An exploratory study of computerized performance monitoring and control systems reveals both positive and negative effects. R.esponses of 50 clerical workers from 2 organizations with computerized monitoring were compared to 94 individuals from 3 organizations in similar jobs without computerized monitoring. The results indicate that computerized monitoring is associated with perceived increases in office productivity, more accurate and complete assessment of workers' performance, and higher levels of organizational control. Respondents indicate that managers overemphasize the importance of quantity and underemphasize the importance of quality in evaluating employee performance. Workers perceive increased stress, lower levels of satisfaction, and a decrease in the quality of their relationships with peers and management as a consequence of computerized monitoring. The relevance of existing models of performance monitoring is examined in light of these findings.

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Many organizations are introducing computer‐based communication and information systems to improve the efficiency and productivity of their personnel. Unfortunately, there exist no suitable schemes which these organizations can use to specify who needs what products or services. Neither is there any standardized methodology for evaluating the appropriateness of the new systems and their impact on the individual users and organizations. The Centre for the Evaluation of Communication—Information Technologies (CECIT) at the University of Waterloo is engaged in research on office automation. Its objectives are to develop suitable methodologies for the specification and evaluation of office automation services. This paper reports on an initial study of the communication—information requirements of white collar workers. The study took place in the summer and fall of 1980. One hundred and fourteen managers and fifty secretarial and clerical workers from four different organizations were involved in the study. Perceived use of various office support services, preliminary and subsequent detailed descriptions of individuals' tasks, and actual communication behaviour were the main focus of our data gathering. Preliminary findings suggest that cognition‐oriented tasks like human relations, planning, decision making and evaluating predominate the work of managers. Significant opportunities exist at the management level for the application of integrated decision‐support and communication systems. However, given the complexity and the lack of routine in the tasks performed by most managers, the development and introduction of office automation services geared for such a target are going to be slow in coming.

This article presents a study of the use of diaries to measure discretionary behavior. These are behaviors such as viewing television where personal choice plays a predominant role. Diary data collected upon two occasions five months apart were compared with automatically recorded data. The results show that use of diaries apparently caused an increase in thefrequency of viewing broadcast teletext on the part of those who normally used it infrequently. The data indicate that diaries are likely to be inaccurate in measuring the durations of behavioral events. It is concluded that diaries should not be used to estimate the population frequencies for discretionary behaviors. he emergence of computer-based technologies for use in both -A the home and the office has focused attention on the analysis of requirements for information and on the measurement of the use of these new systems. Measurement of use is particularly important when results from field trials are used as a basis for predicting demand or for AUTHORS' NOTE:

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Office Automation is of major concern to vendors, to users, and to those academics who study relations between organizations, people and technology. Though technologies such as text processing and electronic mail have become common, other more esoteric systems such as file management, relational data bases and distributed information systems have yet to be widely accepted. Several reasons are offered for this lag. One main reason is the lack of acceptable means for cost justifying office automation technology. Uttal [29] reports that direct cost savings are hard to identify. Despite these difficulties, there have been many attempts to develop cost-justification methods. These range from comprehensive approaches such as those suggested by Bair [3, 4] to very specific methods such as those suggested by Boczany [7]. One of the main reasons that justifications are hard to develop is the difficulty in modeling the effects of these new systems in terms of productivity and effectiveness.

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