Lost productivity due to the internet

lionking said:
My company, which employs about 1,000 people, has strict Internet filters. No Facebook (I'm fighting this with other senior managers), no you tube and so on. I can't access this forum because it's blocked by our net nanny (amazingly I can access Skeptical Community).

Even so, we know that around 25% of Internet access in our business is non-work related. What is the experience of others?

Yes, we can't do business without the web, but how much productivity is lost through misuse of the Internet? I know a lot of you guys post from work. What's the cost?
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I am the bad guy who controls the Internet access for the 200+ employees of a company.

An IT guy with unlimited Internet access used 40% of his working time surfing on non work related websites, during a one-month logging period. Others who don´t have Internet access at work, have iPhones or mini laptops with 3G stick, or a weekly magazine on the desk.

I don´t believe in the power of Internet filtering. I believe in open offices where a community of workers can see what the others are doing.
 
Tony said:
Really? I doubt it. The obvious truth is that since they can do their jobs and find time to goof around on the net, they are spending too much time at work.

If we want to see if the internet is really causing a loss of productivity, we need to compare productivity data from before the internet became widely used against productivity data today. Anything else is speculation.
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Argument for a 30 Hour work week coming in 3...2...1...
 
Sir Robin Goodfellow said:
I don't have time during the day to take a crap, never mind spend hours goofing off. Who the hell can afford to fart around during work hours?
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Me. I don't even have "work hours" per se; I work the job, not the clock. Most of my job is research, which means reading, writing, and thinking, and it's the sort of thing that a few minutes scanning teh InterWebz doesn't interfere with. Most of the rest of my job is teaching, which involves specified interactions with students at specified times. And the rest involves "service," which isn't even well-defined.

But as long as I can get my three journal articles out each year, the administration doesn't care whether or not I'm reading xkcd during working hours. Especially since I'm usually in the office sixty hours a week anyway.
 
In the old days when I worked at bigger companies, if I needed a break I would go for a walk through the halls. I'd walk with a purpose and carry a piece of paper and look like I was reading it and no one ever said anything. That little bit of physical activity was refreshing when you sit at a desk all day.

I walk in a small office so a walk around would take about 8 seconds now.
 
Tony said:
Really? I doubt it. The obvious truth is that since they can do their jobs and find time to goof around on the net, they are spending too much time at work.

If we want to see if the internet is really causing a loss of productivity, we need to compare productivity data from before the internet became widely used against productivity data today. Anything else is speculation.
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Anecdote from one of my clients. Largish (by local standards) tech company consolidated their numerous, scattered rental offices into one new, purpose built, HQ building. After three months they noticed productivity per head had dropped significantly, more than 10%.
After some investigation they found the culprit; their brand new canteen. Previously staff popped out, grabbed some lunch and ate at their desks working; now they spend at least 45 minutes in the canteen.:)
 
My company doesn't have the extra workload to provide. Getting rid of internet access would just lead to decreased morale and reduced productivity due to boredom. And with that, we're still under staffed. My group regularly works 64 hour work weeks. Often 168 hours without a day off. And mostly we just wait for something to break and then tell someone else to fix it.

Sometimes the job just doesn't involve doing much.
 
Sir Robin Goodfellow said:
Well, I don't know what others do for a living. Some jobs do have down time. Mine does not. I could work twenty-four hours a day if I wanted to.

Meh, I just feel crappy this morning. I've got a headache and I can't stay home because there will be almost nobody else at work today. We're severely understaffed even if everybody shows up, and at least two people are taking today off.
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Why don't they hire more people?
 
lionking said:
Yes, we can't do business without the web, but how much productivity is lost through misuse of the Internet? I know a lot of you guys post from work. What's the cost?
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I will honestly say that I believe my work productivity is actually increased by my ability to surf the net while at work.

The ability to take lots of very small random breaks, removes the monotony of my work tasks and keeps me able to stay focused when I am working.

If all I had to look at on the computer was the various databases I work on and emails, I think I would be a lot more bored, less inspired, and less able to focus.

Paradoxical? Maybe so.


...but of course, there are other folks in my immediate office who use the internet to avoid working, by being on Youtube, Ebay, and Facebook non-stop.
 
