Here’s Why You Can’t Get Anything Done at Work
Life + Money

Here’s Why You Can’t Get Anything Done at Work

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More than half of Americans spend less than 25 percent of their time in the office on important, deadline-oriented assignments, according to a new study from the virtual assistant service Time Etc.

The survey found that 43 percent of Americans spend up to half their day scheduling calls and meetings, and 57 percent spend up to half their day attending meetings and on calls. More than a quarter of those surveyed said that working on small tasks makes it difficult to complete their long-term goals.

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The deluge of meetings, emails and scheduling prevents workers from actually getting doing their jobs and ultimately affects their work-life balance. Nearly 60 percent of those surveyed said they stay at work beyond their scheduled hours. More than half of those who work longer days have young children at home. 

Those findings echo a report released last summer from WorkplaceTrends.com, which found that one in five workers say they spend more than two hours a day in meetings. That survey found that email overload and inefficient meetings are top factors in the erosion of employee productivity.

While those surveys reflect employees’ feelings about productivity, employers place the blame elsewhere.  More than half of employers say that mobile devices and texting are the biggest productivity killers at work, making them the number one distraction, according to a survey by CareerBuilder.com.

Other top issues impacting productivity, according to that survey, include the Internet, named by 44 percent of employers, gossip (37 percent), and social media (37 percent).

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