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Newsroom

<ul>
<li>Workers waste an extra 67 minutes online each day due to &lsquo;digital presenteeism&rsquo; pressures</li>
<li>Async privilege is prevalent, with 74% of C-suite execs able to work on their own timetable, compared to 24% of junior staff</li>
<li>An overwhelming majority (81%) believe they are more productive and create high-quality output when they have more flexibility over when they work</li>
</ul>
London and San Francisco, July 19, 2022 &mdash; Damaging habits from the office have been imported into remote work, with a pervasive culture of digital presenteeism taking hold accrding to a new report, <a href="https://language.work/research/killing-time-at-work/?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=press&amp;utm_campaign=killing-time&amp;utm_content=launch" rel="follow noopener" target="_blank">Killing Time at Work</a>, from <a href="https://qatalog.com/">Qatalog</a>, the digital Work Hub, and <a href="https://about.gitlab.com/">GitLab Inc,</a> the provider of The One DevOps Platform.
The research also reveals a new phenomenon dubbed &lsquo;async privilege&rsquo;, with C-suite execs taking advantage of new freedoms to work on their own schedule, but not providing those same opportunities to junior members of staff.&nbsp;
<h3>Digital presenteeism runs rampant - costing time and hurting productivity</h3>
With the rapid rise of remote and hybrid work, many managers can no longer see their team physically present in the office. Knowledge workers are now worried their work won&rsquo;t be recognized, with more than half (54%) saying they feel pressure to show colleagues and managers that they are online and working during certain times of the day.&nbsp;
In many cases, this also means working extra hours. On average, workers said they spend an additional 67 minutes each day (on top of their regular working hours) making sure they are visibly online at work, equivalent to more than 5.5 hours each week.
This culture of presenteeism likely comes from the top, with 63% of workers holding the view that management and senior leadership within their organization &lsquo;prefer a traditional culture with employees in the office&rsquo;. Another 54% also said their colleagues are stuck in old habits, making it hard to shift to asynchronous working.
Bosses' tendency toward presenteeism is likely to be counterproductive, with an overwhelming majority of people (81%) saying they are &lsquo;more productive and create higher quality output when they have more flexibility over when they work&rsquo;.&nbsp;
<h3>Async privilege - Flexibility is not trickling down</h3>
Despite the proclamations of a &lsquo;new way of working', only a third (33%) of knowledge workers said they work asynchronously*&nbsp;&lsquo;Often or Always&rsquo;, indicating that the &lsquo;9-5&rsquo; is still a reality for many, even if they are working remotely. However, the figures also revealed a startling difference between senior and junior members of staff.&nbsp;
Almost three quarters (74%) of those in the C-Suite said they work asynchronously &lsquo;Often&rsquo; or &lsquo;Always&rsquo;, compared to 48% of those at Vice President or Director level, 32% of those at a Manager or Consultant level, and 24% of those in Analyst or Administrative roles.&nbsp;
Tariq Rauf, founder and CEO of Qatalog, said:
&ldquo;The pandemic gave us a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reshape our working lives and cast aside vestiges we learned in the office era, yet it&rsquo;s clear that we are repeating the same mistakes. Workers are desperate to avoid suspicion that they aren&rsquo;t working hard enough, and they&rsquo;re falling back on the same habits of presenteeism, adapted for the digital workplace. The costs are huge, resulting in unhappy, burnt-out employees, reduced retention, and lost productivity.
&ldquo;In stark contrast, C-Suite execs know they can work on their own schedule, without fear of questions from their team. That&rsquo;s why we&rsquo;ve seen this new system of privilege emerge, where senior staff feel empowered to work asynchronously, while not extending the same freedom and flexibility to their team members. There&rsquo;s no excuse for such an enormous disparity, and business leaders need to make much more effort to build a culture and provide the tools that enable asynchronous work for all.&rdquo;
Darren Murph, Head of Remote at GitLab, said:
&ldquo;Presenteeism was never a great way to measure the results of a business. In the post-pandemic world, with the rise of remote and distributed teams, there&rsquo;s no such thing as showing up or clocking out. Work can happen as the sun turns, and the best leaders will reward results over hours. You do that by giving people agency and autonomy by default and coaching the skills to achieve their goals. This paradigm shift will define the workplace of the future.&rdquo;
<h3>Technology is a double-edged sword</h3>
While technology made remote and asynchronous work possible, it also facilitates digital presenteeism, with workers finding a host of ways to show colleagues they are still present in the digital workplace, from sending emails or messages, to adding comments on Google Docs.&nbsp;
