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

Senior Entrepreneurship Writer at CNBC

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

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