In recent years, the adoption of diverse tools and technologies to capture work data has surged, especially following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. While debates around "productivity paranoia" and "productivity theatre" have intensified, a deeper consensus is emerging. Both executives and workers are recognizing the value in these efforts, pointing to a transformative shift: the dawn of the quantified organization. This approach focuses on utilizing work and workers' data for strategic purposes beyond measuring productivity, to effectively redefine organizational performance.
When we conducted a global survey of 1,000 executives and 1,000 workers to explore their sentiments around the use of newly available work data collection technologies, we anticipated a wider gap than we found between executives and workers. The two groups had surprisingly similar views about how work data can improve business outcomes in ways that benefit the organization as well as the workforce.