How workers signal to colleagues they are online and working:
<ul>
<li>Send or reply to emails - 70%</li>
<li>Send or reply to messages on messaging applications - 53%</li>
<li>Set my status on Slack or Teams to &lsquo;Active&rsquo; - 52%</li>
<li>Joining team video calls - 51%</li>
<li>Adding or replying to comments on document editing tools - 29%</li>
<li>Updating shared project/task management tools - 23%</li>
<li>Sending emoji/GIF reactions on messaging applications - 22%</li>
</ul>
Knowledge workers are also contending with a barrage of notifications, making it hard to switch off. On average, workers now receive notifications from six different applications, and almost three-quarters (73%) said they reply to these notifications outside of their working hours, with 30% saying they do this every day.
<h3>A key battleground in the war for talent</h3>
Flexibility to choose your working hours has quickly become one of the key battlegrounds for attracting and retaining talent. Two-thirds (66%) of workers said they would resign from a job if flexibility was limited, and 43% indicated they would consider a lower-paid role if it gave them greater flexibility over their hours.
This should be no surprise considering the improvements to quality of life that it can bring. Three-quarters (74%) of workers said increased flexibility over when they work had allowed them to spend more time on hobbies, volunteering, or side hustles. In addition, among workers who said they work asynchronously &lsquo;Often&rsquo; or &lsquo;Always&rsquo;, 65% said this had a positive impact on their wellbeing, compared to just 6% who said it had a negative impact.&nbsp;
Tariq Rauf added:
&ldquo;For centuries, our daily lives have been built around the traditional working day, but this will soon become another relic of the past. The 9-5 is dead, and businesses will have to adapt to this new reality or die because the best talent wants and expects it.&nbsp;
&ldquo;There are enormous benefits to working asynchronously for businesses, too. It provides people with the space and time to do &lsquo;deep work&rsquo; without constant distractions and, in a world of distributed teams working across different continents and time zones, it is fast becoming an essential collaboration method to ensure people can work effectively and efficiently.&nbsp;
&ldquo;Technology has clearly got a part to play in making this possible, but it needs a radical redesign that is more considerate of the user and prioritizes their objectives, rather than simply capturing our attention. To enable this async world, we need to disable all our sync habits - and thoughtful technology is the way to achieve that. If we can get this all right, the future of work starts to look much brighter.&rdquo;
-Ends-
Notes to editors:
<ol>
<li>In the survey, asynchronous or async work was defined as &ldquo;when people work during different times of the day, without the expectation of immediately responding to others, allowing employees to get work done at a time that suits them&rdquo;. Survey respondents were provided with a definition at the relevant point in the survey.&nbsp;</li>
</ol>
About the study
This study was conducted in partnership with GitLab. 2,000 knowledge workers participated in the survey &ndash; 1,000 in the US and 1,000 in the UK. For the purposes of this study, &ldquo;knowledge worker&rdquo; was defined as someone who works predominantly from home, an office, a co-working space, or a combination of these, and uses a computer or laptop more than 50% of the time to carry out their work. The research was carried out by Attest between 19-21 March 2022.
Press contacts:&nbsp;
Qatalog - Sam Ferris / <a href="mailto:sam.ferris@qatalog.com">sam.ferris@qatalog.com</a>&nbsp;
GitLab - Kristi Piechnik / <a href="mailto:press@gitlab.com">press@gitlab.com</a>
About Qatalog
<a href="https://qatalog.com/">Qatalog</a> is an entirely new paradigm of software for work, enabling high-performance teams to coordinate effectively. Its Work Hub is built around people, teams, and the bespoke needs of a business, and provides a single source of truth that makes work structured, accessible, fast, and efficient. Founded in 2019, Qatalog has raised $18.5m in venture funding from backers including Atomico, Mosaic, and Salesforce Ventures.
About GitLab&nbsp;
<a href="https://about.gitlab.com/">GitLab</a> is The One DevOps platform for software innovation. As The One DevOps Platform, GitLab provides one interface, one data store, one permissions model, one value stream, one set of reports, one spot to secure your code, one location to deploy to any cloud, and one place for everyone to contribute. The platform is the only true cloud-agnostic end-to-end DevOps platform that brings together all DevOps capabilities in one place.
With GitLab, organizations can create, deliver, and manage code quickly and continuously to translate business vision into reality. GitLab empowers customers and users to innovate faster, scale more easily, and serve and retain customers more effectively. Built on Open Source, GitLab works alongside its growing community, which is composed of thousands of developers and millions of users, to continuously deliver new DevOps innovations.

