Coronavirus pandemic has introduced us to a totally new phase of working where almost every employee is working from home. Initially, it was difficult to manage the flow of work properly but somehow we all have adopted this work policy.
There are always pros and cons to everything; it is same in this case also. Some employers are not very supportive towards their employees and are over stressing them. On the other hand, some of the employees are not working properly and giving certain excuses of not working efficiently like network issues, dysfunctioning of the laptop, falling ill and many more.
In such cases, it has been difficult for employers to check out the performance of their employees. So what can be the strategies an employer can adopt to keep a track on their work? Let’s discuss a few of such strategies!
Email Tracking
This is one of the basic and the best method to keep a track on your employees. In businesses, emails are used to delegate tasks, assigning projects, and sharing queries. You can send mails frequently to the employees to keep them engaging in the work and check whether they are working or not. But it does not mean that you send emails which irritate your employees, the content of the mail should be positive and engaging. One thing more you need to understand is that emails are also dependant on a work basis. Suppose you are working in email marketing, then obviously the emails sending and receiving will be more. Instead of keeping the record manually, you can take the help of software which are meant for tracking the mails.
Time Tracking
Time is Money! Keeping a track on how your employees are spending their time is a must. You must have a track on how much time they are spending on work. It is quite easy for them to sit and relax at home and show that they are working more at home. It was one of the most common problems every business was facing in the initial days of lockdown. So what most of the businesses have adopted is time tracker software. What you need to do is ask all your employees to install the time tracker software on their system. The tracker keeps a complete record and some software even saves a screenshot, and in case you are not working and sitting ideally, then the software gives a notification related to it. This method has really helped the employers to track down the work of their employees during WFH days.
Self Reporting
It is beneficial in case you have fewer employees. In self-reporting, you can ask your employees to send a report of the work done by them in a day. You can fix a time or ask them to send the report by the end of working hours. It is a good method if you have trust on your employees, but if you are not very sure about your employees, then you need to check their work report everyday. That is why it is recommended for a company with fewer employees because it will be quite hectic to check every work report in case you have many employees.
Ask for Medical Bills
There are many cases where employees give the excuse of their illness whereas they are relaxing and enjoying at home. In that case, you must ask for medical bills or slips to confirm they are ill or not. But it becomes very tricky if the employee is really ill. He will feel irritated and consider you as inhuman if you are nagging him for medical bills. It depends on your intellect how you will handle such a situation. Suppose, if he is taking leave for one day you must grant him leave easily without asking too much of questions. If the employee is asking for three-four leaves on the basis of medical issues then you can ask for medical bills. To avoid the situation of asking bills and making employees feel irritated, there is one more option you can go for i.e. the software. Yes, there are various attendance/leave software where your employees can apply for leave alongwith the proofs. To get recommendations related natural remedies you can check out Mindzymes.
Arranging Online Discussions
Nothing is better than talking to your employees. Being an employer, you can organize a team-wise meeting through video conferencing. The tone of the meeting should be friendly and not very harsh. You can ask for the issues employees are facing or even take their suggestions related to work. If a team meeting does not work well, you can go for a one on one meeting where the employee is more open to talking about the issues. Even though the employee is not working efficiently, you should still be encouraging instead of being harsh on them. There are various problems an individual may be facing so instead of overburdening or overstressing them try to understand the problem.
Connecting Through Calls
You can also call your employees if you feel he/she is not working properly. When calls are made without any further notification the employee is not prepared to lie. They cannot fake with excuses and you will get to know that they are not working and relaxing at home. But this does not mean you are calling them every half an hour, because it will be very irritating especially for those employees who are actually working. It basically depends on your intellect on how to carry out all such strategies.
So these were some of the basic methods through which you can track the work performance of your employees. But all these strategies should be conducted depending on the situation and using your intellect.