How to Know If Remote Employees Are Working (Without Monitoring Software)

You know a remote employee is working the same way you know anyone is working: the work shows up. Agree what finished work looks like for each role, ask for a short written update every day or week, hold a weekly 1:1 for what the updates miss, and set a few team norms for response times. With those four in place, a person who is not working shows up as slipped commitments and vaguer updates, without any software.

This guide is for a manager or founder tempted to buy monitoring software. It covers the four signals, the warning signs that matter, and what monitoring tools measure and cost. Disclosure: DoneThat, which publishes this blog, makes a work tracker that is not monitoring software; a section near the end says where it fits.

The short answer: judge finished work, not online status

Online status feels like evidence, but it only shows that someone was at a computer. Managers who feel unsure are not alone: in Microsoft's 2022 survey of 20,006 knowledge workers in 11 countries, 85% of leaders said hybrid work made it hard to be confident employees were productive, while 87% of employees said they were productive. Microsoft called the gap "productivity paranoia" and told leaders to reward impact rather than activity, "or risk people LARP-ing their jobs" (Microsoft WorkLab, 22 September 2022; vendor research).

Four ways to know if remote employees are working

Each is cheap to set up, and together they show the work itself, not just presence.

1. Agree on what "done" looks like for each role

Write down, with each person, the three to five outcomes their role owns this quarter and what a normal week looks like: tickets resolved for a support agent, shipped changes for an engineer.

If you cannot describe good output for a role, no tool will tell you whether the person in it is working.

2. Ask for a short written update

A written update shows the work instead of the chair. Pick one rhythm and keep it short:

• Daily: three lines on what got done, what is next and what is blocked. The daily report template has copy-paste formats, and an async standup does the same job in a team channel.
• Weekly: wins, progress against the agreed outcomes, risks and next week's priorities. The weekly report guide has a ready structure.

Good updates are specific. "Worked on the onboarding flow" says little; "Shipped the signup screen, waiting on copy from Sam, next is the email step" can be checked.

3. Use the weekly 1:1 for what updates miss

The 1:1 carries what people will not put in writing: they are overloaded, stuck, dealing with something at home, or no longer believe in the project. Those problems are fixable once you know.

Frequency matters more than length. Gallup's study of nearly 15,000 employees found that 80% of those who had received meaningful feedback in the past week were fully engaged, and that short weekly conversations of 15 to 30 minutes did more than longer, occasional ones (Gallup, 29 May 2023, updated 16 February 2026). For an agenda, use these one-on-one meeting questions.

4. Agree on working norms

Many "is this person working?" worries are really "I sent a message and got no answer." Settle that with written team norms: a response time per channel, one route for urgent issues, core hours if needed, and one place where progress lives. Then judge people against the norms, not against your own hours. The async communication guide covers how to set them up.

Signs a remote employee is not working

A pattern of two or three of these over a few weeks deserves a conversation:

• Commitments slip repeatedly without the person flagging it first.
• Updates get vaguer, or stop.
• Quality drops on work that used to be solid.
• They miss agreed core hours or response times more than occasionally.
• The same task sits "almost done" for several updates in a row.

Other signals feel alarming but say little. A gray status dot, a slow reply, a camera that is off or a low activity rate all fit someone doing good work away from the keyboard. Proximity bias can also color how you read remote work, so check whether the person is producing less or is just less visible to you.

Worried about a second job? Double-booked availability is a reason to check the record, then ask. If the work and norms are met, it is a question for your contract, not for surveillance.

How to monitor remote employees: what the software measures and costs

If you do monitor remote employees, the usual tools record an activity rate, app and website logs and, in some products, screenshots. Hubstaff's support documentation, for example, explains how its activity rate works: each tracked second counts as active if there was any keyboard or mouse input, and the seconds add up to a percentage for each 10-minute segment (Hubstaff, retrieved 4 November 2026).

Hubstaff itself notes that the metric "can reflect engagement but not always employee productivity", and that a developer's activity "could dip 30 to 40%" during heavy reading (Hubstaff blog, 17 June 2025, updated 11 August 2025).

Input is easy to measure, but it is not output, and it is easy to fake. In 2024, Wells Fargo dismissed more than a dozen employees after reviewing "allegations involving simulation of keyboard activity creating impression of active work", according to filings reported by Bloomberg (WealthManagement.com, via Bloomberg, 13 June 2024). Once a number becomes the target, some people move the mouse instead of the work.

If you have a legitimate reason to monitor

Monitoring has legitimate jobs, such as data loss prevention or records a regulator requires. If you have one, the EU regulators' 2017 opinion and the state notice laws below add up to a short procedure (Article 29 Working Party, Opinion 2/2017):

1. Write down the specific purpose, and collect only what it needs.
2. Choose the least invasive option that meets it, such as weekly totals instead of screenshots.
3. Tell employees in writing what is monitored and why, and get any acknowledgment your state requires.
4. Keep the data no longer than necessary, and limit who can see it.
5. Let employees see their own data. In the EU, run a data protection impact assessment first if the monitoring is likely to be high risk.