Qatalog and GitLab study reveals a pervasive culture of digital presenteeism that makes asynchronous work almost impossible.

Study: Async work prevented by digital presenteeism

Qatalog and GitLab study reveals pervasive culture of digital presenteeism

<ul>
<li>Customer growth accelerates at Qatalog, as 5,000 businesses use the work hub to coordinate teamwork and scale operations as flexible work goes mainstream</li>
<li>Qatalog launches Tasks to power project management, Company section to give users a single source of truth for must-reads</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Qatalog rolls out new capabilities for Workflows, Goals and Projects to simplify collaboration between teams and between businesses</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">New integrations with GitHub, Notion and Slack go live to boost visibility on work happening</li>
</ul>
London, December 10, 2021 &mdash; Digital work hub Qatalog today announces that it now powers 5,000 businesses globally, alongside a streak of product launches that bring deeper functionality to its platform.&nbsp;
As flexible work goes mainstream and companies rush to adopt a dizzying array of productivity tools, demand has spiked for a central work hub where teams can navigate the entire virtual workspace in a few clicks and coordinate work in one central place. Just a few months since launch, Qatalog is already powering operations for a wide range of tech-forward businesses, from SaaS and fintech companies through to education and talent platforms. Now, the fast-moving startup is expanding its work hub with the launch of Tasks and Company section, as well as deeper functionality for Workflows, Goals and Projects.
&ldquo;People working across disparate locations, workstreams and tools are having a hard time making sense out of what&rsquo;s happening at work. This was an acute pain point pre-pandemic when we started working on Qatalog; and now as flexible work goes mainstream, it&rsquo;s even more obvious that businesses desperately need a solution.&rdquo; Tariq Rauf, Founder and CEO of Qatalog, commented. &ldquo;In the new world of work, businesses want a central, trusted place that makes their teamwork structured, visible and efficient. Our work hub already delivers this, and the products coming online today help our users save even more time and boost team output even further, without the chaos and confusion.&rdquo;
Qatalog launches Tasks and Company to bring project management and must-reads into the work hub
Qatalog&rsquo;s users&mdash;from operations leaders and product managers, through to executives and HR teams&mdash;are already using Qatalog as a central place to coordinate goals, projects, teams, and more. With the launch of Tasks, teams can now collaborate on project execution by creating tasks to be done, assigning specific owners for each task, and tracking their status.&nbsp;
Additionally, Qatalog is launching Company section, an intranet space within Qatalog. Here, users can access company policies (e.g. vacation policies), must-reads (e.g. company values) and leadership communications (e.g. executive hire announcements), all within one work hub.
Kent Smith, Operations Team Lead at Threekit, commented: &ldquo;Qatalog is a single source of truth for content documentation and a way to create business rules. This makes it easier for organizations, in our case the sales team, to get the information they need so they can spend more time selling and less time searching for information.&rdquo;
Qatalog rolls out new features for Workflows, Goals and Projects to simplify teamwork
Qatalog users can now share Workflows with external partners to better automate routine work with contractors, freelancers, agencies and other teams outside of Qatalog. For example, design operations leads can use this to streamline the production of new marketing collateral with an agency, or people operations managers can use it to build repeatable processes for onboarding new joiners.&nbsp;
&ldquo;Qatalog automates routine processes not only within organizations, but also between businesses,&rdquo; Tariq Rauf comments. &ldquo;This is a big deal for our customers because it saves time and minimizes friction between teams.&rdquo;
Richer capabilities are also going live for Goals and Projects to give users an easy way to coordinate teamwork in a central place. Teams can now quickly visualize progress on goals, divide projects up into phases and use threads to make decisions and request feedback. Rather than having conversations spread across emails, goals tracked manually in spreadsheets, or files scattered across various tools, customers are relying on Qatalog to simplify work and bring it all into one trusted place.&nbsp;
Commenting on how Qatalog structures information about work in a consistently accessible way, Logan Deyo, Founder of byDesign, said: &ldquo;With other tools it&rsquo;s like throwing paint on a canvas and it ends up differently each time, but with Qatalog anybody can throw paint on canvas and it&rsquo;ll end up the exact same picture, every single time.&rdquo;
Qatalog rolls out integrations with GitHub, Notion and Slack
New integrations with GitHub, Notion and Slack give Qatalog users visibility into work happening across disparate teams, tools and projects. This knits work that&rsquo;s happening across different tools into one central place so, from within one work hub, engineering managers can quickly get context on pull requests on GitHub or product leaders can check on feedback from customer calls on Notion.
About Qatalog
Qatalog is a work hub that gives people a radically simpler way to coordinate work across teams and get context on what&rsquo;s happening. Thousands of businesses around the world use it as the central place to manage knowledge and collaborate together. By bringing structure, access and efficiency to teamwork, Qatalog makes it easier for businesses to scale their operations. Backed by Atomico, Salesforce Ventures and Mosaic, Qatalog was founded in 2019; its mission is to unlock the collective potential of teams.

