Facebook in the workplace

It seems to be a trend these days for companies to ban the use of sites such as Facebook, Myspace, Bebo etc. for personal use during the working day. Understandable to a point I would have to say, but I would also add that I think it’s also important for staff to have a certain amount of freedom in the workplace and as long as they still produce results in their respective field a little surfing of the web is a small price to pay for a happier workforce.

The truth is that people will find another equally unproductive way to take up that 10 minutes or so of time, only in that 10 minutes they will moan to the person who they are nearest to about being unhappy in their work and the conditions of the place that they work being unbearable.

A former MD of mine told me that I should try and take a 10 minute break from my monitor each hour and break up the day by surfing the web when things where quiet. He added that in my role as a web developer it was good to keep up with popular sites even if they had no relevance to my work. His philosophy was that if I and the other employees where treated as adults and allowed to govern our own web usage we would A) be happier in our roles and B) be more likely to work overtime (which is generally unpaid in this profession) as and when required.

It resulted in me working 7 days a week at some periods to ensure deadlines where met and clients kept happy, but amazingly I still enjoyed and liked my job and the company I worked for.

In fairness I must add that my current employers attitude to web usage has been quite sensible to date although they have just announced a restriction, not a ban, on Facebook and similar sites.

I think also that Facebook in particular can be used as it was originally inteded as a networking site.
There are a lot of groups set up on Facebook that are good for business.

In my opinion people don’t need Facebook or alternative sites to waste time. They’ve been doing that since well before facebook or the internet as a whole was available to them. Whether it be going for a smoke break or simply chatting to a colleague for 10 minutes at a time there will always be ways to slack off.