Office workers are now spending more time handling e-mail, attending ineffective meetings and being interrupted.
To measure working habits, San Diego-based IBT-USA created the White-Collar Productivity Index. For the past five years, the company has collected statistics on over 1,000 employees at some 30 companies, representing a variety of sectors, including the automotive, finance, biotech, education, insurance, accounting and technology.
?With fewer people in the office to do the work, employees feel the need to collaborate more but, in many cases, actually accomplish less,? according to the company.
According to the WPI:
— Workers spent 8.8 hours per week handling email in 2004, up from 4 hours in 2000.
— Handling paper mail now takes 1.3 hours a week, down from from 2.0 hours.
— Time attending ineffective meetings: 2.1 hours per person per week in 2004, three times the 2000 level.
— Interruptions cost 4.5 hours a week, up from 3.3.
— Delegating work increased from 3.3 hours per week in 2000 to 3.5 hours per week in 2004.
That adds up to about 15 hours a week — about two full days of work. So maybe it’s no wonder that…
— People are putting in more overtime: now 6.4 hours a week, up from 4.9.