Distractions cost your company's bottom-line

The workplace has long been the ultimate manufacturer of distraction with good intentions.

Everyone wants to get things done as fast as possible with as much quality as they can. The more we get distracted, the harder it is to stay productive. That much is true. But when you start talking about how much workplace distractions cost your company's bottom line, then we're talking about a real problem.

Coming to office late, reading newspapers during working hours, social networking such as Facebook, gossiping, shopping during the lunch break and using working hours to eat, entertaining friends and relatives at office are common in some offices.

Managers are worse

Misusing company phones to call home during working hours to check if the children are keeping well, mothers guiding children to do home work over the phone, female employees doing make-up well before closing time and daily review of TV programs are commonly seen in most organisations.

Some companies are shutting down access to various social media sites saying that company productivity is taking a big hit since social media's adoption and popularity has grown.

Those occupying senior positions are sometimes even worse. They use their privileges to attend to personal work during working hours. The fact that managers have the freedom to decide and often need not get approval to leave office on official matters gives them the opportunity to engage in acts that are unwarranted, draining company resources.

Treatment

There are parents who entertain children at the workplace. They may come to office after school or classes and stay in office distracting not only the parent but others as well. Children by nature attract the attention of all your colleagues. This is not limited to lower level employees but executives too. Such managers do not set the right example to the people below them.

These managers cannot take up any disciplinary issue with their subordinates and it promotes irresponsible employees which have a direct impact on productivity and the bottom line. Workers who shirk their responsibilities and rely on other staff to pick up the slack can also damage workforce morale. In a small business, one irresponsible employee can create a culture of irresponsibility throughout the company, particularly if other workers see that the behaviour is condoned or, worse, rewarded with promotions or plum assignments. Managers must act immediately to correct irresponsible behaviour and promote responsible action.

The question is whether you want to treat employees as adults or children. Monitoring consists of looking at the quantity and quality of work produced and the occasional gentle rebuke if someone gets distracted, which doesn't happen often. The most important source of productivity is job satisfaction and instituting a prison style system is not good for productivity in theory.

But the reality is that lack of policies, procedures, rules and accepted norms and continuous reinforcement of messages for consistent compliance, no organisation can get the alignment of all employees with the accepted work disciplines.

Of course there can be exceptions where a person is paid for the pre-agreed volume and quality of work where other things do not matter from the point of view of cost.

Lead by example. Model the responsible behaviour employees should emulate. Behavioural standards must be demonstrated from top down - if management behaves irresponsibly, it creates the impression that the behaviour is sanctioned by the company.

Responsibility

Remind employees of the policies and procedures they must abide by and why they should do so. Explain the impact of the employee's irresponsibility and demonstrate the detrimental effect the irresponsible behaviour has on business operations and the bottom line.

Ask the employee to suggest ways through which he or she can improve behaviour. Place the onus on the employee to identify solutions for his irresponsibility.

Develop a performance improvement plan to clearly specify the expectations for future performance and examples of acceptable behaviour.

Follow up on a regular basis or at the intervals agreed upon in the performance improvement plan. If the employee has failed to correct his behaviour and continues to act irresponsibly, take progressively severe disciplinary action up to and including discharge from employment.