5 Workplace 'Time-Wasters': Worth The Time?
Studies show that activities long considered by managers to be time-wasters at work may actually boost your productivity. How many of these are part of your workday?
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Salary.com's 2014 Wasting Time at Work survey paints a dismal caricature of the contemporary worker. More than 60% of the 750 workers responding to the survey admitted that they waste from 30 to 60 minutes on the job every day. More than 25% of workers surveyed acknowledged that they squander more than an hour each day.
But isn't this just human nature? Our animal instincts bind us with evolutionary traits kicking in each workday (especially right after lunch), compelling idle chitchat with coworkers, furtive Internet activities, and other HR department bête noires. Office gossip, for instance, is "part of the fabric of our communication. It's absolutely impossible not to gossip," according to career coach Julie Jansen in a Fox Business News article.
There's also the issue of employee health -- to which frequent workplace breaks are vital. Ergonomic experts recommend that office workers look away from their screens every 15 minutes, and take breaks every 30 to 60 minutes to stand up and walk around.
So, what does "wasting time" at work actually mean? More to the point, do the activities considered by Salary.com and its survey respondents to be time-wasters actually harm productivity? Or do such activities preserve your health and enhance your workplace productivity?
Here's a look at five activities traditionally considered time-wasters that can actually benefit your performance at work. Once you've reviewed our top five, tell us if you've ever engaged in any of these activities at work, and how doing so affected your productivity. What other activities that may not look like "working" actually help you accomplish your workday tasks? Tell us all about it in the comments section below.
Conjuring up images of three-Martini lunches like those favored by TV characters Don Draper or J.R. Ewing, on-the-job drinking has shed its stigma and is making something of a comeback. Facebook and Google, for instance, are known for openly allowing beer drinking at work. Major marketing firms freely let the libations flow at the workplace to encourage collaboration while justifying longer workdays. Some small startups host "happy hours," where employees and friends of the company can meet up to unwind, strengthen their bonds, and make new connections, all of which may eventually lead the company to new growth opportunities. In the old days, we called this networking.
(Image source: Stirling Council, John McPake Creative Commons license)
Watercooler visits keep you healthier than the standard smoke breaks or coffee breaks (and have none of the deleterious effects of the company drink cart). Gathering around the watercooler also offers myriad opportunities for touching base with your colleagues.
Certainly, watercooler gossip can be harmful -- but it can, alternatively, be constructive, according to a Fox Business report. Done right, with a positive attitude, workplace gossip can create loyalty, contextualize change, and raise morale (the latter, for instance, by spreading the news of a coworker's good fortune, such as a promotion, wedding engagement, or news of a birth).
So go ahead, wet your whistle (and whet your curiosity). It will keep you hydrated, healthy, and in the loop.
(Image source: John Liu via Creative Commons license)
Offering numerous fun and competitive platforms -- including board games, billiards, chess tables, ping-pong, and even swimming pools -- startup incubators and Silicon Valley titans alike have long recognized the value of games in the workplace. In addition to giving employees more reasons to stay in the office, games are a great way for co-workers to get together and collaborate while keeping their minds sharp.
Computer games and gaming apps, from Starcraft to Bejeweled, are similarly appreciated in progressive workplaces. Gaming apps can even be adapted to enhance productivity, security, and collaboration by using gamification techniques.
(Image source: Tony Alter via Creative Commons license.)
Daydreaming is important work. Studies show that daydreaming self-motivates while enhancing productivity. Companies such as Google, Facebook, and LinkedIn recognize this by affirmatively giving their employees paid time to "goof off."
Psychologists have found that just before a moment of remarkable insight, the human brain activates those parts of itself associated with understanding poetry and metaphors -- and to achieve this moment of insight, a person must be in a good mood and take time to relax.
Hence, daydreaming is essential for innovation. So, don't put up with any interruptions.
(Image source: Umberto Salvagnin via Creative Commons license)
Contrary to what your boss may say, browsing fun Internet sites at work is good for you and your company (as long as you don't click on malicious links).
A 2011 National University of Singapore study ("Impact of Cyberloafing on Psychological Engagement") demonstrated that just-for-fun Web browsing improves worker productivity -- much more so than other break-time activities do. The researchers tasked three groups of study participants with highlighting as many instances of the letter E as they could in a given passage and then -- after a 10-minute interval during which one group browsed Websites -- had the participants highlight as many cases of the letter A as they could in a passage.
The results? The Web dalliers were 16% more productive after their break than those who spent their break on non-Web activities -- and 39% more effective than a control group that worked on a filler assignment. Surveyed afterwards, the Web users reported feeling significantly less bored and tired -- and significantly more engaged -- relative to the other participants.
While the study also showed that checking personal email presented a counterproductive exception, if you indulge in a few minutes here and there browsing some of your favorite (non-email) websites at work, you're likely doing your boss a favor.
(Image source: Public Domain Pictures via Pixabay.)
Whether or not an activity constitutes wasted time depends on your perspective. Next time your boss looks askance at the time you spend watching cat videos at work, you can share the stats presented here as proof that you're actually making yourself a better worker. Would your boss tolerate these behaviors at work? Are you employed by a company that sees the business value of wasted time? Or are you expected to be a nonstop automaton every second you're on the clock? Tell us about it in the comments section below.
(Image source: Pixabay.)
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