How to control social networking sites chatting during office hours?

Dear Seniors,

Can anyone help with how to control social networking site chatting during office hours? Since this has become very convenient on mobile phones, it is very difficult to trace and is consuming a lot of man-hours.

Thanks and regards,
jd

Mr. JD,

You can control social sites by blocking them; it is possible in case of employees using your company computer or laptop. However, it is not possible to stop the use of social sites on their personal mobile phones. You can reduce it by circulating a notice, but if you want a 100% ban, then you have to ban the use of mobile phones in the office, which nowadays is almost impossible. It is advised to create awareness among employees.

Arun J.

Hi Arun,

How to create awareness... Do you have any suggestions? A ban on mobile phones will not be a practical solution. Nowadays, there are very few who consider moral responsibility and refrain from such activities. I hope you agree with me.

Thanks and regards,
jd

Dear JD,

With reference to your query, in our office, we have blocked the social sites. Wi-Fi connection is available for all office staff; however, we have registered the laptop and mobile handset numbers with our IT admin. The IT person is monitoring the bandwidth for any downloads of songs, clips, or pictures, whereby we inform the user and trace the person. We have emailed all employees about this; hence nowadays, usage is under control. However, we cannot fully stop it. This is a suggestion for you which we have tried.

Warm Regards,
Anish
9167002872

This is partially one of the reasons why Facebook and other social sites are seeing an increase in MOBILE usage. With the proliferation of smartphones, it is almost impossible to control this unless companies start operating like concentration camps. The only way is probably educating your employees about "time management" and how they can control their urges to keep looking at their phones for updates. I am sure some of our trainer members will be able to help out with suggestions on how to achieve this.

Regards,
CHR

Hi CHR,

WhatsApp videos and joke messages are often circulated within the office, and the whole office gets distracted for a few minutes, which ultimately costs the company man-hours. We need to train employees on how these apps can be used in a productive way, but the moral responsibility of the employee also comes into play.

Thanks and regards,
jd

Mr. Anish,

I don't think it's ethical as an employee. I will never allow anybody to spy on my mobile; it's my own freedom to view and download content as I desire. I don't know how your employees have agreed to it and given consent to register their mobiles with the company IT department. If I try to implement the same in our company, it will lead to great dispute. I don't think anyone should enter into anyone's personal boundaries. I am not at all in agreement with your suggestion; it is my own view.

Arun J.

Mr. JD,

How can you come to know that you are losing valuable man-hours? Is any particular employee making mistakes in their work? Is a specific employee delaying their work?

If everything is going smoothly and employees are giving 100% effort in their work, then you should ignore such things. If your work is being hampered and you have proof that it is solely due to excessive use of mobile phones for social websites, then only consider taking action.

Arun J.

Dear Arun,

I agree with your comments. In our case, we have provided SIM cards to all our staff members under the corporate CUG plan. We do not check what is actually downloaded by the user; it only matters how employees can minimize usage in terms of not affecting the Wi-Fi load and hours. Since employees are aware that there is a monitoring system, they are careful about their usage. The intention is not to interfere with personal information.

Additionally, the Wi-Fi services are provided by the company for official usage, similar to the office landline. If somebody wants to avail themselves of it, they need to register their handset number. This message is conveyed to the employees positively. For instance, if somebody is willing to do so, "If you are an honest employee, why don't you use Wi-Fi with the declaration of your handset number? We trust you."

I have already mentioned that this way we can control; however, we can't achieve 100%.

Thank you, Arun, for your view. I respect it.

Warm Regards,
Anish
9167002872

Dear Arun,

Yes, we did a small survey and found out that the employees not using social networking sites are more efficient, fast, and have better time management compared to those who are using it, especially for non-productive work. They are distracted from their regular routine, and they also distract others. Work received from those not using social networking sites meets all deadlines compared to those using these apps. They often need extensions of deadlines for projects.

There are also a few who use these sites for the productivity of work, which is good. Hence, I do not wish to block the sites.

Thanks and regards,
jd

Dear JD,

If this is the situation, then you must call those employees in person and give verbal warning, but in a polite manner because even though it is a mistake, it can't be treated as a grave mistake. Tell them if improvement is not found, you will go for a written notice. Always remember there is a sentence in management... If you want to apprise someone, then apprise him in front of all, but if you want to punish somebody, do it in person.

Arun J.

Dear Arun,

I agree with you; it cannot be a grave mistake. Since human beings crave for innovations and once they have that, they tend to sometimes overuse it. We can try this solution also; I expect to get some improvement from the present situation.

Thanks and regards,
jd

I guess using phones during working hours must be prohibited. Employees should only use their phones during break time. In this way, they won't be distracted by text messages and social networking sites.

Hello JD,

Guess I (or rather my suggestions) would be the ODD MAN OUT in this thread.

Looks like everyone among us is responding/reacting like the Governments respond to something it wants to 'ban' but can't.

Let's face it—it's human nature to DO WHAT'S OUT-OF-BOUNDS, whether we like it or not.

I am sure those with kids would know it better than others.

And the only way to think and act is NOT to totally and outrightly ban any such acts, but to regulate/control such actions (be it social media access or any other acts) in a way that benefits BOTH the Company and the Employees.

Sounds out-of-place and/or ridiculous/impractical?

Just have a look at this Link and you will know that such an outlook by the Company/Management actually works—and that too in India itself.

Startups like Jombay and HelpShift encourage employees to access e-commerce sites, design office space - The Economic Times

I am not sure IF this is a coincidence, but it came in yesterday's Economic Times.

And when Startups can make it work, I wonder how it CAN'T happen in well-established Companies—whether it's IT or Non-IT sector shouldn't matter I guess.

I think one Quote is very apt here: "If you do today's business with yesterday's methods, you won't be in business tomorrow."

Regards,

TS

Dear JD,

You need to create awareness in the office. Display posters with a positive message stating, "Be productive" or "Your time is important to us. We value your work," and so on. We need to create a "win-win" situation. First of all, you need not view it negatively. Let us make people aware of this and discuss it in meetings and training sessions. We need to help people realize this. Also, pay attention to the people who are using and their workload. They may not like the tasks assigned to them.

To sum up: create awareness and establish a win-win situation.

S Kumar

Hi JD,

Just a suggestion for your IT team: If they can track the phone or computer download bandwidth, why don't they put a firewall on social networking sites? This could help you a lot in reducing the usage.

Regards,
Vaibhav

A certain level of motivation among employees towards work would definitely lead to less use of social sites during office hours. Assigning them independent small projects would also result in them spending more time on work tasks, consequently reducing their usage of social sites.

Now, let's reverse engineer why an employee would open a social site. Not everyone in the office uses it for chatting; some simply check out what's new. The urge to check what's new typically arises when an employee is stuck in monotonous work. Providing employees with more creative tasks can help address this issue.

Encourage creativity among employees. When they engage in creative work, they will naturally spend more time on activities that stimulate their creativity.

Dear All,

I appreciate and thank everyone who helped me with their valuable suggestions and ideas. I think now I can tackle the issue to some extent by implementing your inputs.

I am sure, like me, many might be in the same situation as mine and hope this was helpful to them too, especially when you are working on hourly basis projects.

Thanks and regards,
jd

Hi,

My suggestion would be that you stop accessing social networking sites on your office laptop/desktop through IT people. However, as people have mentioned, it may be challenging to prevent the use of mobile phones within the office premises. Instead, you could create a new policy, conduct a session to educate employees on the dos and don'ts within the office premises, and inform them that violating the policy may result in disciplinary action by the company. This approach would help you control the situation, and your productivity would not be negatively affected.

I totally agree with seniors; it is practically impossible to block all websites on official PCs and laptops. On the other hand, you cannot restrict a person from using mobile phones in the office. Even companies provide official phones with internet access to employees, which can be used for updating statuses on social websites and personal emails. The only way to address this issue is to educate staff to be responsible during office hours and make them realize the cost of these wasted man-hours. A training on time management would be a great initiative. The trainer can customize the training to meet the needs of your organization and add specific content to convey indirect messages to the staff. Regular toolbox talks with the staff will also be helpful.

Regards,

I agreed with this things few days ago. I used to use social networking sites during office hours because nowadays it is too easy to access them on mobile phones. However, now I only submit my cell phone to one of my friends during work hours.

We can place a small jammer where the signal will be too low for employees. Additionally, we have land phones for each and every cabin, so we can solve the problem easily.

You can issue a circular on this matter with the subject line stating that anyone caught using social networking sites during office hours will face a penalty of Rs. ***. Additionally, please form a team to monitor and identify such activities. It is crucial that the staff members are not informed of the identities of the team members to maintain confidentiality. Another approach could be to inform them that a team has been established to identify the individuals involved. This will create a sense of caution among the staff. I hope this initiative will be successful.

Mr. Arun,

You can use Mobile Tracker. It's useful to disconnect the mobile signals on their phone. It protects from not receiving calls, messages, and internet access as well.

This is the best idea I thought.

Hi,

I want to suggest that all companies facing issues due to employees using social media during work hours should provide a separate black and white mobile phone with a SIM card. Companies should restrict employees from diverting their calls to this SIM card in case their personal mobile phone is switched off. When an employee starts their shift, a company executive should collect the employee's personal mobile phone and switch it off so that incoming calls will be directed to the work phone. The allocation and management of the new black and white mobile phones can be decided by the company.

