Microsoft Says Productivity Paranoia ‘Harms’ – Employers Have Another View

Employees believe they are as productive as ever. The bosses don’t believe it. New data from Microsoft’s Work Trend Index, which surveyed 20,000 workers in 11 countries, finds that despite early signs of a productivity boom during the pandemic – when many workers traded commuting time for longer hours than home- employers and employees do not seem to have the same perception on the same issue. We are probably talking about a productivity gap.

About 87% of workers who responded to the survey said they are productive at work. This spring, the tech giant found that the number of meetings per week among users of the Teams platform had increased by 153% since the start of the pandemic. Overlapping meetings increased by 46%. At least 42% of people are multi-tasking, actively sending an email or pinging a colleague during a scheduled meeting.

However, 85% of employers surveyed said remote work has made it difficult to ensure employees are productive. This “productivity paranoia,” as Microsoft calls it in its report, arose from the paradox of employers fearing that productivity is being lost, even when hours worked, number of meetings, and metrics showing actual activity have increase.

The report comes as macroeconomic data has shown a sharp decline in productivity, potentially fueling employers’ fears about how much work their employees are doing, especially when out of sight. After surging amid the pandemic, U.S. labor productivity — excluding agriculture, which measures goods and services produced per hour worked — fell at its fastest pace in 74 years in the first quarter and also fell by the second trimester.

Many argue that inexperienced workers taking on new jobs after the… “big layoff,” experienced workers having to train so many new hires, and the burnout of those who worked overtime during the early years of the pandemic seem to be what really have the biggest impact on reducing productivity.

The latest Labor Trends Index also found that offers of free food, rock concerts or threats of punishment may not do much to lure people back to the office.

What could really keep people coming back is simply their colleagues: 84% say workers would be motivated to return to the office because of socialization, and 85% by the chance to rebuild team and peer bonds. Survey participants also said they would be able to go to the office more often if they knew their team members (73%) or work friends (74%) would be there.

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