And also very true that letting employees go free range on the internet does mean that they might find and explore cool stuff that they can use as a source of ideas for work.

And other examples, often in IT, of work patterns which have crunch periods and quiet periods, but you still need to be present in the office during the quiet periods.

All I’m saying is from my experience, be careful about getting into bad habits. Sure, it’s fine to play if you have nothing else to do. But very easy to start getting the actual work out of the way as fast as possible (even if this means putting as little effort in as you can) so as to have more spare time for gaming/ time wasting. Don’t assume that no one will notice.

Stabs is also right that if the net wasn’t available, people probably would find more productive things to do, even if it just meant sitting around the water cooler and chatting. Building up working relationships and possibly even talking about work is likely more productive than messing around on the net. But who knows?

In any case, this issue isn’t going away any time soon. It’ll be interesting to see how employers adapt.

But in my experience, if you make that pay performance dependent (quantity/quality based) instead you see a huge burst of initial productivity, an eventual burnout, and then enormous attrition. People eventually decide that the extra pay isn’t worth the amount of work they have to put in to meet the productivity standards, and the productivity standards have to be continually raised because a few exceptional people are always exceeding them… making it impossible for average people to sustain ‘minimum’ results. When you get to that burnout point, people start wasting time again, because they know that they can’t succeed, or that even if they do succeed, they’re just going to raise the standard again.

Granted, my experience is mostly in call center type environments (many) and I’m not a specialist on human behavior or business or anything. But sometimes I think it would be so much simpler if we were all subsistence farmers or something. (lol)

I’ve seen a lot of people playing things like Solitaire at work. The problem I have with it is it kills initiative. Most staff can find something productive to do if they have no tasks on their plate. Re-organising their files, checking they have adequate stationery and so on. If their day consists of dodging anything optional all day so they can maximise time spent entertaining themselves they will do it. And I’m referring here to random surfing more than games because that was the issue I had with various secretaries, receptionists and IT support I’ve worked with.

If you have 5 minutes you’ll get a quick google search. Give me an hour and I’ll have checked multiple online and offline sources and produced photocopies of the relevant articles and pages from textbooks. Give me a week and I’ll have checked external sources or ordered books sent over.

Also I’ve usually worked collaboratively. Meaning that as long as I look busy if a new enquiry comes in someone else will usually pick it up.

I’ve worked through breaks and before and after hours.

It’s not obvious at all in many professions if someone’s giving it their full attention.