Saving face(book)
Productivity losses are abound at workplaces, and Facebook is a major factor, according to a BBC article.
Unfortunately, their major data source was a study “based on a survey of 3,500 UK companies.” I’m sure such parties don’t have a vested interest in lost productivity. Despite my dripping sarcasm, there is an alternative that the study fails to consider. Maybe letting your employees browse social networking sites while on the job reduces stress and increases productivity.
Ryan Deschamps at The Other Librarian thinks “Facebook could enhance community image and social learning” regarding an Ontario, Canada court decision to ban the site from its libraries all of the city’s publicly-owned computers. He also says that Facebook’s popularity may be the reason it was banned in that case. Singling out sites that make news is a common response from groups who are uneducated and want to get rid of perceived problems quickly.
Perhaps it is more instructive to think about why employees are browsing Facebook on company time. Even within Facebook’s walled garden, employees are not productive.
The BBC quotes Dr. Will Reader, a Sheffield Hallam University researcher, in the UK.
Although the number of friends people have on these sites can be massive, the number of close friends is approximately the same as in the face-to-face real world contact.
~ by Jason on September 11, 2007.
Posted in facebook, social networking, technology
Articulate Digits 
As I say in the article, the problem is that “productivity” is measured in terms of hours available versus hours not spent on Facebook.
What is being missed here is that productivity is not merely a measure of what you can get out of your employees — increases in intellectual capital and innovation can also increase productivity. That is, your employees could do more with less time because they are smarter, more skilled and have are using their imaginations.
Whether Facebook can deliver on the latter is another question, of course. I think it also matters what your business is doing. Facebooking in a policy shop may have benefits. Facebooking on an assembly line may not. The problem is not that managers should not block Facebook — it’s that they don’t really understand the implications of the service on their company. So, they rely on others who will Google a BBC article and make decisions based on that.
Thanks for the comment and explanation. I agree with you. I don’t think Facebook should be allowed in all cases, nor did I mean to present it in such a sweeping way. I just disagree with companies who jump on the bandwagon of denying site access without researching the benefits.
Hey Jason — I think we are pretty much on the same wavelength. 😉
That’s the thing, Jason. Many of these companies are run by old fogies who have no idea what Myspace is and fear change. They hear about this new service on which you can connect to other people at lightning speed and that it’s being used at work. Well here’s something we can blame our decreased productivity on, they say. So what do they do? They jump the gun and ban it massively. Emergency! Censor! Control!
Perhaps it is the incompetent, old fogy bosses who are causing the “decreases in productivity.”
Exactly N. It’s interesting not only to chuckle at the way those unfamiliar with technology refer to new systems, but also the lengths to which they are wary of the system (facebook). Thanks for commenting!