Employees waste two hours a day on IT misuse

May 24 2006 - A study by ntl:Telewest Business found that computer and telephone practices can have negative effects on employee productity. Bad habits at work lengthen the working day - and men waste the most time at work.

On average, the 1,468 people questioned were found to waste 2 hours and 10 minutes each day at work. Of this, an hour and 38 minutes could be attributed to the ineffective use of communication technologies.

Over-reliance on voicemail when returning or making phone calls was highlighted as a major timewaster, because of having to wait for people to call back with the required information. On average, 27 minutes was wasted responding to voicemails or managing phone calls. A further 12 minutes was lost trying to locate colleagues. Similarly, waiting for emails to be answered with relevant information was another source of daily time wastage, averaging 42 minutes a day.

When asked to admit what they were really doing while they were 'working', men appear to waste the most time on non-work activities. Main findings were (men first, women second):

• Emailing with friends: 39% compared to 36%
• Following sport online: 19% compared to 4%
• Arranging social life: 29% compared to 21%
• Online shopping: 21% compared to 14%

Stephen Beynon, MD, ntl:Telewest Business, said: "Communications tools that once contributed significantly to productivity have started to become a drain on it. That means employees can be faced with working longer hours unnecessarily. Many bad habits, such as 'voicemail tag', are inevitable but using more appropriate communications tools can cure much of the timewasting."

"Often the root of reduced productivity is that you don't know where people are, be it in a meeting, at another location or away off site. New communication services with instant messaging features are changing this, as they can identify instantly what an individual is doing and enable the 'caller' to communicate with them in the most appropriate way. New services will aim to iron out the productivity blips that hamper organisations today and save employees from wasting time at work," he said.

Other sources of wasted time found in the study were:

• Travel not including to and from work: 14 minutes
• Chasing responses to urgent emails: 42 minutes
• Responding to voicemails or managing phone calls: 27 minutes
• Trying to locate colleagues: 12 minutes
• Meetings that are unnecessarily long: 12 minutes
• Asking others for files or documents (e.g. version control): 9 minutes
• Scheduling and rescheduling meetings: 8 minutes
• Conference calls that could be far shorter: 6 minutes

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