The holiday season is a tradition in many offices — 69 percent of employers planned to throw an office holiday party this year, a 3 percent increase from last year, and more than half of employers planned to hand out holiday bonuses, according to a recent survey.
But the season can also be time-consuming.
A separate survey found more than half of workers (53 percent — 3 percent more than in 2015) say they spend at least some work time shopping for holiday gifts online. Forty-three percent say their online holiday shopping generally takes an hour or more.
Employers aren’t thrilled about the distraction. Eleven percent have fired someone for doing online holiday shopping at work; 54 percent block employees from accessing certain sites at the office to reduce gift buying.
A higher percentage of IT and financial services employees (68 and 65 percent, respectively) shop online at work during the holiday season, compared to workers in other industries. Ironically, retail industry employees were at the bottom of the list; 42 percent purchase items online at work.
To find out more about employees’ online holiday shopping habits, check out this survey from CareerBuilder. Learn more about workers’ holiday season gift-giving, including some of the most unusual holiday gifts for coworkers — ranging from two left-handed gloves to a jar of gravy — in the job search site’s annual holiday survey.
In addition, if your office is one of the nearly 70 percent who held an office holiday party this year, but you experienced low turnout or other issues, you may be interested in our blog post on whether or not this year’s holiday party should be the last one your company sponsors.