Real-User Monitoring for Hybrid Workforces

In this era of hybrid work—at home, on the go, and in the office—employees rely on a mix of SaaS applications, legacy systems, and third-party tools. Ensuring seamless digital experiences under these circumstances is crucial because slow-running apps mean costly loss of productivity. 

IT teams and business leaders face mounting challenges: how can they measure performance, maintain productivity, and cultivate user satisfaction—all without compromising security or modifying application code?  

Ekara Browser Agent Real User Monitoring (RUM) is a cutting-edge solution that addresses these challenges. 

Challenges of Monitoring Hybrid Work Environments 

Hybrid work environments have transformed workflows and introduced new complexities for the teams that support employees who work with business applications. (Read more about Hybrid Observability and Why It’s Crucial for Modern Businesses.)  

In terms of real-user experience, employees often deal with slow load times, laggy interactions, and errors in critical web-based applications like Salesforce, Office 365, and Workday. These issues lead to frustration, reduced efficiency, and lost productivity.  

Meanwhile, IT teams face a number of challenges in their efforts to see into and improve the employee experience on such mission-critical web applications: 

• Blind spots in SaaS applications: traditional RUM cannot provide visibility into third-party apps that the company does not own, control, or have the ability to edit. 
• Unawareness of front-end performance: technical monitoring that focuses on the back end misses real-world end-user experience problems like JavaScript errors. 
• Legacy or internally developed software: for these types of app, it may be too complex or risky to modify the codebase as required for traditional RUM.  
• Security concerns: organizations hesitate to embed third-party scripts or intervene in code due to compliance risks. 
• Troubleshooting after the fact: performance issues go unnoticed until users complain, leading to downtime, reduced productivity, and poor user experience in critical business applications 

Browser Agent RUM: Efficient, Lightweight Monitoring  

Ekara Browser Agent RUM is a lightweight, easy-to-deploy browser extension that ensures 100% monitoring coverage across all web applications—without modifying application code. It works seamlessly in remote and hybrid environments, capturing real user interactions in real time. 

Here’s what Ekara Browser Agent RUM looks like in action: 

A team of financial analysts logs in on Monday morning. Their CRM, banking platforms, and reporting tools take forever to load. Deadlines are tight, clients are waiting, but work is crawling. Complaints are coming in to the helpdesk fast and steady: 

 “Why is our system always slow?” 

 “Is it my home WiFi? The VPN? The browser?” 

 “I just got disconnected again—can you fix this?” 

Employees waste time troubleshooting instead of working. The IT team, blind to the root cause, can only suggest generic fixes: “Try restarting your router” or “Clear your cache.” But that’s not solving the problem. 

By deploying Ekara RUM Browser Agent on all remote employees’ browsers, IT teams get real-time data from every user, in every location: 

– A pattern emerges—CRM applications slow down for employees using specific VPN configurations 

– Latency spikes are linked to a certain region’s internet provider 

– IT can fix the root cause instead of wasting time on guesswork 

Employees experience faster, uninterrupted access to their applications. Productivity increases, frustration drops, and IT becomes a proactive enabler instead of a reactive fixer. 

Browser Agent Advantages for Tech Teams  

1. Zero-Code Deployment: 
   • No need for tracking scripts or SDKs. The browser agent can be deployed automatically via enterprise IT tools like Group Policy (GPO), ensuring full coverage with minimal effort. 
2. Comprehensive Monitoring: 
   • Tracks performance and detects unresponsiveness from the end-user perspective across SaaS applications (e.g., Salesforce, Microsoft 365), internally hosted tools (e.g. company portals, HR systems, finance tools), and even hybrid applications that mix internal and external components. 
3. Real-Time Insights: 
   • Provides actionable data on front-end performance issues such as slow API calls or high latency in specific regions. 
4. Security and Compliance: 
   • Operates without third-party scripts, and without accessing or editing application code, to keep systems safe from cyber threats and data breaches. 

Ekara Browser Agent for Real-User Monitoring: Highlights 

Ekara Browser Agent RUM bridges the gap between IT teams and business leaders by providing a unified view of digital experience metrics in hybrid work environments, measured at the front end.  

No Code, No Hassle! 

The Browser Agent works as a browser extension, capturing real-user interactions across all web applications without requiring any changes to the application itself. 

Faster deployment: no need for development teams to implement SDKs 

Lower maintenance: no worries about code updates breaking applications  

Coverage of any and all web-based applications, even SaaS delivered apps in which IT teams cannot intervene 

Internal, SaaS & Everything in Between 

A Browser Agent sees everything an employee uses in their browser, including internally hosted apps, SaaS or cloud-based tools, and hybrid applications. 

Visibility into UX across all web-based tools: IT teams can analyze how apps perform, even those outside their direct control 

Detects slowdowns from employees’ perspective: unlike back-end monitoring, the Browser Agent detects degraded service in SaaS applications that impact productivity 

Optimizes software license and application usage: helps businesses track which applications are most popular among employees and identify potential redundancies in SaaS subscriptions 

Instant Enterprise-Wide Monitoring 

A Browser Agent can be deployed automatically via Group Policy (GPO) or similar enterprise IT tools, ensuring full coverage with zero effort from employees. 

No disruption to employees: employees can do their work without having to install, configure, or even notice the browser agent is running 

Scalable to large enterprises: easily deployed across thousands of users without manual setup 

Ensures consistent monitoring: no risk of users disabling or forgetting to install it 

Browser Agent RUM Elevates Digital Performance Observability 

Since digital performance directly impacts business outcomes, organizations need real-user visibility into the applications employees and customers rely on daily. Ekara Browser Agent RUM offers a transformative approach to real user monitoring. Its lightweight deployment, comprehensive coverage, and actionable insights make it an indispensable tool for teams managing end-user application performance in hybrid workforces. 

With Ekara RUM Browser Agent, IT teams can move beyond reactive troubleshooting to proactive optimization—ensuring higher productivity, improved employee and customer experiences, and less downtime. 

For organizations looking to optimize their digital workflows without compromising security or control, Ekara Browser Agent RUM is the ultimate solution—empowering teams to stay ahead of performance challenges and deliver exceptional user experiences.