Executive Pay: The Curious Case of Carlos Ghosn’s Arrest
February 12, 2025
Automation is the next big thing! Right from the time of the printing press, automation has always been making headlines. It fundamentally changes the way jobs are performed. However, given the rapid technological advancement in the recent past, there has been an unusually high level of scaremongering regarding how automation is going to affect the […]
Introduction Sales support systems were developed to assist the sales force in improving productivity. This improvement in productivity was through continuous communication with the field offices about customer activities and requirements. The sales force focus was on cultivating long and fruitful customer relation. Before the advent of information system, customer-related information was recorded in individual […]
The Indian pharmaceutical market is huge, and drugs worth billions of dollars are manufactured and sold every year in India. Some of these drugs are sold locally, and some are exported abroad. India is the fourth largest pharmaceutical market in the world whereas it is also the largest exporter of pharmaceutical drugs worldwide. This rapidly […]
Elon Musk launched his car company Tesla in order to make cars that would not harm the environment. He has marketed Tesla as being an eco-friendly car. Also, some of the largest economies in the world like China and the United States plan to switch to electric cars in the next couple of decades. The […]
Today, South Korea is one of the largest economies in the world. It is the 12th largest to be precise. However, the influence it has in global markets is significant. It is home to many multinational corporations which compete against the best in the world. For instance, American markets are flooded with Korean manufactured automobiles. […]
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.
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *