—Age groups have become a major influence in how employees work during their work day. Many often using scheduled work time for personal consumption.
—The age group that misused the internet the most at work were the younger employees that fell in the age range of 18 to 35 years. Which is a reflection on how society has adapted with constant interaction with other outlets. However blame cannot be just on social media, but on other third party websites as well. Opening another tab and viewing other websites have become so easy with rapid improvements in technology making distractions greater than ever.
Why do 18-35 age groups feel like it's appropriate to misuse the internet in the workplace:
- Not feeling challenged at work.
- Work too many hours.
- The company doesn't give sufficient incentive to work harder.
- They are unsatisfied with their career.
- Just plain bored.
I do believe that programs such as "Staff Monitoring Solutions" is required in today's work place to insure quality and time is effective to the highest degree. Tools such as: "Blocking, Monitoring, Capturing, Management and Reporting." This will help protect both sides of employment like fraud in the workplace to other conduct related implications. Saving cost can be high:
- Do you think upper management should take age in consideration when hiring new employees knowing that younger (18-35) use the internet for personal use rather than work related productivity?
- Who should be blamed for why 18-35 misuse the internet in the work place? Employer or Employee?
Sources:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/cherylsnappconner/2012/07/17/employees-really-do-waste-time-at-work/
http://employee-monitoring-software-review.toptenreviews.com/
Although your statistics clearly show that younger people are on the internet more than middle-aged to older people I don't think employers should consider not hiring younger employees. While employees need to be accountable for their actions, employers should set strict guidelines to what is appropriate and follow up on discipline when employees fail to follow them. Employers need to monitor what their employees are doing on the internet and make sure it's work related, and if it's not they need to talk to the employee and make sure it doesn't happen again.
ReplyDeleteI definitely don't think that employers should take into account not hiring young employees because statistics show that they are the group that most misuses the internet. I would consider that discrimination. However, I think that companies should monitor internet usage for all of their employees. In the company I worked for over the summer they had implemented this and it had positive results productivity.
ReplyDeleteI think one great advantage of young people being connected is the fact that using their own smart phones and tablets, the employers sometimes can help them pay for part of their bills and save money by not having to acquire new technology. Also it can help telecommuters, since nowadays everything goes into the cloud, and also it makes it easier for employers to track the employees that are on the field.
ReplyDeleteAlso in relation to social media, today's world is connected to social media, and employers should have a very clear and defined line on how to allow employees to use it, and what to restrict. My personal opinion only, since I see that everyday technology grows, and everyone is connected full time
Age shouldn't matter when it comes to the hiring process and you can't specifically target that age group. I agree with Paulina, all employees should be monitored.
ReplyDeleteI think that employees 18-35 misuse of the internet is both the employees and the employers. You can not discriminate against them because of their age group, but employers could give them more responsibility and involvement. This could keep them more interested and involve in their job along with breaks through out the work day. It makes sense that if a person is unhappy in their work life they are going to look to other distractions, like the internet.
ReplyDeleteI don't think employers should look at younger candidates as undesirable. I feel that the rise of technology could be a possible contributor to why younger employees go online for work and personal reasons during working hours. They have more experience with the Internet and its benefits, which is something you want in your employee. I agree that programs like Staff Monitoring Solutions may be helpful to discourage the misuse of the Internet.
ReplyDeleteinteresting data on younger candidates. I also agree that programs such as Staff Monitoring solutions are beneficial for work places.
ReplyDeleteA third of the workforce spending over two hours on the internet per week at work is higher than I had thought. However, I am not convinced that monitoring employees' internet use is the correct solution if this information will be used to reprimand them. How can an employee feel satisfied with their job and inspired to achieve if he or she feels as though they are not trusted by having their activities monitored and recorded? Adding to this, numerous studies show that when workers take short breaks they are more productive. Perhaps ten minutes now and then online is the current equivalent to yesterday's "water cooler" chat. Furthermore, excluding potential employees based on their age is not only unethical, it is illegal.
ReplyDeleteI think that people in the age range of 18 to 35 misuse the internet in the workplace more than others because they have had the internet around for a large portion of their life. This leads to an addiction almost while the older generations already knew how to live without it. In my opinion, it should be up to the employee to separate time at work from personal time and up to the employer to oversee this. While on the clock, you are getting paid to work, not paid to play around on the internet.
ReplyDeleteI do not think that the younger generation should be discriminated against based off these statistics. There are a lot of things that have changed of time, especially with technology. If an employee isn't surfing the web on their company computer, they can easily do it on their smartphone. Monitoring what employees and employers do on their company computers is definitely a good idea.
ReplyDeleteI agree that there should not be age-based discrimination in the hiring process. Darwin's theory will ultimately win out in this competitive job market, with the time maximizers surviving and the time wasters being eliminated.
ReplyDeleteEmployers should definitely take in consideration that new generations use Internet for personal use while they are working. An old saying is “time is gold” and I am a true believer of this. If you were the owner of a company, why would you pay money to your employees if they were not providing any benefit to the company? You might be thinking that I am pathetic writing this, but as a futures graduates we have to think from the Company’s perspective. Employees had been hired to produce outputs to the company. The more outputs an employer can produce in a company, the more valuable and the more efficient he/she is for the company. The more valuable for a company this employee is, the lesser risk he/she has to get fired. Finally, if employees have some free time they should try to do something beneficial for the company. In good companies, extra effort can workout in raises or bonuses.
ReplyDeleteI think employers should take everything into consideration when hiring or deciding to hire a future employee. Both the employer and employee should be held responsible for the 18-35 misuses of the internet in the work place. The employee should be held responsible because you are viewed as a professional and gaining income and have responsibilities; the employer should also be held responsible because they should make sure they are using their employees to their fullest potential in order to make the business more successful. Employers should get their employees more involved if internet misuses are happening, they should also look into how the business is doing a the current time. If sales are dropping and internet misuses are increasing actions must be made in order to make sure your business is safe whether that be firing an employee to make an example out of the situation or taking the internet away in general as punishment for a bad quarter or year in sales.
ReplyDeleteBeing in this age group, I can see that it is easier than ever to get distracted from work by going on third party websites. However, there should not be discrimination against individuals of this age group through the hiring process. Internet monitoring should be in place to deter this behavior.
ReplyDeleteAge should always be taken into consideration when hiring but every company would take age into consideration differently. A company that requires workers to use the computer for majority of their job tasks would take into consideration someone who is between the age of 18-35 into account when hiring because of the misuse that age group has when it comes to the Internet. At the same time for many jobs that age group might be a valuable asset to the company and be of great worth to the company despite the statistics of work related productivity due to misuse of the Internet. At the same time, companies can also have policies and rules regarding Internet use during the work day and what displinary action is taken for disregarding those policies and rules. Also, companies can employ a system on their computers that block sites that are not work related. They can also monitor each employees computer use, although some employees see this as an invasion of privacy but if they are only completing work related tasks on their work computers their privacy is not being invaded.
ReplyDelete