Using your personal phone at work does no harm, study suggests

Researchers concluded that despite fears of distraction and loss of focus, work performance did not decline when a smartphone ban was lifted

Allowing staff to use personal phones at work does not harm productivity, a new study has found.
Researchers at the universities of Galway and Melbourne looked at workers from a European global pharmaceutical company that recently relaxed its policy on using phones for non-work purposes.
The company had originally banned personal use of phones in the 1990s for health and safety reasons, amid concerns of employees being distracted while working around dangerous chemicals.
But in recent years, staff said the restriction made them feel cut off from the outside world, and claimed it was damaging competitiveness.
Previous research has suggested that employees spend an average of 56 minutes during a working day using their smartphone for non-work related tasks, checking their device an average of 150 times a day.
It also takes around 25 minutes to return focus to a task after putting a phone aside due to a distraction, such as a notification, studies have shown.
To find out if phones are harming productivity, researchers followed 40 employees who used their personal smartphones when at work and compared them to 40 who maintained a self-imposed ban.
They found that work performance did not decline when the smartphone ban was lifted and researchers felt able to deal with family and personal issues, leaving them less overwhelmed.
Prof Eoin Whelan, of the University of Galway’s J E Cairnes School of Business and Economics said: “Rather than enforcing a ban on smartphones in the workplace, our experiences in tracking the introduction of smartphones in this company suggests a more effective strategy would be to establish an organisational climate where the company expectation for smartphone behaviours are known, for example ensuring that they are not used in meetings or in the canteen, with adherence monitored by employees themselves.
“Managers must realise the unintended consequences of forcing a smartphone ban.
“Preventing phones in the workplace can increase work-life conflict, which in turn has significant implications for work performance, job satisfaction, absenteeism, turnover intentions, as well as general wellbeing.”
The experiment concluded that despite fears of smartphone distraction and loss of focus, work performance did not decline when the smartphone ban was lifted.
The perceived conflict between the demands of work and personal life significantly declined for workers who had access to their phones, compared to those who did not.
Employees with access to phones reported being able to help with family issues during the day, helping to reduce pressure on their partners.
Spreading personal communications throughout the day also meant employees were not overwhelmed when they turned on their phone after work.
Most research into mobile phone use and work has focused on the harm to employees of feeling like they have to be contactable outside office hours.
Employees spend an average of 2.5 hours per workday using mobile phones for non-work activities.
Studies have shown that each employee loses 720 work hours due to distraction every year, with smartphones top the list of office distractions.
The researchers say they hope their findings will show the benefits personal phones have in maintaining a work-life balance.