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I have no idea whether the study reported here is any good, but I remembered the story, so thought I would post it.

Workers are more productive when they are able to occasionally do non-work stuff online, researchers at the University of Melbourne have found. Dr. Brent Coker studied the habits of 300 workers and found that the large majority engaged in what he calls "Workplace Internet Leisure Browsing" (WILB)—surfing the Internet for personal reasons. But despite the common perception that such a behavior is a drain on employers, Coker says that these employees are able to focus better when performing tasks for work.
In his report, Coker said that 70 percent of workers engage in WILB, the most popular of which involved looking for information about products, reading news, playing games, and watching YouTube videos. "People need to zone out for a bit to get back their concentration," he said in a statement. "Short and unobtrusive breaks, such as a quick surf of the internet, enables the mind to rest itself, leading to a higher total net concentration for a days work, and as a result, increased productivity."
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http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2009/04/study-surfing-the-internet-at-work-boosts-productivity.ars
 
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Tony said:
If we want to see if the internet is really causing a loss of productivity, we need to compare productivity data from before the internet became widely used against productivity data today. Anything else is speculation.
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This.

Productivity as measured by economists has continued to go up since the internet became ubiquitous.

Maybe people before the internet found other ways to waste time.
Or maybe the internet lets them do their work faster.

I know mine does. I am a translator, and it makes looking up obscure terms really easy and fast. Without Google I would have to search through reference books, which would take a long time. Multiply this by every other translator in my company. It's like a free service from Google. If they limited the websites that can be looked at by employees, it might be harder to look up words or find examples of usage.
 
I think having the internet at work can actually be mentally healthy, as it allows very tiny little breaks from work. These little breaks, keep us sane and happy.

But of course, abuse should be dealt with.
 
Professor Yaffle said:
I have no idea whether the study reported here is any good, but I remembered the story, so thought I would post it.


http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2009/04/study-surfing-the-internet-at-work-boosts-productivity.ars
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Thanks for this Prof. I'm trying to convince my boss to at least allow Facebook access. She's an excellent boss, but conservative so this study could help. Our company has a Facebook page and releases a heap of you tubes, but all we can do is ask staff to view them at home in their own time. A bit silly really.
 
A lot of what I do is answering the phone and so when I use the internet it's not really lost productivity because I would just be waiting around for the phone otherwise and passing on messages. I answer it on its first ring the vast majority of the time. I don't go online for personal things when I'm tutoring there.

The JREF forum isn't blocked but one forum I post on is on account of it being about videogames. I have briefly gone to that site on my phone in the past but that is costly.
 
I must admit I'm hardly a paragon of virtue. It's my job to keep important customers on side, and get new ones. I also do other stuff which contributes to our bottom line. I know I generate millions of dollars income, and our Division is running at over 25% ROI, way above budget. Since I bought my iPad I spend probably three hours a day browsing this forum.
 
Oh, hey guys... if you've got time to lean, you've got time to clean. Next time you find yourself caught up at work, grab a broom, start sweeping. And scrub the damn toilets while you're at it. Those things are filthy.
 
Professor Yaffle said:
I have no idea whether the study reported here is any good, but I remembered the story, so thought I would post it.


http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2009/04/study-surfing-the-internet-at-work-boosts-productivity.ars
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A thank you from me also, Prof. This study provides some actual evidence for what I feel about internet at work. When I'm focused on my job, I'm 100% focused, but then I need to take time out, which usually means coming to JREF for a catch-up and giving my brain something equally (more?) stimulating but on a completely different subject. Then I'm ready to go back to that report I was writing, or phoning some clients. Without this pattern of on-off my brain would literally explode and my productivity over the course of the whole day would decrease.

I think most of us are probably working at cognitive under-capacity at work most of the time. The theory that allowing non-work related internet access at work will lead to decreased productivity implies that are brains full to bursting from that work stuff we have to think about, when it's more likely that most of the time we can cope with thinking about more than one thing in a 45 minute period. Especially the kind of clever folks who hang out here, right? :)

Also, isn't there evidence that after about 40 minutes of concentrating on the same task one's focus is diminished and you need a break/change?
 
True to form, XKCD nails it today.

let_go.png




And on that note, I'm taking a break for a while!
 
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