Two out of five work days wasted: survey

Australian office workers are unproductive for two out of five working days, according to survey.

Australian office workers are unproductive for two out of five working days, according to a survey conducted by Microsoft.

Tony Wilkinson, Microsoft Australia’s office system product manager, said the survey found that people are productive only two-thirds of the time.

Australian respondents to the international survey said that only 65 percent of their working hours were spent productively, naming procrastination and lack of team communication as the top two time wasters.

Wilkinson said information overload and the challenges of teamwork and staying connected caused people to be unproductive.

While Australia mirrored the US in number of hours worked per day (nine) and the number of hours spent in meetings per week (six), the results of the survey found that Australians generally aren’t swamped with as much email as their American counterparts.

Just over half of Australian respondents said their email did not pile up, receiving an average of 45 emails a day compared to 56 in the US.

Almost a quarter of Australian respondents said that they preferred a flexible working week, with more hours in exchange for fewer days.

“People are trying to balance family with work responsibilities,” said Wilkinson.

Microsoft’s Personal Productivity Challenge surveyed almost 40,000 respondents from more than 200 countries from September 2004 through to January 2005. Over 400 Australians took part.