The visibility gap: What managers track vs. what actually drives performance

By Eric Czerwonka for Buddy Punch Stacker

Updated May 28, 2026 6:33 AM

As work has become more distributed, digital, and flexible, one question has quietly become harder to answer: How do you actually know work is getting done?

Workplace monitoring isn't new, but its role has expanded significantly in the past few years. Research from Pew Research Center shows that more than half of employees (54%) say their employer tracks when they start and finish work, with many also reporting monitoring of communications, task completion speed, and computer usage.

For managers, the answer isn't as simple as checking a single metric or tool. Instead, it often involves piecing together multiple signals - from time tracking and task completion to conversations, updates, and system activity. And as expectations around visibility have expanded, so has the complexity of managing it.

At the same time, managers are navigating a delicate balance. They're expected to ensure accountability and performance, but also to avoid crossing the line into micromanagement or unnecessary oversight.

To better understand how managers are approaching this, Buddy Punch surveyed 531 U.S.-based people managers across industries. The study explores what organizations expect managers to track, what actually helps them manage effectively, and where tracking starts to feel more like monitoring than meaningful visibility.

Key Findings

Managers are expected to track more than just outcomes. Most are responsible for monitoring both work progress (68%) and employee hours (67%), along with additional layers like productivity and system activity, reinforcing how broad visibility expectations have become.
What helps managers most isn't more tracking, it's clearer signals. One-on-one conversations (46%) and team updates (39%) rank above formal tools like time tracking (31%), suggesting that real-time communication often carries more weight than structured data alone.
Tracking starts to break down when it becomes excessive. Frequent status updates (43%) and detailed activity monitoring (42%) are the most likely to feel like oversight, pointing to a tipping point where visibility turns into friction.
Managers support accountability, but not at the expense of trust. While 82% say tracking helps keep teams accountable, 78% also believe too much tracking can make employees feel untrusted, highlighting a clear tension in how tracking is experienced.
There's no single model for getting it right. Nearly half of managers (44%) are leaning more on conversations and trust, while 35% are moving toward more structured tracking, signaling that most are still working to find the right balance.

What Managers Are Actually Expected to Track

For most managers, "knowing work is getting done" isn't based on a single signal. It's a mix of inputs - and often, a lot of them.

Across organizations, expectations around tracking are broad and layered. The majority of managers report being responsible for monitoring task completion or project progress (68%) and employee hours worked or attendance (67%), suggesting that both outcomes and time still carry equal weight.

Many managers are also expected to monitor:

Productivity or output metrics (61%)
Time spent on specific tasks or projects (56%)
Activity within work tools or systems (49%)
Customer or client outcomes (48%)

Only a small minority (2%) say they aren't required to track anything formally at all.

Taken together, these factors point to a clear pattern: most managers aren't just tracking one dimension of work. They're tracking multiple layers at once.

What Actually Helps Managers Manage

There's a clear gap between what managers are expected to track and what they say actually helps them manage.

The most helpful signals are the ones that make work visible without extra effort: one-on-one conversations (46%), team updates (39%), and employees proactively sharing progress (37%).

These aren't about collecting more data. They're about reducing guesswork.

More formal systems still play a role, but they're less likely to stand on their own. Around a third of managers point to performance dashboards (35%), task tracking tools (32%), and time tracking data (31%) as helpful - suggesting these tools are useful, but not sufficient.

And notably, even end results like customer outcomes (28%) or completed deliverables (28%) aren't enough by themselves to fully inform how managers evaluate work.

What becomes clear to is something subtle but important: managers need visibility both into what has happened and into what's happening.

The most effective signals are those that surface progress early, make expectations clear, and keep everyone aligned before issues arise.

When Tracking Starts to Feel Like Monitoring

When managers were asked what crosses the line from helpful into oversight, the answers point to a common theme: How tracking is experienced makes a big difference.

There's also evidence that this kind of scrutiny changes how people behave at work. Research from the U.S. Government Accountability Office finds that constant monitoring can increase stress, reduce morale, and make employees feel like they're under continuous evaluation - even when it doesn't improve actual performance. In that sense, more visibility doesn't always translate to better outcomes.

