Calls for ban on phones at work

SCHOOL mobile phone bans may not go far enough, with some employers saying personal devices should also be banned at work.

Society’s obsession with social media and constant connection is causing distraction, safety issues and wasted time among employees – and employers have had enough.

While many retailers, such as supermarkets, have long restricted personal phones on the shop floor, formal policies are creeping into more sectors.

Brisbane Junior Chamber of Commerce president Nathan Schokker said more than half of business owners he dealt with were taking action to tackle the issue.

“Definitely in the last 12 months it’s something that gets spoken about more and more,” he said.

“I’d say 50 per cent are taking action, whether that’s talking to their team or creating a policy and trying to be on the front foot.

“Most people try to take a ‘softly softly’ approach and raise it with their teams and say ‘let’s cut down phone use’, then it just progressively increases in severity so memos go around the business saying ‘we are going to start policing this’, then they have no place to go but to create a policy so it’s official and there is no excuse.”

Mr Schokker, also director of property services and maintenance business Talio, introduced a policy for his 25-plus staff strictly banning phone use during certain tasks and strongly discouraging use for all other work time.

In his case, it was mainly about safety, but for most it was about wasted time.

He said the productivity issue was common across all sectors, from service work to white collar professions.

“You can quickly lose half an hour or an hour in a day and if you add that up over a year that could be hundreds of hours that disappear with no work being done.”

Dr Amantha Imber, founder of at innovation consultancy Inventium, said there was a clear trend toward people struggling to focus at work.

Her Workday Reinvention Program, designed to help solve the issue, was launched a month ago and had already been “inundated with interest”.

“On average, people can focus for six minutes before they give into some digital distraction,” Dr Imber said.

“Social media is designed to be addictive – there are people whose job it is to keep people using the app for as long as possible.”