method is to have computer personnel monitor the information directly from the network. This prevents the data they monitor from being leaked to the internet. However, this would require that you hire employees who are skilled and may be too costly. On the other hand, outsourcing to an online monitoring service is much more economical, but all of the data is at risk to being intercepted by potential adversaries to your company.

No matter what software package of service that you ultimately choose, you have a legal obligation to inform your employees that you are monitoring their activities. Otherwise, you could be breaking the law and be punished with lawsuits, fines, or imprisonment. The most effective way to make them aware of the monitoring is to have your employees sign documentation that they acknowledge and consent to the monitoring.

Desktop remote monitoring services are an excellent way to increase productivity and ultimately profitability. Keeping track of employee productiveness is already difficult, but remote monitoring makes it a little easier. And the increased profits may even pay for the monitoring services.

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