What is Employee Monitoring?

I’ve been reading a lot about employee monitoring and how companies are using it to understand productivity, security risks, and workflow patterns. From what I understand, employee monitoring basically refers to tracking work-related activities like app usage, time spent on tasks, website activity, or sometimes even screenshots to make sure teams stay productive and company data stays protected.

But here’s the issue I’m trying to figure out:
Different organizations use these tools in very different ways. Some say it helps streamline operations, while others feel it can affect trust or team morale if not implemented correctly.

So I’m looking for some suggestions from people who’ve actually used these systems:

• What kind of setup works best without feeling intrusive?

• Are there features you found essential or totally unnecessary?

• And when choosing employee monitoring tools, how do you even decide between the top employee monitoring tools, the so-called best employee monitoring tools, or the wide range of employee monitoring tools in India?

Would love to hear real experiences, recommendations, and what you’d do differently if you had to implement it again.