Get All Access for $5/mo

How Much Time Do Your Employees Spend Doing Real Work? The Answer May Surprise You. (Infographic) A survey of more than 2,000 employees found that only 45 percent of time at the office is spent on primary job duties.

By Catherine Clifford

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Your employees are at work. Sure. But there's a better than 50 percent chance that they aren't getting real work done.

Employees say that they only spend 45 percent of their time at work actually completing their primary job duties, according to a survey of 2,000 office workers conducted by management software developer AtTask and market research firm Harris Interactive. That means more than half of their hours at the office are spent doing other things. Have a look at your latest payroll statement: that's expensive lost productivity.

Related: How to Be the Best Boss (Infographic)

Wasted time at the office goes toward taming the ever-spawning inbox, handling administrative tasks, going to meetings and dealing with miscellaneous interruptions, according to the survey.

For more data on the culture of the current office community, including how business employees prefer to communicate and what causes most workplace conflicts, have a looksee at the infographic embedded below.

Oh, and then get back to work.

Click to Enlarge+
How Much Time Do Your Employees Spend Doing Real Work? The Answer May Surprise You. (Infographic)

Related: Sam Adams Founder: 'You Can't Expect More of Your People Than You Expect of Yourself'

Catherine Clifford

Frequently covers crowdfunding, the sharing economy and social entrepreneurship.

Catherine Clifford is a senior writer at Entrepreneur.com. Previously, she was the small business reporter at CNNMoney and an assistant in the New York bureau for CNN. Catherine attended Columbia University where she earned a bachelor's degree. She lives in Brooklyn, N.Y. Email her at CClifford@entrepreneur.com. You can follow her on Twitter at @CatClifford.

Want to be an Entrepreneur Leadership Network contributor? Apply now to join.

Editor's Pick

Business News

How Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang Transformed a Graphics Card Company Into an AI Giant: 'One of the Most Remarkable Business Pivots in History'

Here's how Nvidia pivoted its business to explore an emerging technology a decade in advance.

Business Ideas

63 Small Business Ideas to Start in 2024

We put together a list of the best, most profitable small business ideas for entrepreneurs to pursue in 2024.

Business News

Want to Start a Business? Skip the MBA, Says Bestselling Author

Entrepreneur Josh Kaufman says that the average person with an idea can go from working a job to earning $10,000 a month running their own business — no MBA required.

Starting a Business

How to Find the Right Programmers: A Brief Guideline for Startup Founders

For startup founders under a plethora of challenges like timing, investors and changing market demand, it is extremely hard to hire programmers who can deliver.

Leadership

Why Hearing a 'No' is the Best 'Yes' for an Entrepreneur

Throughout the years, I have discovered that rejection is an inevitable part of entrepreneurship, and learning to embrace it is crucial for achieving success.