Australian productivity is being severely hampered by workers wasting time at work, according to the new Ernst & Young Australian Productivity Pulse survey.
Almost one-fifth (18 per cent) of employees’ time at work is wasted to, which equates to $109 billion in lost wages for organisations, according to the survey. In addition, only 58 per cent of a day’s work adds ‘real value’, with the rest of the time spent wading through red tape, working in the wrong job, and battling with inefficient systems.
The financial services and insurance sector was among the least wasteful industries surveyed, when it came to both unproductive time at work and the overall efficiency of the organisation.
Ernst & Young advisory leader Neil Plumage said the wasted time at work had implications for both the public sector and the private sector.
"This means that every single day $320 million is lost in valueless work. If we improve that by just 10 per cent, the impact to Australia’s productivity would be tremendous," he said.
He was quick to point out that the findings of the survey did not condemn Australia as a nation of ‘slackers’.
"Australia is one of the hardest working countries in the world, and given an overwhelming 71 per cent of workers are motivated to do their job to the best of their ability, we simply can’t put the productivity issue down to personal motivation," Plumage said.
The main problems were that skills were being mismatched with jobs, people were being underutilised, there was a lack of career progression, and there was no clear direction from leaders, Plumage said.
