The Hidden Camera

Hidden cameras and other surveillance missteps can sour employees, threaten your success or get you sued.

This is the numero uno, smartest step toward intelligent workplace surveillance, so it's a little surprising that so many organizations fail to do it. A video surveillance policy might state where cameras can be placed, as well as the fact that employees have no right to privacy in the general working areas of a facility. It should also make clear the disciplinary consequences that can result from unprofessional employee actions caught on video.

"It should be short and sweet," says Jennifer Shaw, an employment lawyer and partner at Jackson Lewis in Sacramento, Calif. "A lot of employers go crazy being super-detailed when they don't need to be." Shaw advises her clients to write the policy into the employee handbook and to make sure employees have signed off on the handbook, acknowledging that they have read and understood it.

One of the nice things a policy brings to the table is it shows that a company has a regular, standard practice around surveillance. That's something Connie Sadler, director of IT security at Brown University, thinks may be lacking at universities. She's heard of cases where supervisors have independently installed video cameras in buildings in response to thefts, some in not so obvious places. Installing cameras "willy-nilly," as she puts it, makes her uneasy. "The thing that concerns me is not really even whether they're used or how, but more what's our obligation to the community and employees in terms of what we tell them," she says. For example, should those supervisors have to ask permission to put up cameras? She also points out other gray areas: What if a student steals a laptop in a workspace such as one of the school libraries, and is caught on tape? "The student could say, I wasn't notified, there wasn't a policy,'" conjectures Sadler.

Sadler would love to see consistent policies at universities. "I think people are looking for guidance. For so many things that are regulated, we look to industry standards, reasonable application. For video surveillance, I really don't see any reasonable standard."

But the lack of consistent policies is not confined to the halls of academia. When asked to take a crack at estimating what percentage of companies have policies, Shaw figures only halfan estimate that roughly matches CSO's research. "More people are calling me wanting information about it. Some of the calls have been from employers who've been burned because they didn't have a policy in place," Shaw says.