So *how* do you waste time at work?
 

Wasting time at work

I found this story and it cracked me UP!.

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U.S. Workers Say They Waste 2 Hours A Day
Personal Internet Use Ranks As Top Time-Wasting Activity

POSTED: 10:39 am CDT July 11, 2005
UPDATED: 11:13 am CDT July 11, 2005

The average U.S. worker admits to wasting more than two hours a day at the workplace, according to a new survey conducted by America Online and Salary.com.

The survey found that the wasted time was double what employers expect and costs U.S. companies up to $759 billion a year.

How are workers spending that wasted time?

Top 10 Time-Wasting Activities

Surfing Internet (personal use)
Socializing with co-workers
Conducting personal business
Spacing out
Running errands off-premises
Making personal phone calls
Applying for other jobs
Planning personal events
Arriving late -- Leaving early
Other

According to the survey, most workers -- 44 percent -- used the time for personal Internet use, such as emails, message boards and chat rooms.

About 23 percent said they wasted time socializing with co-workers.

Other popular time-wasting activities cited in the survey included conducting personal business, "spacing out," running errands and making personal phone calls.

Bill Coleman, senior vice president at Salary.com, said employers build a certain amount of slacking off into the salary structure.

Coleman said employers expect workers to waste about an hour a day -- plus lunch.

"Our survey results show that workers on average are wasting a little more than twice what their employers expect. That's a startling figure," said Coleman.

But Coleman said in some cases, the wasted time turns into something positive for the company.

"Although in some cases this extra wasted time might be considered 'creative waste' -- time that may well have a positive impact on the company's culture, work environment, and even business results. Personal Internet use and casual office conversations often turn into new business ideas or suggestions for gaining operating efficiencies," he added.

According to the survey, the most popular excuse for wasting time at work was not having enough work to do.

Nearly a quarter of those surveyed said they squandered their work hours because they were underpaid.

The survey found that men and women waste about the same amount of time per day at work, despite the fact that most HR managers surveyed suspected that women waste more time than men.

The survey also found that older workers tend to waste less time at work than younger workers.

Workers over 55 years old wasted an average of just 30 minutes a day, according to the survey.

America Online and Salary.com interviewed 10,044 workers in the online survey.

Top 5 Excuses for Time-Wasting

Don't have enough work to do
Underpaid for amount of work I do
Co-workers distract me
Not enough evening or weekend time
Other

Top 10 Time-Wasting States

Missouri -- 3.2 Hrs/Day
Indiana -- 2.8 Hrs/Day
Kentucky -- 2.8 Hrs/Day
Wisconsin -- 2.8 Hrs/Day
Nevada -- 2.7 Hrs/Day
Oklahoma -- 2.7 Hrs/Day
Virginia -- 2.7 Hrs/Day
Pennsylvania -- 2.6 Hrs/day
Connecticut -- 2.5 Hrs/day
Idaho -- 2.5 Hrs/day
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GC, most definitely.

the stumble plugin on firefox
gc
facebook
myspace
songmeanings
google images
and ocassionally, work!

GC
MySpace
Email
Yahoo Entertainment news
TWOP
and job hunting... though I have to be really careful with it

Don't most companies log your Internet use now? Mine did, and the top ten users had a "talk" with their boss.

Interesting. What if they had to use IE (or whatever browser) to perform their work, such as doing research? Did they have the web addresses these people visited, or was it merely them having the browser open?

We're allowed to use the Internet unless we aren't getting our work done by deadline.

My big time wasters are:
-researching for class projects
-job hunting
-reading blogs, which we're encouraged to do anyway
-GC and Livejournal

I know that those who worked in IT doing web-based work were exempted, but their websites were tracked, so management knew how many times you visited a particular site.

For everyone else, I believe they measured the amount of time your web browser was open and also recorded the sites you visited. So if you checked your Hotmail and then left your browser open while you went to lunch, it would look like u spent an hour on Hotmail when you really didn't.

Any way I can.

ONLINE!

I waste time by surfing the net, GC (obviously), text messing friends from my cell phone, checking my email as well as learning about different GLOS.

GC;)
Yahoo mail and listserves
Hotmail
my credit union
My school website
CNN
SFGate (SF Chronicle online)
Websites pertaining to photography and project related stuff

Messing around with Google Earth. This thing is way to addicting.
GC
Phishhook.com
thejakartapost.com
various South African online newspaper
and wikipedia