8 productivity killers you must beat in order to accomplish more @work 

8 productivity killers you must beat in order to accomplish more work 

by Bishwabandita Guru

Have you ever struggled to focus on a project when your cellphone receives too many notification beeps from a recent private post on Facebook? Haven’t you got tempted to check first and reply to those messages? Probably for you the reply consumes only 5 minutes or even less. But in reality the distraction continues and it inhibits to an extent that your work deadline flies for the day.

Let’s not place all the blame on a mere gadget. Your co-workers, your habits, the rules that set your typical workday too can pose as productivity killers.

So has your workday fallen victim to any of these workplace productivity killers? If yes, let’s catch and beat them.

#1 Workplace gossip

Considered as a biggest energy drainer, it inhibits productivity.

Cure: Stay away from people who like to waste time by unwanted gossip, surround yourself with productive people. 

#2 Social Media

Undisciplined Social Media usage is the biggest time sucker. Overuse of Social Media makes strict deadlines fly and disrupts the flow of work.

Cure: Blocking access to Social Media sites on office devices, formulating and implementing effective policies regarding Social Media usage at work.

#3 Web surfing 

According to a recent research, workers waste between one and two hours a day web surfing, costing their companies billions in lost productivity. The temptation that is caused due to web surfing leads efficient workers to make mistakes and productivity gets compromised. That’s the reason Career Guidance Counselors ask workers having performance issues to resist temptation until they reach home for personal web access.

Cure: Banning private internet usage at office. 

#4 Texting on Cellphone

Accessing smartphones during office hour for non-work use is a huge productivity killer. A recent study claims that the majority of workers (65 %) hardly have their work emails on their phones. They use their cellphones for personal messaging, games, shopping, online dating and other such activities during office hours.

Cure: Having an open discussion with workers about tech distractions, conceding to their existence, discussing challenges and suggesting remedies to allow productivity soar. p

#5 Leaving desk too often

Frequent and lengthy snack/ smoke/bio breaks, going near other co-worker in intent to gossip, wasting time simply loitering around are the habits that not only disturb sincere workers, but also disrupt the workflow.

Cure: Policies should require such employees to make up the break time at the end of the day. 

#6 Loud-mouthed co-workers/speaker phones

Sitting next to someone who’s mostly on calls or speaker phones or who regularly gets visitors stopping by their desk to chat or gossip may be incredibly distracting.

Cure: Offices should create separate sections for focus driven work and provide unfrequented areas to hold private phone conversations.

#7 Email

From a smart worker’s perspective, email is a slow and burdensome form of conversation. It is a huge time sucker and productivity killer, as responding to mountain of messages kill long hours of productivity. And the tragedy is – it feels like real work.

Cure: Get your inbox emptied every day. Stop hitting refresh button every now and then. Set timing to check and reply emails.

#8 Long and poorly prepared meetings

Long and poorly prepared meetings disrupt the flow of work. According to a recent survey, 73 percent of the workers agree that they do other works during meetings. This mostly happens when minutes of the meetings are not properly scheduled.

Cure: Avoid unnecessary meetings.

Check the following points before scheduling a meeting.

• Is the presence of each of the attendees absolutely essential?
  
• Is the meeting well prepared and have a detailed agenda?
  
• Is the meeting time-bound?