Workers are faking productivity levels, and it’s hitting businesses hard – ‘productivity theater’ is placing the burden on a smaller pool of workers and causing stress levels to soar
Two-thirds of UK workers are pretending to be more productive than they are and carrying out tasks to appear busy without actually doing meaningful work.
Research from Asana found 67% of workers admit to ‘productivity theater’ in their daily workflows. This, the study noted, is a term used to describe workers performing tasks to appear productive without actually progressing in their work.
This growing trend of productivity theater in the workplace is having a significant impact on teams, Asana found, most notably by placing a heavier burden on a smaller group of legitimately productive workers.
Nearly half (40%) of respondents said they see colleagues stressed because their co-workers are over-reliant on their work.
In terms of capacity, more than seven-in-ten workers said their workload has become so unmanageable that they’ve felt the need to take a day off at least once in the past six months.
Asana’s findings align closely with previous research into the issue of productivity theater. A study by Visier, for example, specifically highlighted the correlation between hybrid working practices and this trend.
A survey by the firm found 43% of employees spend more than 10 hours each week on productivity theater tasks. Meanwhile, 83% of respondents admitted to engaging in at least one of the most-common performative work behaviors identified in the study.
These included:
- Responding to colleagues via email/instant message as promptly as possible, even though an immediate response wasn’t necessary (42%)
- Attending meetings that weren’t necessary (36%)
- Keeping laptop screens awake while not actively working (28%)
- Exaggerating progress when giving a status update (9%)
This isn’t the only issue affecting productivity, however. Asana found that the evolution of work in recent years is creating a confluence of productivity-related problems for workers.
As much as half of a worker’s average daily activities focus on repetitive, mundane tasks, the study noted. The time staff spend in unproductive meetings is also a serious cause for concerns, having doubled since 2019 to around five hours per week.
Management figures also have a lot to answer for, Asana noted. When it comes to management-related issues, seven-in-ten workers said their senior is often unavailable or unresponsive when seeking guidance.
This can have a significant impact on team morale, according to the study.
“The good news is that bosses who are available, express appreciation, give others credit, and give their people the freedom to use their judgment generate loyalty, extra effort, and creativity,” said Dr Bob Sutton, professor emeritus at Stanford University.
Productivity is also hit hard by a lack of communication, especially with the advent of hybrid work. More than four-in-ten workers said they struggle to remember who’s responsible for what on their team, with a similar number admitting that they’ve worked on the wrong task due to a mix-up.
More than nine-in-ten said they rely on informal networks, friends, and unspoken understandings to get things done.
Technology failures hamper productivity
Asana’s study also revealed productivity is being hit hard by poor use of technology, with virtually all the workers surveyed stating that there needs to be greater innovation.
On average, they said they were losing nine hours a week just searching for the information they needed.
“Technology is needed to enable work, but what’s even more important than choosing the right tools is to be thoughtful about how people should use them,” commented Jen Rhymer, assistant professor in the Strategy and Entrepreneurship Group at University College London (UCL) School of Management.
“Businesses that want to remove bottlenecks should establish processes and guidelines to ensure that the technology they’ve onboarded is used effectively and in a standardized way between teams. Creating norms and behaviors around asynchronous communication is also crucial to moving work forward.”
The report echoes research from Atlassian this summer, which found that between them, Fortune 500 firms are losing 25 billion work hours a year through ineffective collaboration.
Two-thirds said that they felt it was more important to react to notifications than to make progress on actual tasks, while half said they’d wasted time on tasks before discovering that they were duplicating work being carried out by other teams.
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