Why high-tech means low esteem

Most US workers say they feel rushed on the job, but they are getting less accomplished than a decade ago, according to newly released research.

Workers completed two-thirds of their work in an average day last year, down from about three-quarters in a 1994 study, according to a survey conducted for Day-Timers, a Pennsylvania-based maker of organisational products.

The biggest culprit is the technology that was supposed to make work quicker and easier, experts say.

"Technology has sped everything up and, by speeding everything up, it's slowed everything down, paradoxically," said John Challenger, chief executive of Chicago-based outplacement consultants Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

"We never concentrate on one task anymore. You take a little chip out of it, and then you're on to the next thing. It's harder to feel like you're accomplishing something."

Unlike a decade ago, US workers are bombarded with email, computer messages, cellphone calls, voice mails and the like, research showed.

The average time spent on a computer at work was almost 16 hours a week last year, compared with 9.5 hours a decade ago, according to the Day-Timer research.

Workers typically get 46 emails a day, nearly half of them unsolicited.

Sixty per cent of workers say they always or frequently feel rushed, but the proportion who feel extremely or very productive dropped to 51 per cent from 83 per cent in 1994.

Twelve years ago 82 per cent said they accomplished at least half their daily planned work but that number fell to 50 per cent last year. A decade ago, 40 per cent of workers called themselves very or extremely successful, but that number fell to just 28 per cent.

"We think we're faster, smarter, better with all this technology at our side, and in the end, we still feel rushed and our feeling of productivity is down," said Maria Woytek, marketing communications manager for Day-Timers.

The latest study was conducted among a random sample of about 1000 people who work at least part-time. The earlier study surveyed some 1300 workers.

Psychology professor Ronald Downey of Kansas State University, who specialises in industrial organisation, said expectations that workplace technology would save time and money had mostly proved untrue.

"It just increases the expectations that people have for your production."

Even if productivity increases, it's constantly outpaced by those expectations, said Don Grimme of GHR Training Solutions, a workplace training company based in Coral Springs, Florida.

"The irony is the very expectation of getting more done is getting in the way of getting more done," he said. "People are stressed out."

Companies that are flexible with workers' time and give workers the most control over their tasks tend to fare better against the sea of rising expectations, experts said.

Problems of efficiency have been made worse by businesses that have moved to 24-hour operations, bosses who micro-manage and longer commuting time. Downsizing resulted in fewer staff doing the work of those who left.

Challenger said there was a trend among companies to measure job performance like never before.

"There's a sense that no matter how much I do, it's never enough."

- REUTERS