Thirty Percent of Workers Holiday Shop Online at Work, CareerBuilder.com Survey Shows
November 19 2007 - 8:00AM
PR Newswire (US)
-- Half of Employers Monitor Workers' Online Activities CHICAGO,
Nov. 19 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- 'Tis the season for grab bags and
gift exchanges. If you are among the 30 percent of workers who have
or plan to holiday shop online while at work this year, career
advisors recommend making purchases during your lunch hour or break
time. A new survey from CareerBuilder.com finds that half (50
percent) of all employers report they monitor employees' Internet
usage. The survey included 5,989 workers and 2,929 hiring managers
and human resource professionals. As online shopping kicks into
high gear on Cyber Monday (a term coined by the National Retail
Federation for the first Monday after Thanksgiving), productivity
in the workplace may be impacted. CareerBuilder.com's survey found
that nearly a quarter (24 percent) of workers who holiday shop
online expect to spend two or more hours doing so this year.
Thirteen percent plan to holiday shop online for three or more
hours while 5 percent anticipate spending five or more hours.
"Employers tend to be more lenient around the holidays -- in fact
only two percent say they have fired an employee for holiday
shopping online," said Rosemary Haefner, Vice President of Human
Resources at CareerBuilder.com. "However, workers need to be
mindful of company policies on Internet usage and should designate
their lunch hour or break times for shopping excursions or other
non-work related activities." Internet Usage at the Office --
Research: 61 percent of workers use the Internet for non-work
related research and activities while they are at work. Among these
workers, 20 percent spend on average more than an hour of their
workday on non-work related online activities and nine percent
spend more than two hours. -- Email: When it comes to keeping in
touch, 60 percent of workers say they send non-work related emails
at work, with 20 percent saying they send six or more per day. Of
those who send non-work related emails, 22 percent spend more than
30 minutes during the typical workday doing so. -- Instant
Messaging: One-in-five workers (21 percent) report they send
instant messages while at work. Of those who IM, 45 percent say
IMing makes them more productive. -- Networking: Nearly two-in-five
workers (37 percent) have a social networking profile. One-third
(33 percent) of those with a profile spend time on their social
networking page during the workday with 9 percent spending 30
minutes or more. -- Blogging: One-in-ten workers (12 percent) have
a personal blog, but only 20 percent update it at work. Of those
who do blog at work, only six percent spend a half hour or more
blogging. When it comes to getting things done, 71 percent of
hiring managers say Internet use at work for non-work related
activities negatively impacts productivity. Half of employers
surveyed said they monitor employees' online activity - 23 percent
monitor both time spent online and content, 19 percent just monitor
content and eight percent just monitor time spent. Nearly
one-in-five employers (18 percent) said they have fired an employee
for using the Internet for non-work related activities. More than
one-third (35 percent) of organizations monitor employee emails and
7 percent said they have fired employees for sending non-work
related email. Survey Methodology This survey was conducted online
within the U.S. by Harris Interactive on behalf of
CareerBuilder.com among 2,929 hiring managers and human resource
professionals (employed full-time; not self-employed; with at least
significant involvement in hiring decisions); and 5,989 U.S.
employees (employed full-time; not self-employed), ages 18 and over
within U.S. between August 10 and September 4, 2007. Figures for
age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, region and household income
were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their
actual proportions in the population. The data has been weighted to
reflect the composition of U.S. employers and employees
respectively, and propensity score weighting was also used to
adjust for respondents' propensity to be online. With a pure
probability sample of 2,929 and 5,989, one could say with a
ninety-five percent probability that the overall results have a
sampling error of +/- 2% and +/- 1.3% percentage points,
respectively. Sampling error for data from sub-samples is higher
and varies. However that does not take other sources of error into
account. This online survey is not based on a probability sample
and therefore no theoretical sampling error can be calculated. A
full methodology is available upon request. About CareerBuilder.com
CareerBuilder.com is the nation's largest online job site with more
than 22 million unique visitors and over 1.5 million jobs. Owned by
Gannett Co., Inc. (NYSE:GCI), Tribune Company (NYSE:TRB), The
McClatchy Company (NYSE:MNI) and Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ:MSFT), the
company offers a vast online and print network to help job seekers
connect with employers. CareerBuilder.com powers the career centers
for more than 1,100 partners, including 150 newspapers and leading
portals such as America Online and MSN. More than 300,000 employers
take advantage of CareerBuilder.com's easy job postings, 23
million-plus resumes, Diversity Channel and more. CareerBuilder.com
and its subsidiaries operate in the U.S., Europe, Canada and Asia.
For more information, visit http://www.careerbuilder.com/. Media
Contact: Tanya Flynn 773-527-5393 DATASOURCE: CareerBuilder.com
CONTACT: Tanya Flynn of CareerBuilder.com, +1-773-527-5393, Web
site: http://www.careerbuilder.com/
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