Current generation of people can't live without Facebook and Twitter. We can't change their behavior. Instead, focus on measuring their results by setting objective goals. This way they will be forced to focus on work and they can use social networks when they are free. In my opinion, putting in controls will demotivate employees and also doesn't help in achieving business results.

I agree with your comments. In our case, we have provided SIM cards to all our staff members under the corporate CUG plan. Additionally, we do not check what is actually downloaded by the user. It only matters how employees can minimize usage in a way that will not affect the Wi-Fi load and hours.

Attribution: https://www.citehr.com/502934-social...#ixzz3BfOSJu1q

There is a good solution for this as I have already seen some software companies using it. Allowing only mobile phones which do not contain any multimedia, camera, or radio will solve this issue permanently. Meanwhile, keeping a check while entering the work premises with the company monogram as "VERIFIED" on the back of the phone.

Private organizations always conduct R&D and restrict or stop networking in the office. In the name of social networking, they do not want their workforce to use social networking, regardless of whether it is good or not. This restriction is mostly observed in government offices. There must be some way to regulate it. Social media is so tempting that one may end up spending the entire day on it. The government is meant for the implementation of their schemes and programs. Social networking is personal and common, so employees can engage in it during their own time. Some staff members already spend their time playing skill games. Let us focus on providing good and sincere service as intended. Phones have become essential items. There can be a middle ground for this.

Dear all,

There is no other way than self-discipline to be practiced by the employees. Mobile usage at their seats can be restricted. Maybe they can be allowed to check messages at the common room, etc.

Devarajan N K

Hi all,

When an employee is hired by an organization, in effect, his or her time is the primary factor offered to the organization in return for consideration. Therefore, it becomes the responsibility of the employee to justify actions that are time-wasting and unproductive. Periodic interaction by the HR with the employees, emphasizing the need for indulging in responsible behavior, would go a long way in minimizing the wastage of time.

Sadanand

As many people have said above, it is not a good idea to ban social networking sites/chats totally. I do agree that there are some employees who waste too much time on these things, but an intelligent HR or a line manager has the responsibility to find out what tasks can be given to each employee to increase his or her productivity. If the company decides to block or ban these sites completely, then there is also a negative effect: demotivation and lack of concentration towards work. Like it is said - everything is great in balance. As an HR professional, we should understand that the company doesn't pay employees based on time, but based on the work done or tasks achieved; hence, performance should be the only factor to determine productivity.

Nowadays, there are many teenagers who can multitask between SMS, chats, Facebook, Twitter, and also win a 'certificate of excellence' at their job. Such employees actually drive the projects much faster and make better relationships with clients via these sites. If social networking is blocked completely, all this social rapport with clients and vendors also gets destroyed. Hence, we are always aware of the concept of 'Performance-based Pay' which HR always has control over. Compensation is the motivation for employees to do good work, and boring tasks assigned to employees lead to them accessing time-wasting sites.

Hi JD,

There is a solution to it. If you could clarify the industry that you are working in, it would be easier to suggest a tailored solution. I had done a project for a client with a similar situation. Here are a few tips.

Before you begin, bring down the hammer, please collate actual data of loss on man-hours, which is easy. There are 2 primary things (cell phones and office computers/laptops). Most companies block or monitor computers/laptops, which of course are easy to break and surf the internet without the IT knowing. Cell phones are harder to track. A point to remember is that social sites are commonly used to transfer company data.

Please clarify the industry so I can send you my analysis (no fee) or write to me at [Login to view].

Hi, I am not sure what you are looking for. Is it the intention to use the mobile as a mobile only or as a smartphone? If there is no use of a smartphone in your company (which is very difficult nowadays), you may ban smartphones inside the office premises, as many industries do. For example, many companies do not allow camera phones on their premises. All the mobile phones that can access social sites are smartphones with cameras, which may be banned.

Please remember that it may give a negative impact on the business as well. You may need to analyze both situations and take appropriate action.

It is not a viable solution to ban or block anything within office premises - this is now an old-school method or jailer method. A not so intelligent HR manager will think things work fine after blocking things. A smarter HR manager will explain the benefits of not using any of these technologies, devices, and sites "while working" - which means little fun is possible if and when there is no work or employees or workers have completed the task. Believe it or not, this is a very simple thing to understand by this analogy - A knife is used in the kitchen, but it also has the potential to cut off a finger easily if misused. However, the same knife increases productivity and makes work faster in kitchens. It is here again the lack of awareness in the company which leads to problems while smartphones and social media exist.

It may be difficult to believe that in our small company of 125 employees, we have been given access to social media like Facebook, Twitter, Skype, WhatsApp, and even YouTube. Smartphones are of course allowed, and we do have an internet firewall to trace all online activities and emails. We also have a lot of CCTV cameras. Nobody has been yet caught for misconduct on IT policies - Our company simply promotes the performers and discourages bad performance during appraisals, and everything has worked fine all the last 8 years.