According to employment law firm Peninsula, social networking is eating up employee time and once again the numbers are huge. Facebook being the main culprit, the firm believes that workers are costing their companies more than about $260M USD (R1.7bil) daily as a result of using Facebook for an estimated 233 million hours each month while on the job. 3500 companies where surveyed on the topic which provides quite a healthy research group. Another firm down under said employees are costing the Australian economy $11 Mil USD daily ‘wasting’ time on social networks.

I think its time for corporations to start developing work-related applications to be integrated into the Facebook platform so their works do constructive work while networking. Blocking the popular social networking destinations wil do little to curb employee slacking.

Blurp from a relatedt BBC news article

Lunch-break option

Mike Huss, director of employment law at Peninsula called on all firms to block access to sites such as Facebook.

He asked: “Why should employers allow their workers to waste two hours a day on Facebook when they are being paid to do a job?”

He said that loss of productivity was proving a “major headache” for firms.

“The figures that we have calculated are minimums and it’s a problem that I foresee will escalate,” he said.

While some firms have embraced Facebook as a motivational tool, others have cracked down.

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