Privacy in the Professional Driver’s Workplace

The aim of this paper is to provide a discussion about workplace privacy in the context of the professional HGV driver, as well as to empirically investigate the attitudes of the drivers and their employers regarding this issue. It explores privacy issues from an organizational and employee-employer perspective via three types of concerns: individuals' privacy rights, protection of personal information, and workplace surveillance, i.e. performance and behavioral monitoring. This study differs from earlier work on workplace privacy in that it specifically addresses the mobile HGV workplace, which is generally only briefly mentioned as a example of detailed, real-time workplace surveillance. The results (based on interviews with professional HGV drivers (employees) and road haulage company representatives (employers) in Sweden) do not indicate high levels of concern over privacy in general, protection of employees' personal information, or performance and behavioral monitoring. However, the interviews reveal a communication gap between drivers and companies regarding privacy policies and practices, and differences in perceptions of ITS services' benefits for the companies versus the drivers. Suggested methods to improve organizational communication and driver benefit include ongoing, two-way dialogue about ITS services, feedback mechanisms to raise behavioral awareness, and before-after studies to investigate possible behavioral impacts.