How Facebook, Smartphones And Television Distract Office Employees

This is a guest post compiled by Jackson Nwachukwu. 

After a careful study of things which may likely distract people in their offices or workspace, I came to an understanding that amongst many, there are three which keeps people off balance while working. They are: Facebook, Smartphones and Television.

Unfortunately, all of these three are unavoidable. In fact it's believed that an average office worker will become less smart when he/she works without the necessary pieces of technology, of which smartphones, and television set are among them. You may want to ask, where did Facebook fit in? O yes! It's right there on your mobile phone and also on the computer sitting right in front of your desk!  Now let's look closely at the three of them.


Television Set


Starting with "Television", a lot can be said about having it as one of the important gadgets in an office. Most guys cannot do without it, and it remains a fact! Among a roll of employees in a company, there are those who are news freaks, shares/stocks market enthusiasts, sports lovers, and so on. These are people who irrespective of who or how many customers standing in front of their desk must periodically stretch their necks to watch what's been shown on TV.

The greatest distraction of it all happens when their desk or workstation is directly faced with a Television set. I have been in a bank, where virtually all the staff members including customers in the banking hall were all cut off guide watching the London 2012 Olympic Games during an office working hours.

To everybody in that banking hall, business can wait for sometime, after all, the both parties who bring about transactions are all into the game! The irony of it all is that the work ethics forbids such scenario and a profit oriented management says a BIG NO to it. But not having a TV set in a banking hall is like telling the customers that the bank is not well informed!

Smartphones And Facebook


That said, what about Smartphones and Facebook? I decided to put the two together because they work hand in hand. One of the widely used smartphone by office employees is BlackBerry.

It's no news that BlackBerry has a common feature which from time to time keeps half of its users off balance. I am talking about "Pinging". Ordinarily, pinging is only necessary when your company office communicator is not working, so you can easily ping your colleague to pass across whatever you need him/her to do. But this is not the case today! With the tremendous increase in the usage of BlackBerry phones, using it just for office work is now an understatement. Office employees now ping and receive both official and unofficial pings from colleagues, family and friends, hence distracting them while at work.

Pinging with a BlackBerry device is not just enough, Facebook friends on the other side, sends in their chat requests and buzz, all at the same time the employee is working or attending to customers. In cases, where an employee decides to silence his/her smartphone (which is very rare), the computer sitting on his/her desk takes over with Facebook friends and other social media activities taking order of the day.

What Can Be Made Out Of This?

Having a smartphone and television set stationed is essential for an office worker and by virtue of job tasking, your smartphone or computer happens to be your workstation and portal to all concerned fellows or those who receive whatever services that you render.

On the other hand, the TV mounted in front of your desk also keeps you informed locally and on the international scale. However, one can really see that the three are all agents of distraction in an office, yet are all necessary pieces of technology products needed for an effective and efficient running of an office work.

The question now is which among the three distracts people the most during working hours in an office?

Your opinion is welcomed in comments...

This post was written by Jackson Nwachukwu. He is the founder of NTB Networks Inc. and presently the founding editor at NaijaTechBlog.com; where he writes about technology and blogging related topics. You can hook up with him on Google+.