Abstract
Electronic monitoring of employees is both controversial and on the rise. Unfortunately,research examining electronic monitoring has focused predominantly on the reactions of
monitored employees. Little is known about the processes that trigger managers’ decisions to electronically monitor subordinates. Employing a distributed virtual team simulation, this study examined the effects of dependence and trust on managerial decisions to electronically monitor
their subordinates. Results indicate that managers who are in higher dependence relationships with subordinates or have lower cognition-based trust in subordinates are more likely to engage in richer electronic monitoring of those subordinates. Moreover, although managers tend to increase the level of electronic monitoring over time, this tendency is stronger when cognition-
based trust is low versus high. The implications of these results on electronic monitoring, trust,
and cybernetic models of control in organizations are discussed.