On its own, wanting to check that people are working is a weak reason to monitor. For tool-by-tool detail, the comparison pages for ActivTrak, Hubstaff, Time Doctor, Insightful and Teramind set out what each does and how DoneThat differs.

What monitoring costs you in trust and stress

A meta-analysis in Personnel Psychology pooled 94 independent samples covering 23,461 workers. It found no evidence that electronic performance monitoring improves performance, and found that it is associated with higher stress regardless of how it is designed. More transparent, less invasive monitoring went with better attitudes, and more invasive monitoring went with more counterproductive behavior, such as withholding effort (Ravid et al., 2023).

Surveys agree, though they show correlation, not cause. In the American Psychological Association's 2023 survey of 2,515 US workers, monitored workers were more likely than unmonitored ones to feel micromanaged (51% vs 33%), to report emotional exhaustion in the past month (39% vs 22%) and to say they did not feel valued (26% vs 17%), according to an APA press release via Newswise (7 September 2023).

Monitoring can even make rule-breaking more likely. In an experiment with about 200 US employees, Chase Thiel, David Welsh and colleagues found that people told they were under electronic surveillance cheated more on a set of tasks than people who were not. In a separate survey of about 100 employees, monitored workers were more likely to take unapproved breaks, ignore instructions and deliberately work slowly (Fortune, 4 July 2022; ASU W. P. Carey School of Business, 27 June 2022). The authors' explanation is that being watched makes people feel less responsible for their own conduct.

What monitoring costs you in legal duties

Monitoring is legal in many places, but it comes with duties. This is a summary, not legal advice.

• New York: private employers that monitor employees' phone, email or internet use must give written notice on hiring, get an acknowledgment and post the notice, with civil penalties of up to $500 for a first offense, $1,000 for a second and $3,000 for each later one (NY Civil Rights Law § 52-c).
• Delaware: employers must show an electronic notice each day the employee uses the employer's email or internet, or get a one-time acknowledged notice (Del. Code tit. 19, § 705).
• Connecticut: employers must give prior written notice of the types of monitoring. A law in force since 1 October 2026 adds the locations where monitoring happens and a plain-language statement for new hires (Jackson Lewis, 10 September 2026).
• Maine: a law enacted in January 2026 requires notice before any surveillance and an annual written notice, and lets employees decline tracking apps on personal devices (Littler, 22 January 2026).
• EU (GDPR): Article 88 calls for specific safeguards for "monitoring systems at the work place" (GDPR Art. 88). In their 2017 opinion on data processing at work, the EU's data protection regulators called software that logs keystrokes and mouse movements or captures remote workers' screens disproportionate, and said employees can rarely give valid consent to their employer (Article 29 Working Party, Opinion 2/2017).

Regulators enforce this. In a decision announced in January 2024, France's data protection authority fined Amazon France Logistique €32 million (about $35 million) over warehouse scanner tracking so precise it could require staff to justify every break; Amazon disagreed (Engadget, 23 January 2024).

Should you track remote employees?

Not with monitoring software, for most knowledge-work teams. Before you track remote employees that way, answer four questions:

1. Have I written down what good output looks like for this role? If not, start there.
2. Have I asked the person directly? A conversation surfaces the reason faster than software.
3. Is there a legal, security or pay requirement? Then it is a compliance decision: scope the tool to it and tell people.
4. Would I explain the tool to the whole team? If the plan only works when people don't know, it fails the notice laws above wherever they apply.

What to do if you suspect someone is not working

1. Check the record. Compare the last month of updates and finished work against the agreed outcomes.
2. Check yourself. Were expectations clear, and is someone else blocking the work?
3. Talk about the work, not the hours. "The onboarding emails were due two weeks ago and I haven't seen a draft. What's going on?" opens a better conversation than "Are you actually working?"
4. Agree on a short plan. Two or three deliverables with dates, plus a written check-in a few times a week.
5. Decide on evidence. If the work arrives, you have your answer. If not, you have a fair basis for the next step.

A hypothetical example: a designer's updates have said "iterating on the dashboard" for three weeks. In the 1:1, it turns out they are waiting on data from another team. An activity rate would have shown a busy designer; the conversation showed a blocked one.

Where DoneThat fits, and where it does not

DoneThat is not monitoring software. The desktop app reconstructs each person's workday from screen and app activity and writes a daily summary for them. Screenshots are processed and immediately deleted, never stored, and apps a person excludes are redacted on their own machine. Each person sees their own day and sets, summary by summary, whether it stays private or is shared with the team, the organization or publicly.

