And it goes without saying that the number-one scapegoat is the Internet, which allegedly gives the time-wasting worker a virtually unlimited number of ways to squander work hours. An article in the October issue of Computer Currents quotes a SurfWatch Software study that claimed that employees were spending 25 percent of their Internet time visiting non-business-related sites. [2]
Well, it may or may not be true that employees are loafing more than they used to -- I don't think they are, but let's assume, for the sake of discussion, that maybe more people are wasting their employers' time than used to be the case, back in the good old days of Henry Ford, J.P. Morgan, and the 12-hour workday. But why does it matter how employees spend their time, as long as they're completing the work the boss asked them to do?
Tote that barge, lift that bale!
When it comes to overseeing employees, most managers are stuck in the Dark Ages. They think the way to manage a worker is to hover over his shoulder, making sure he's got his nose to the grindstone all day. And they think that if he does have his nose to the grindstone, that in and of itself means he's doing a good job.
Telecommuting, not surprisingly, is a major hot button for many employers. The Personnel Journal article says that in a lot of companies, workers who have to work at the office like to make snide remarks to their telecommuting colleagues -- "So, you decided to come to work today," and so forth. Managers, for their part, can't seem to get past the sneaking suspicion that their employees who work at home are somehow getting away with something. (I think managers don't like telecommuting largely because they can't do it.)
Web browsing is the most popular whipping boy these days -- and not entirely without reason. After all, it provides the distracted worker with a built-in way to waste time without leaving his or her workstation -- and while appearing to be busy.
(Countin') dem beans, dem beans
The problem here is that white-collar managers have a mindset more appropriate for a manufacturing plant -- they seem to think that employees are robots who work at a constant pace, cranking out a certain number of widgets per hour. Any loafing, they reason, costs time -- and every hour lost to loafing means a certain number of widgets won't get made. The people who measure productivity love to argue that if there are 60 people working for a company, and each of those 60 people wastes one minute out of every hour, that's one employee-hour being wasted. Multiply that by eight, and you've got a "waste" of an FTE (full-time employee). Put another way, you might as well have one person sitting at the desk all day, doing nothing, because that's how much time is getting wasted.
I suppose it would be nice if people worked that way -- unfortunately, they don't. Most people I know tend to work at an uneven pace. They'll be really productive for a certain portion of the workday, somewhat productive for another portion, and not at all productive for still another portion. There's nothing wrong with this -- it's human nature. The productivity weenies would argue that each person should simply go into the "really productive" mode all day, instead of only part of the day. Doing that would maximize company productivity.
The logical extension of this is that "really productive" time could be maximized by cutting out the things that allow employees to go into "somewhat productive" and "not at all productive" modes -- and, of course, the way to do that is to make them work in the office, under the manager's nose, and with no distractions available. Sound familiar?
Well, in my experience, this is not how it works. When I'm working at home, doing e-mail customer support for a couple of Web-based information products, I'm much more productive than when I'm working in an office. I'm not sure exactly why -- but I think it has to more do with the fact that at the office, there are more, not fewer, distractions. Phones ring, co-workers drop by, coffee and (if you're lucky) doughnuts are available, and the boss can drop by and interrupt what you're doing at any moment. By contrast, when I'm in my home-office (where I'm typing this column), I shut the door, and there are almost no distractions. The phone can't ring, because my modem usually has it tied up. My co-workers are hundreds, if not thousands, of miles away. Coffee may be available, but I've usually already got it by the time I get here. And the boss sends e-mail if he wants to get hold of me. Which he usually doesn't, because I'm getting my work done efficiently.
It's not how, it's how many
I'm not advocating loafing. Obviously, if the economy is going to function, companies are going to make money, software is going to get released on time, and a day's work is going to get done in exchange for a day's pay, everyone has to pull his or her weight. My point is simply that end-of-day results are what managers should be looking for. When you assign someone a task -- coding a software feature, testing a module, writing a procedure, or, for that matter, rebuilding an engine or painting a wall -- what counts is what gets done and when the finished product is available. A worker who can do the whole job in an hour, then spend the rest of his day playing solitaire or surfing the Web, is just as good as a worker who needs to go flat-out all day to get the same task done.
In my experience, it's the "productivity" weenies -- the ones who whine about employee loafing and who think people are replaceable robots -- who are always losing workers and then having to scramble to fill the job openings that result. By contrast, the best bosses I've had have been results-oriented -- people who hire good employees (or consultants), show them what they need, then step aside and trust their staff to get the job done with minimal supervision, while still being available for consultation when needed. Managers who trust their subordinates are rewarded with trust, respect, and loyalty. And also with hard work and minimal loafing!
Copyright © 1998 John J. Kafalas
[2] Fran Quittel, "Surf on your own time," Computer Currents, October 1998, p. 41.