Documenting a Process – Importance and Its Benefits
While improving business processes, it is essential that one document the process as well as any improvements made to it. Most consultants will document both the “As-Is Process” as well as the “To-Be Process”. While many think about it as customary and do it for the same reasons, there are other important reasons to document […]
The Glocal Approach in Business Is Applying Practical Intelligence in the Real World
What is Practical Intelligence, Why Is It Important, and How It Works in the Real World The world admires Street Smart tinkerers and Go Getters who get “things done”. For instance, how many times haven’t been in awe of the Fixers and the Technicians, who with little formal education manage to repair mechanical and electrical […]
Business Process Re-Engineering – Meaning, its Need and Technology
Hammer and Champy’s concept of Business Process Re-Engineering depends on harnessing technology to optimize processes as its main driver. To understand why technology is imperative for BPR, let’s first review what BPR does. What is BPR? “BPR is the fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of business processes to achieve dramatic improvements in critical contemporary measures […]
Phases of ERP Implementation
Like any other project, ERP implementation goes through various interconnected phases. These phases may be sequential but at occasions overlap. Normally, every phase has entry criteria, which needs to be fulfilled before the commencement of the phase. A phase is deemed to have completed when pre-determined deliverables are achieved. Various phases of ERP implementation, for […]
ERP Service Module – Planning, Warranties and Contracts
Service Planning – Attending of unscheduled maintenance tasks arising out of breakdown and faults both for internal and external customer is an important service activity of any organization. However, bulk of service activities arise out of planned service activities. For internal customers, this may be routine maintenance of plant and equipments, arising out of preventive […]
The 21st century is also known as the information age. The biggest companies in the world today sell nothing but information. Consider the case of Google, Facebook, and Twitter, etc. that have billions of dollars in market capitalization. Every company, big or small, now has a social media department. The job of the people in these departments is to manage the image of the company on social media. The workers in such jobs are required to spend part of their day on these social networking sites doing productive work.
However, for the vast majority of the workforce in the world, social media is a distraction. It might seem to be a minor and harmless one at first. However, that is not the case. The Economist magazine has researched in this regard. They estimate that logging onto social media costs the US economy a mindboggling 650 billion dollars. When statistics were converted to a per worker basis, the number came to $4500! Hence, every worker in the United States is annually wasting $4500 of their employer’s money loitering around on social media. The problem is apparently much bigger than it appears to be at first glance. In this article, we will have a closer look at how these digital distractions wreak havoc on worker productivity.
The straightforward solution to this is to remove the ambiguity about social media use from the workplace. Companies need to formulate, publish and communicate policies that specifically explain if social media can be used in the workplace and if so for how long.
These policies will vary widely depending upon the nature of the job. For instance, manufacturing jobs need higher attention to detail. Hence it is dangerous to allow even bare minimal use of social media. The same cannot be said of service-related jobs.
If users are working at a back office, they could be allowed to take a break to visit these websites. However, the time spent on these websites must be included in their leisure hours and not the work hours. The problem arises when workers can spend a large amount of time online without accounting for it.
The ideal way to implement this would be to block these websites on the company network and have one or two shared workstations where these websites are active. Hence, when users log into this workstation the time spent there will be recorded. Also, when social media is not readily available at the user’s fingertips, the usage tends to drop sharply.
Apart from such deadlines, companies should ensure that the task given to the worker fills their working hours completely. They can conduct time and motion studies to estimate the amount of time required for a job. Hence, if a worker can complete the tasks faster, they should be rewarded with leisure time which may include social media usage. Companies should accept social media as an integral part of life in the 21st century. They only need to manage its interference with work.
Lastly, it is important for the companies to ensure that they honor privacy laws while enforcing their policies. Companies do have the right to stop workers from accessing certain websites. However, they do not have the right to collect personal information about the worker without their consent.
To sum it up, social media has become a workplace menace. Companies need to adapt quickly by formulating policies that regulate its usage. In the absence of such regulations, workplace productivity is likely to be hit further.
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