Customer growth accelerates at Qatalog, as 5,000 businesses use the work hub to coordinate teamwork and scale operations as flexible work go

Qatalog lands 5,000 customers, announces streak of product launches

Customer growth accelerates at Qatalog, as 5,000 businesses use the work hub to coordinate teamwork and scale operations.

<ul>
<li>A crisis of trust is opening up within the modern workplace as a chronic lack of visibility leads 2 in 3 workers (66%) to question the actions of colleagues and leaders.</li>
<li>Qatalog&rsquo;s survey of 2,000 knowledge workers from the UK and US reveals that 63% of workers find it harder to build trust with each other when working remotely.</li>
<li>Despite the popularity of remote and flexible work, the study found that it erodes empathy within the workplace and creates new challenges for leaders to navigate as they plan for the future.</li>
</ul>
London, November 17, 2021: Digital work hub <a href="https://qatalog.com/" rel="follow">Qatalog</a> today publishes a survey of 2,000 knowledge workers which uncovers a crisis of trust within the modern workplace, fuelled by a chronic lack of visibility within companies.&nbsp;
<h2>A fragmented workplace characterized by a lack of visibility</h2>
The study found that remote work is feeding a chronic visibility problem within the modern workplace. When working remotely, two-thirds (66%) of respondents reported that they lack visibility of what colleagues are working on and how it fits into the bigger picture.&nbsp;
This is creating blindspots and silos right across the modern organization, on everything from customer feedback to marketing campaigns. It undermines confidence that colleagues and managers are working on the right things, consistently hitting their goals, and can be relied upon. It&rsquo;s no wonder that 63% say it's harder to build trust with their colleagues in a remote environment.&nbsp;
After nearly two years of remote work, 40% say they still find it hard to manage work across distributed teams. This may be due to complacency and underinvestment on the part of employers. About a third (34%) say their employer has either not invested, or has not adequately invested, in the tools and policies needed to support remote or flexible work.&nbsp;
Either way, this lack of visibility means that good work is often going unrecognized. Less than a third (28%) of the workforce feel that their positive contributions at work are regularly recognized, and one in ten (10%) say that their positive contributions are ignored altogether.&nbsp;
These visibility challenges also impact career progression: 47% of workers believe it's easier to get promoted if you spend more time in the office.
<blockquote>
Tariq Rauf, founder and CEO of Qatalog, says: &ldquo;Employees feel valued when they know how their work fits into the bigger picture and are given the space to work on their own terms. That&rsquo;s hard when the workplace is so fragmented and visibility is so poor. To fix this, employers must be intentional about helping teams work with a shared perspective even when they&rsquo;re not in the room together.&rdquo;
</blockquote>
<h2>The emerging crisis of trust</h2>
The findings also show that, in this fragmented working environment, workers' faith in their leaders and colleagues is eroding.
Employees are suspicious about the motivations of employers that want to bring them back into the office. Although only 2% of those surveyed feel positive about the effects of returning to the office, 37% attribute a return to their bosses&rsquo; interests.&nbsp;