Team views show shared summaries and relative trends, not per-person hours or live screens. History can be exported as CSV or queried through the API and MCP, and the desktop app is open source, so what it captures and redacts on your machine can be checked.

For a manager, updates then start from what happened rather than from memory. DoneThat supports the four signals; it does not replace the 1:1. And if an employer rolls it out to a team rather than leaving it to individuals, the steps above still apply: say in writing what it captures and why.

The honest limit: a manager who wants keystroke-level surveillance, live views of employees' screens or proof of every minute will not get it from DoneThat, by design. Screen-based capture is also a bigger ask than a timer, so it works best where people choose to use it.

Frequently asked questions

Is it legal to monitor remote employees?

Often yes, with conditions. Expect a duty to tell employees in writing what you monitor, and in the EU a test of whether the monitoring is necessary and proportionate. The legal section above gives examples; get legal advice before you start.

How often should remote employees check in?

A short written update daily or weekly, plus a weekly 1:1, suits most teams. Daily fits new or fast-moving work; weekly fits steady work and senior people.

What is the difference between tracking and monitoring?

"Tracking" is used for both. A timesheet or a written update records work, usually by the person doing it. Monitoring means an employer observing employee activity, often continuously. What matters is who sees the data and who decides what is shared.

The bottom line

You do not need software to know whether remote employees are working. You need a clear idea of "done", a short written record, a weekly conversation and shared norms. This week, write down the outcomes for one role and ask that person for a three-line update on Friday.

Sources

• American Psychological Association, via Newswise (7 September 2023). Worries about artificial intelligence, surveillance at work may be connected to poor mental health. APA press release on the 2023 Work in America survey; online survey by The Harris Poll of 2,515 employed US adults, 17 to 27 April 2023.
• Article 29 Working Party (23 June 2017). Opinion 2/2017 on data processing at work (WP249). Section 5.4.1, monitoring of home and remote working.
• Delaware Code, Title 19, Chapter 7, § 705, Notice of monitoring of telephone transmissions, electronic mail and Internet usage. Retrieved 4 November 2026.
• Engadget (23 January 2024). France fines Amazon $35 million over 'intrusive' employee surveillance.
• Fortune, Mellor, S. (4 July 2022). Monitoring your employees at work may actually make them slack off, slow down, and even steal more. Reports an experiment with 200 US employees and a survey of 100 employees by Thiel, Welsh and colleagues.
• Gallup (29 May 2023, updated 16 February 2026). A Great Manager's Most Important Habit. Study of nearly 15,000 employees.
• GDPR (Regulation (EU) 2016/679). Article 88, Processing in the context of employment.
• Hubstaff Support. How is time tracked and calculated in Hubstaff? Retrieved 4 November 2026.
• Hubstaff, Nekvinda, A. (17 June 2025, updated 11 August 2025). How to increase Hubstaff activity.
• Lazzarotti, J. J., Jackson Lewis P.C. (10 September 2026). Deadline Imminent for Connecticut's Expanded Electronic Monitoring Law. On Public Act 26-73, effective 1 October 2026.
• Levitt, H., Bloomberg, republished by WealthManagement.com (13 June 2024). Wells Fargo Fires Over a Dozen for 'Simulation of Keyboard Activity'.
• Littler, Gilligan, A., Silver, S., Argento, Z. and Appenteng, K. (22 January 2026). Maine Joins Three Northeastern States in Regulating Workplace Electronic Monitoring. On LD 61.
• Microsoft (22 September 2022). Hybrid Work Is Just Work. Are We Doing It Wrong? Work Trend Index Pulse Report (vendor research); survey of 20,006 knowledge workers in 11 countries by Edelman Data & Intelligence, 7 July to 2 August 2022.
• New York Civil Rights Law § 52-c*2, Employers engaged in electronic monitoring; prior notice required. Statute text via New York Public Law (the official nysenate.gov page blocks automated link checks). Effective 7 May 2022. Retrieved 4 November 2026.
• Ravid, D. M., White, J. C., Tomczak, D. L., Miles, A. F. and Behrend, T. S. (2023). A meta-analysis of the effects of electronic performance monitoring on work outcomes. Personnel Psychology, 76(1), 5 to 40. K = 94 independent samples, N = 23,461.
• Welsh, D., ASU W. P. Carey School of Business (27 June 2022). Monitoring employees makes them more likely to break rules. Summary of research by Thiel, Bonner, Bush, Welsh and Garud, first published in Harvard Business Review.

Written by Don, DoneThat's AI coach (LinkedIn) - so this article is AI-written. Every statistic is cited next to the claim and linked in the Sources list, and vendor research is labeled as such. The legal summary is general information, not legal advice. Published by DoneThat (Letss B.V., Amsterdam). More about DoneThat; corrections and questions go to support.