Requiring frequent status updates (43%) tops the list, followed closely by reviewing detailed activity or productivity reports (42%). Close behind are monitoring activity within work tools or systems (41%), tracking time spent on specific tasks (41%), tracking employee hours or attendance (40%), and requiring detailed documentation of tasks or work (39%).

What these all have in common is that they add layers of scrutiny, often without adding new insight.

It suggests that managers aren't necessarily pushing back on tracking itself. They're pushing back on redundancy, over-documentation, and systems that require constant proof of work rather than making work easier to see.

Most Managers Are Trying to Find the Line

When asked to step back and summarize their overall view, managers tend to land somewhere in the middle.

The most common perspective is that some tracking is helpful, but too much can undermine trust (42%). This outweighs the nearly two-thirds who say tracking is essential for accountability (31%), as well as those who prefer minimal tracking and more autonomy (14%) or believe it entirely depends on the team or type of work (13%).

In other words, most managers are navigating a balance between pro-tracking and anti-tracking.

That balance shows up across everything in the data: organizations expect broad visibility, managers rely heavily on communication, and frustration tends to emerge when tracking becomes excessive or disconnected from real management needs.

The takeaway: Finding the right amount - and the right type - of tracking is what actually determines whether it works.

How Manager Approaches Are Shifting

Over the past two to three years, the most common shift in how managers approach tracking has been toward more reliance on conversations and trust (44%). At the same time, a sizable share report moving in the opposite direction, relying more on structured tracking and visibility tools (35%).

This split reflects the broader tension in how work is managed today. That tension is tied to a larger shift in how work itself is structured. Research from Accenture shows that most employees now prefer hybrid models, while organizations are still adapting how they support productivity across locations. In many cases, tracking and visibility tools are being used to bridge that gap, even as managers continue to figure out how to use them without adding friction.

Rather than converging on a single model, managers are experimenting - adjusting their approach based on what helps them stay informed without adding unnecessary friction.

Managers Don't Reject Tracking - They Redefine It

Most managers strongly support accountability.

A large majority agree that tracking work and time helps keep teams accountable (82%), and even more say that most employees work responsibly without needing much oversight (86%).

That tension shows up clearly in how they think about tracking.

On one hand, managers recognize the value of visibility:

82% say visibility into work progress is more important than monitoring employee activity
82% agree that tools showing work progress help reduce the need for micromanagement
82% say clear expectations reduce the need to closely track employees

On the other hand, they're also clear about the risks:

78% say too much tracking can make employees feel like they're not trusted
65% say managers are sometimes expected to track things that aren't actually helpful

Managers are distinguishing between tracking that clarifies work and tracking that replaces trust.

The difference isn't subtle. The former reduces friction and keeps teams aligned. The latter adds work without improving understanding, and can undermine the very accountability it's meant to create.

The Bottom Line: Visibility Works Best When It's Aligned

Across all of the data, one thing is clear: managers are struggling to see work in the right way.

Organizations have expanded what gets tracked, layering time, tasks, productivity, and activity into increasingly complex systems. But managers themselves are more selective. They rely most on signals that provide clarity in the moment - conversations, shared updates, and visible progress - while pushing back on tracking that feels repetitive or disconnected from actual decision-making.

What determines whether tracking works is whether that visibility is useful, timely, and aligned with how work actually gets done.

When it is, tracking reinforces accountability without friction. When it isn't, it creates noise, extra work, and sometimes even erodes trust.

For organizations, the opportunity is to build tracking systems that make work easier to understand - for managers and employees alike.

Methodology

This survey was conducted with 531 U.S.-based adults aged 18 or older who were employed full time or part time and held roles with direct people management responsibilities. Respondents included business owners, founders, and managers who directly oversaw at least one employee. All respondents were responsible for evaluating employee work progress, productivity, or time management, and interacted with the employees they manage at least once per week. Individuals who did not formally supervise employees or who had no management responsibilities were excluded. Participants worked at organizations with five or more employees and had been in their current role for at least three months. The survey was fielded online from March 11 to March 17, 2026. Results reflect descriptive statistics with no weighting applied.

This story was produced by Buddy Punch and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.

This story was originally published May 28, 2026 at 2:00 AM.