Workplace Wasteland
Have you been looking around? Over the past few years, I have noticed a decrease in employee commitment, performance, and enthusiasm. What happened? There are two key factors. These include an employee commitment shift, whereby, employees are leaving when the bell rings (or before) to go to a ballgame or an anniversary dinner; and, we now have 24-hour access to a wealth of information via Internet browsing, email, and online shopping – all of which can be easily accessed during work hours. Okay, so what?
A 2008 Salary.com survey reported, “Sixty-four percent of respondents said they waste one hour each day, 22 percent waste approximately two hours daily, and 14 percent waste three or more hours each workday.” Conservatively speaking, using this data, 64 of every 100 employees each generate up to 2.64 hours per day or 13.20 hours per week of unproductive time. This time is paid – do the math. This is costly when times are good, and can be devastating when times are tough.
Add to this scenario that “Over 60 percent of employees” stated they “do not have enough work to do each day.” And further, that socializing with co-workers, searching the web, making personal phone calls, and taking longer breaks is acceptable or justified. After all, what else are they to do when they have no work to do?
As a business owner or manager, perhaps you have been focused on establishing or building the business and you haven’t been looking around. Start today. Develop a workable plan for aggressively assessing all functions of the business to determine who and how many employees should be completing each task. Determine sooner than later if you have too many employees.
Implement methods of consistently measuring employee performance and the improvement of processes. Working smarter and being more productive in all areas will be instrumental for a positive balance sheet. You must employ only those employees who genuinely want to do a good job, who are dependable, and who bring value to the company. Manage employee focus and opportunities to foster measurable employee commitment, improved performance, and added enthusiasm.
Simultaneously, implement written policies that clearly identify and communicate employee responsibility regarding the use of company-provided communication tools. It is helpful to communicate how much wasting time costs the company and individuals with regard to possible decrease in benefits offered, reduced merit increases, and limited career opportunities.
The obvious goal is to effectively increase the total number of productive hours each employee works. Know who is doing what, have a good understanding of the amount of work to be accomplished, and normal time allotment for the particular function of any given position. Getting this detail is required for a good assessment. Too often, companies become much too relaxed with regard to expectations. And far too many times, bring on new staff when it is not required.
It is hoped that you can communicate the value of a “good day’s work” and can illustrate to all employees that improved productivity results in rewards, while downtime costs everyone.
