- Majority of workers (51%) in favour of workplace wearables
- However significant fears over ‘big brother’ surveillance and data hacks
- Employee wellness voted top potential benefit, not without doubts
- Concerns over impact on stress and mental health
In an Office Genie survey of 1,000 people currently working in Britain, half (51%) believe wearables are beneficial in the workplace. And respondents in the youngest and oldest age brackets are the most receptive to workplace wearables, with 69% of 18-24 year olds thinking they are beneficial alongside 61% of 65+ year olds.
Workers consider the top three potential benefits to be: employee wellness (43%); health benefits (41%); and a boost in productivity (36%). When stress trackers, posture correctors, and AI assistants (such as Alexa) are expected to be the biggest workplace wearable investments this year [1], wellness, health and productivity are clearly key interests.
Stress monitoring was deemed the most appropriate use for workplace wearables (42%), despite nearly half of respondents (49%) being concerned about the negative impact wearable tech could have on employee stress levels.
Physical health (41%) was the second choice for the most appropriate use, followed by productivity (30%). The two least popular options were mental health monitoring (24%) and location monitoring (20%). This fits into the concerns of a significant number (43%) that being monitored by wearables, in general, could have negative consequences on mental health.
With global shipments of wearables increasing [2] and a huge 202 million wearable devices being given out by companies in 2016 [3], it’s important to bear in mind employee concerns. The primary fear is workplace wearables enforcing a ‘big brother’ surveillance culture (67%).
People are worried their boss may snoop on out-of-office data recorded by devices too (58%). So much so, that if employers were to provide employees with wearable tech, employees would rather use it solely for professional use (33%) than both professional and personal use (21%).
Following high-profile hacking cases such as the WannaCry attack, many people (64%) are also worried data from their workplace wearables could be hacked.
Peter Ames, Head of Strategy at Office Genie, has the following advice: “If employers are planning to introduce workplace wearables, these concerns have to be considered. First and foremost employees need to be be clear as to the legitimate reasons behind their introduction.
“Developing a policy informing staff of the data sets that will be employer-accessible can help reduce fears of snooping bosses.
“These concerns aside, workplace wearables have been linked to improved productivity and job satisfaction, as well as health benefits. So it definitely isn’t worth writing them off - particularly with the majority of employees in favour of them!”
[1] ‘Wearables in the workplace: The tech taking over your office in 2017’ by Libby Plummer for Wareable
[2] ‘Wearable technology is more than just a fashion statement’ by Jason Deign for Cisco
[3] ‘Wearables in the workplace and the dangers of staff surveillance’ by Jane Wild for The Financial Times