Cognizant starts 'idle' activity monitoring on devices; firm says 'not tracking' employees

Cognizant has started deploying activity-tracking software on company-issued devices, with select teams now using tools that monitor keyboard and mouse movement throughout the workday. The rollout began about a month ago and is currently limited to specific projects, but more teams are being gradually added, according to a report by Mint.

The company said tracking is a common industry practice and has been requested by select Cognizant clients in select Business Process Management or Intuitive Operations & Automation projects. It added that consent of employees have been taken and they are aware of being tracked and it is not used for performance evaluation.

The tracking system, ProHance, flags employees as “idle” after five minutes of no activity and marks them “away from the system” after 15 minutes. While such tools are common in process-driven environments, their broader use has raised concerns among employees about how the data might be used.

Cognizant maintains that the tool is client-driven and not meant for performance evaluations. “We occasionally use various productivity measurement tools, a common industry practice… at the request of customers,” a spokesperson told Mint. The data, they said, is aimed at identifying inefficiencies in process design.

Despite assurances of consent-based deployment, employees described the onboarding process as mandatory, citing compulsory ProHance training modules that ended with a required “I agree” confirmation.

Speaking to Business Today, a spokesperson from Cognizant said, "We occasionally use various productivity measurement tools, a common industry practice, in select Business Process Management or Intuitive Operations & Automation projects, at the request of customers. The purpose of these tools is to help better understand the client process steps and related time metrics to assess process design inefficiencies as part of the process transformation efforts. These tools are not designed or used to track or evaluate the individual performance of employees. Also, the tools are used only after obtaining the consent of employees and it is made clear that these are not used for performance evaluation. Additionally,  these tools have no impact on the composition of teams engaged in these projects and any suggestion to the contrary is incorrect."

A number of IT firms have deployed monitoring measures amid ongoing hybrid work setups and increased industry pressure to boost visibility, optimise time usage, and improve output across IT and business process management (BPM) operations.