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A new study finds that entrepreneurs of all ages lose weeks of productivity every year to “wasted time.”
The survey, which surveyed 2,000 U.S. small business owners, evenly split between generations, found that the average respondent spends one hour and 36 minutes each day on tasks they consider unproductive.
This “wasted time” equates to more than three work weeks per year for small business owners.
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Conducted by Talker Research on behalf of Slack investigation We uncovered the top time-wasters faced by respondents.
These include non-work-related distractions (57%), procrastination (47%) and the seemingly endless time spent waiting for status updates (28%).
However, a new productivity killer is emerging: context switching between multiple apps and tools (17%). With surveyed entrepreneurs juggling an average of four different digital tools per day, and almost a third of them using five or more, the cost of technology fragmentation is becoming clear.
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Three in 10 respondents waste time searching for information in the wrong places, and 29% feel they receive duplicate messages across multiple platforms.
“Today’s business owners juggle multiple tasks and tools at once. Digital tools make them more productive, but constant app switching can make them less efficient,” says Jaime DeLanghe, vice president of product management at Slack. “Successful entrepreneurs learn how to streamline their digital workflows so they can focus on growing their business and better serving their customers.”
While all respondents report having “wasted time” during the workday, the survey split respondents across generations to see who they feel has the best time management skills.
The study found that Gen Z small business owners consider themselves the best at time management, significantly outperforming previous generations.
The survey found that 47% of Gen Z respondents said they generally have “good” time management skills, compared with 33% of Millennials and just a quarter of Gen Xers (25%) and Baby Boomers (24%).
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Interestingly, the study found that across generations, the ability to focus on what’s important is the main driver of productivity (69%).
From there, opinions vary by generation: Gen Z, Gen X, and Baby Boomers reported that setting boundaries and saying “no” when they can’t take on any more work is the next most important thing, but Millennials prefer to use technology to help them stay on track.
And this millennial enthusiasm for technology may be spreading: A significant proportion of small business owners (59%) adopted new technology this year to simplify tasks (62%), save time (59%) or improve their products or services (51%).
“It’s encouraging to see small business owners, regardless of age, embracing technology to increase their productivity,” DeLange says. “To succeed in these high-pressure roles, it’s essential that entrepreneurs choose tools that seamlessly integrate and streamline processes rather than complicate them. This can be a huge help when trying to do more with less.”
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