You are working hard when you download the tools to go to perthnow.com.au to read breaking news.
Then an email from a friend provides you with a hyperlink to the weirdest cat video you’ve seen, since yesterday.
Before you know it, you’ve spent two hours.
Cyberloafing, or engaging in non-work-related screen time while connected to work, often tops the list of how employees enjoy themselves in the workplace.
Camera icon Professor Gary Martin. Credit: Bruno Kongawoin
He sits next to other notorious time assassins, such as making idle gossip with his comrades, taking too many breaks, making personal phone calls, and the one that leaves most marinated heads in misery: soliciting other places to work during working hours.
Increased distance work, increased flexible work options, and access to personal electronic devices in the workplace have significantly increased the opportunities available for cyber-loafing. Some bosses are worried about how little they feel they can do to keep the focus on workplace productivity under control.
Bosses have blamed cyber-loafing on a declining work ethic, lack of commitment, and total laziness, sometimes even labeling those who are distracted as attention-deficit cubicle gears.
Not surprisingly, some employers have blocked certain websites and social networks or developed draconian internet usage policies. However, an emerging generation of bosses is reconsidering whether cyberloafing could have been unfairly given a negative light.
More and more experts believe that a cyberloafing point could be beneficial for employees, as small breaks between tasks could revitalize workers and even help manage work stress.
Therefore, briefly shutting down from work from time to time, a psychological breakdown, can help restart employees who suffer from declining energy levels.
Because workers tend to visit mainly the places they like, it is believed that a quick screen time acts as a break for coffee or a snack, providing a pleasant and rejuvenating experience for the worker, in turn, to trigger a re-establishment. of the brain.
The result is that a head of activity that was previously considered to waste employees ’time could be an increase in productivity.
We all cyberbully from time to time. But when does an electrical break become a good slack in the old fashioned way?
Depending on the individual, a period of five to 15 minutes of cyber-loafing is believed to be more likely to have a refreshing impact.
Anything beyond this time period is likely to make the transition back to work-related tasks more difficult.
Just because bosses are starting to see the benefits of a cyber-loafing site doesn’t mean you have to spend all day at work browsing online to get the best airfare for your winter shelter in the world. or find the love of your life through a dating site.
But you should give up the guilt trip to spend a few minutes on Instagram when mid-afternoon fatigue sets in.
For more information and experience on current workplace topics, visit AIM WA Workplace Conversations
Professor Gary Martin is Executive Director of the Australian Institute of Management WA