More than a third of office workers deliberately spend longer hours in the office than needed in a bid to impress their manager, a new poll has revealed. However, this extra work does not increase productivity and can end up having a detrimental effect on home life.
The research, by officebroker.com, found that 39% of workers regularly stayed late or arrived early during the last year, in a bid to seem more dedicated to their job than their colleagues. Over a quarter (26%) said they consistently worked longer days than were actually needed to do their job effectively.
Employees are filling their time browsing the internet, emailing friends, filing and doing menial, non-urgent tasks such as organising their calendar. They are more likely to stay longer at work when a new boss had been appointed, a pay review was imminent or redundancies were expected.
Those employees working extended hours were found to be committing between an hour and two hours extra a day, adding a minimum of half a day extra to their working week, solely to impress others.
A spokesman from officebroker.com says the ‘faking it’ office phenomenon has poor long-term implications for both the employee and their employer. For workers, it’s better to find a new career which they really love, rather than pretending to enjoy the career they already have.
He said: “The general consensus is that many workers across the country are putting in longer office hours than ever before. What our research has found however is that many are doing it in a bid to improve their office image and win favour, rather than because their workload demands it.
“People are sitting idle in their office in a bid to stand out from the colleagues and impress their bosses. This means a poorer work life balance and ultimately no productivity gains for the firm – just increasingly tired workers – which benefits nobody.
“It was also interesting to note that workers were planning when to put in the longer hours, choosing to spend more time in the office when a pay rise, redundancy or new appointment was on the horizon.”
Over the longer term, careers could be at risk with this strategy however, as management become aware of this tactic and crack down on unproductive tasks in the workplace.