Australian Government Restricts Social Media to Boost Productivity

We recently reported that Australia spends most time on social networking sites. Apparently, that includes the Australia Governmental bodies too.

An audit revealed that the Australia Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research used social media for about 400 hours per week. It was also said that usage peaked at 1pm and remained steady until about 3pm. This was the situation even when the department had restricted access to social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and MySpace.

With social media flooding the offices, questions on employee’s productivity were raised. Liberal senator Cory Bernardi said “millions of dollars were being spent as public servants wasted their time facebooking and tweeting on social media sites.” He added saying, “This government needs to advise departmental staff that formulating policy is more important than playing Facebook Scrabble,” The Australian reported.

To prevent social media from hampering work efficiency, the Department of Treasury has blocked YouTube, Facebook and MySpace access but allowed Twitter for work purposes. Some departments like the Attorney-General’s Department has allowed  staff to use Facebook, but blocked  MySpace.

With all the negativity about social media in workplace, we thought new media could be helpful if a company were to set the right rules and embrace it, rather than restrict it. That depends largely on the company’s culture, though.