Are You Distracted 17 Times a Day?

Employees face up to 17 different distractions throughout the working day, attend unproductive meetings and struggle to use technology that was originally intended to improve productivity.

Meanwhile, businesses are investing in time and tools for skilled professional office-based staff (knowledge workers) to collaborate and concentrate, according to The Productivity at the Office – Challenges 2015 report from Jabra.

Workers question the productivity of collaborative workspaces

The report reveals that most workers question the productivity of collaborative workspaces that businesses have created to achieve efficiencies: most are situated in open-plan offices (34%), which are also thought of as the least productive environments (35% agree).

The report also reveals the failure of knowledge workers to organise effective collaboration time. Over half agree that meetings without direction or a clear agenda lead to wasted meeting time, 32% cite lack of decision-making, 31% cite lack of follow-up, 26% a lack of preparation and 25% the effect of latecomers.

In a conference call scenario, some of the most annoying issues are due to sound, whether not being able to hear people’s voices, irrelevant background noise, connection issues, overall audio quality or not knowing if speakerphones are working as intended.

36% claim meetings diminish their personal productivity

This presents a paradox: the majority of knowledge workers want to attend meetings, despite these issues, because of the perceived productivity gain to the organisation, even though 36% claim meetings diminish their personal productivity.

Productivity of time spent at their desks is also important: workers spend most of their time at their desks, over 66% of the working week (over 6 times more than in meetings), so this is where productivity gains can be made or lost.

However, knowledge workers deal with up to 17 distractions during work, many of which are caused by other people. Most common are distracting noise levels (46%), interruptions from colleagues (43%), and number of emails (28%).

People also value environmental factors that could be better controlled, such as temperature, air quality and lack of privacy. Rethinking desk-space for time spent concentrating could eliminate a host of issues that negatively impact productivity at work.

Limited productivity at work affects the ability to attract and retain staff

The report also highlights how limited productivity at work affects a company’s ability to attract and retain staff, as distractions in the workplace affect work-life balance.

Today, a proportion of knowledge workers are struggling to complete their tasks during the working day. 36% are completing tasks outside of working hours and the office, in order to make sure work is completed ahead of the next working day.

To facilitate meetings, technology such as smart boards, speakerphones, project management software or mind-mapping or brainstorming software is often used.

Yet, implementing these tools is often counter-intuitive to productivity, for example time spent setting up conference calls. The time and investment wasted extends to: 25% of meetings are delayed due to technical and/or user issues, and on average, 2.7 minutes of every meeting is lost as a result.

Depending on the number of attendees at the meeting, the cost to the business can escalate. Whilst 71% of meetings take place in one place, 29% are across multiple locations so collaborative technology is crucial. However, knowledge workers struggle to use it, causing significant frustrations that five in ten say are the most annoying.

“Productivity is critical to business success and remaining competitive. Every allocated resource should be used to its best advantage and to the most benefit to the organisation, with processes and tools in place to make sure this happens,” said Nigel Dunn at Jabra UK & Ireland. “Whilst many organisations have designed workspaces to facilitate better collaboration and have invested in technology to bring people together in meetings or on calls, this approach is not consistently delivering the intended benefits. Businesses need to re-evaluate their knowledge workers’ needs to ensure productivity throughout the working day, if they are to meet commercial goals.”

The Productivity at the Office report is a survey of over 2,449 workers aged 18-65 across USA, UK, France, Germany, Russia, Japan, China, Denmark, Sweden and Norway, conducted in May 2015 as part of Jabra’s New Ways of Working initiative.

Click here to download the report