Although 60% of workers say that they are more productive while working remotely, only 30% believe their bosses are more productive when working this way. When people suspect their leaders are taking the foot off the gas and are not being held accountable, it erodes trust within the team.
The lack of trust isn&rsquo;t just felt between employees and their leaders. 63% of workers believe it's harder to build trust with their colleagues in a remote environment.&nbsp;
Empathy is also eroding in the remote and flexible working world, with suspicion and frustration creeping in its place. If a colleague is slow to respond to a message when working remotely, 34% say they get more frustrated than they would do in person. Worse, 10% say they&rsquo;re more suspicious of colleagues that take sick leave when they&rsquo;re working remotely.
<blockquote>
Rauf adds: &ldquo;The modern workplace is putting pressure on our ability to empathize. You used to be able to walk into the office, talk to people to get their perspective, and absorb everything going on around you. Now, it&rsquo;s the opposite: the workplace is highly fragmented, people are working in the dark, and it&rsquo;s hard to put yourself in others&rsquo; shoes. In this environment, it&rsquo;s tricky to build a strong connection with colleagues and feel engaged with work.&rdquo;&nbsp;
</blockquote>
<h2>Flexible working is here to stay</h2>
Despite the growing trust crisis, flexibility looks like it's here to stay, with employees willing to tolerate the downsides because of the advantages it brings.&nbsp;
Nearly half (47%) of employees prefer working from home full-time, while 48% prefer working flexibly, sometimes at home and sometimes in person. 75%, meanwhile, want the flexibility to completely or partly work to their own schedule. The feeling is so strong that 73% of employees believe that remote and flexible work are key to a company&rsquo;s ability to compete in the war for talent.
<h2>A looming confrontation&nbsp;</h2>
The survey data also points to a potential confrontation brewing between workers and leaders on pay, benefits, and access to flexibility.&nbsp;
Any companies considering cutting salaries for remote workers based on their location could face a striking backlash. More than 90% think it&rsquo;s unfair to cut the wages of remote workers based on their location, while 90% of workers say they will quit their jobs if salaries are cut based on proximity to the office.
And that&rsquo;s not all. With the cost of living increasing, 93% of workers plan to make some sort of change in their professional lives. From asking for a pay rise (29%) to working from home more often (17%) or quitting their job for something else (17%), workers will demand change if their employers don&rsquo;t offer it - something for management teams to be mindful of as they plan for 2022.
<blockquote>
Rauf adds: &ldquo;The Great Resignation is a huge danger for every business today &mdash; the balance of power is shifting away from companies to employees. Building a culture of trust and flexibility has never been more critical to keeping people engaged in this new world of work.&rdquo;&nbsp;
</blockquote>

Qatalog survey of 2,000 knowledge workers uncovers a crisis of trust within the modern workplace. Read more in the press release.

Workplace trust crisis press release | Qatalog

We published a survey of 2,000 knowledge workers which uncovers a crisis of trust within the modern workplace.

