Manager Checking CCTV to Confirm Colleague Is Leaving Early Divides Opinion

A woman has sparked debate online by asking for advice after spotting on CCTV that their colleague is routinely leaving work early.

In a post on Wednesday on Mumsnet, user Marie2022 wrote: "I have been in post for a few weeks and have had some problems with one of my direct reports. Nothing serious, mainly the 'not my job' type of responses from her regarding things that are very clearly her job."

A few days before, the manager had sent an email to the employee at a time when she should have seen it, but did not get a reply: "At which point someone said that she wasn't actually there," wrote the Mumsnet user: "The following day I asked her to confirm her hours, which she did."

Looking further into the issue, she checked the office CCTV for the past two weeks and discovered that the employee had been leaving 10-20 minutes early every day.

"Is this a big deal?" she asked: "As a manager, would this bother you? I just want to get some options before doing anything."

In the U.S., the standard working week begins on Monday and ends on Friday. According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average workweek for all employees working in private industries was around 34.5 hours a week in 2022.

But despite working for an average working day of around 7-8 hours, the time in which we are productive at work is thought to be a lot less.

A survey by U.K. money-saving brand VoucherCloud polled almost 2,000 full-time office workers about their habits and productivity at work.

Seventy-nine percent of those surveyed said that they did not consider themselves to be productive throughout the entire working day. When asked how long they think they spend productively working while at the office, the average answer was just 2 hours and 53 minutes.

When it came to this employee's early clock-off habits, Mumsnet users were split about the manager's reaction.

One Mumsnet user took a straightforward approach and said: "Leaving early, they would be told in no uncertain terms it stops immediately, otherwise another quick trip to HR and a first written warning would be coming their way."

But another comment disagreed and said: "I think it depends on the workplace. I have worked places where we were required to be at our desks at certain times and where we were just expected to get our work done with maybe some loose core hours. The clock-watching places and managers were miserable to work for."

Other replies on the viral post questioned the manager's use of CCTV with the employee: "Why are you checking CCTV? Do staff know they are being monitored that way?" asked one commenter, while another said: "I can't believe you actually checked CCTV. I suspect you're new to management. The best managers I had were those that didn't micro-manage."

There is evidence to suggest that allowing flexible working for employees can have a positive impact on work. Management consultancy firm Gartner questioned over 10,000 digital workers from the U.S., U.K., and Asia-Pacific regions for its 2021 Digital Worker Experience Survey.

Forty-three percent of respondents said that flexibility in working hours helped them achieve greater productivity, citing time gained back thanks to not being required to commute, less time spent in meetings, and less management supervision.

Other replies suggested that the issue was straightforward and that the employee should never be leaving work early. One Mumsnet user wrote: "You are contracted by your company for a certain amount of hours, you can't have staff just wandering off whenever they feel like it."

Another commenter advised: "It's just ten mins. I guess you need to weigh up whether it's worth p***ing her off vs her work contribution generally."