The Irish economy is losing an estimated €700m per year from employees who are accessing social networks for personal use during working hours.
In a recent survey conducted by IrishJobs.ie it was revealed that more than half of workers admitted to using sites such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter while at work.
The figures state that 65,000 of the 1.8 million strong workforce spend more than an hour a day on social networking sites while at work. Some Irish companies have tried to combat the situation by allocating employees a small percentage of their work time for personal internet use, while others have blocked access to the popularly visited sites.
With Ireland’s GDP at more than €159bn, according CSO figures for 2009, social networking sites could be costing the country more than €700m, with SMEs likely to be the hardest hit by the productivity drop.
“Our results clearly show that Irish workers are spending increased time whilst at work on social networking sites, which, if left unchecked, could have negative repercussions on the productivity of many companies across the country,†said Valerie Sorohan, marketing manager of IrishJobs.ie.
