It’s well known that distractions wreak havoc on productivity. Now comes a study from CareerBuilder revealing exactly what makes it so hard to concentrate at work, including smartphones, chatty colleagues, and never-ending social media feeds.
Asked to name the biggest productivity killers at their companies, 2,175 managers said pretty much what you would expect: Cell phones (52%), the Internet (44%), gossip (37%), and email (31%).
Then there are the, um, more surprising things that bosses have found someone doing instead of actually working, including:
- Taking a sponge bath in the restroom sink
- Searching online for a mail-order bride
- Hiding in a bathroom stall to play a video game on a smartphone
- Sabotaging another employee’s car tires
- Trying to hypnotize other employees to help them quit smoking
- Writing negative posts about the company on social media
- Sleeping on the CEO’s couch
- Searching Google images for “cute kittens”
- Building a model airplane
- Visiting a tanning booth instead of making deliveries
- Flying drones around the office
- Printing pictures of animals, naming them after coworkers, and hanging them on the walls around the work area
Then there was our personal favorite: “Drinking vodka while watching Netflix.”
What if you’re one of those people (you know who you are) who just can’t resist a little unauthorized R&R now and then? It might help, says CareerBuilder human resources chief Rosemary Haefner, to “schedule ‘play breaks.’ Give yourself permission to take a break, and set a definite ending time. Not only will you have something to look forward to, but you’ll also know when it’s time to get back to work.”