Qatalog releases data on trust gap at work

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Exclusive data from Qatalog and Cornell University&rsquo;s Ellis Ideas Lab reveals that the uncontrolled adoption of digital tools is killing productivity at work.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Employees are wasting an hour every day trying to find information hidden within apps; 6 in 10 of people say it&rsquo;s hard to know what colleagues are doing; 43% say they spend too much time switching between different work apps like Slack and Zoom.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Qatalog today launches the Work isn&rsquo;t Working campaign at <a href="https://language.work/" rel="follow noopener" target="_blank">https://language.work/</a> to challenge this productivity scam and call for a reset of standards amid the transition to hybrid work.</li>
</ul>
London, June 9, 2021: Digital work hub Qatalog today reveals the findings of a landmark study conducted with researchers at Cornell University into the impact of apps on our working lives. It reveals how productivity software is cheating workers out of time, focus and creativity in a battle for their attention in the new digital workplace.
The research is released as part of Qatalog&rsquo;s Work isn&rsquo;t Working campaign, launched today at <a href="https://language.work/" rel="follow noopener" target="_blank">https://language.work/</a>, to protect people from an onslaught of new workplace technology and the hangover of ineffective pre-pandemic working practices.&nbsp;
&ldquo;We need to call time on the great productivity scam. There&rsquo;s been an explosion in the number of apps we rely on to do our jobs, but the result isn&rsquo;t greater productivity &mdash; it&rsquo;s total chaos,&rdquo; said Tariq Rauf, CEO and founder of Qatalog. &ldquo;No matter their individual merits, each tool is adding to a noisy digital environment that is, quite literally, driving workers to distraction. The more time that we waste on this mess, the less we have for deep thought and meaningful engagement with our colleagues. We deserve better.&rdquo;
<h2>Time to Slack off and Zoom out</h2>
The research found that soaring adoption of workplace apps, from Slack to Zoom, is cheating workers out of time, focus and creativity.&nbsp;
Productivity tools are killing our productivity.&nbsp;
In a typical working day, people are wasting 59 minutes trying to find information across tools like Google Workspace, storage systems like Dropbox and messaging channels like Slack &mdash; <a href="https://qatalog.com/blog/post/productivity-tools-killing-productivity/" rel="follow">5 hours of wasted time every week</a>. Knowledge is fragmented across too many tools, with 54% of workers saying that this makes it harder to find what they need. &ldquo;Technology is trapping knowledge. In many ways, we&rsquo;ve replaced the commute with mindless busywork trying to find it,&rdquo; says Rauf.
We&rsquo;re working in the dark as tech runs amok.
People are uncertain about what work is being done in other teams&rsquo; apps and communication platforms. The branding team might live in a project management app, while the content team organizes work in an online wiki and the sales team tracks everything in a CRM. 61% of people say it can be hard to figure out what others are working on, while 44% say siloed digital tools make it hard to know whether work is being duplicated.&nbsp;
Confused workers are oversharing, adding to the chaos.&nbsp;
Half of workers (49%) say they&rsquo;re concerned that the information they post to their company&rsquo;s apps will get lost in a sea of updates. This feeds uncertainty about whether crucial information is actually reaching its intended audiences, while 53% of people admit to making updates even when they&rsquo;re not fully necessary, just to cover their bases.&nbsp;
Context switching at work is rife, and our creativity is suffering.
An explosion of apps is fuelling workplace distraction. 43% of workers report spending too much time switching between different digital tools, whether cycling through tabs or digging through messaging channels, and 45% say this context switching makes them less productive. This chaotic work environment makes it harder to work together on creative projects &mdash; nearly two thirds (62%) of people report missing opportunities to collaborate in the modern workplace.&nbsp;
Technology is fuelling a burnout crisis.&nbsp;
The impact of all this? 89% of respondents say their work life is getting worse, <a href="https://hbr.org/2021/02/beyond-burned-out" rel="follow noopener" target="_blank">according to HBR</a>. 7 in 10 also say there could be more efficient ways of using technology to get work done, according to the new Qatalog research.
<h2>Qatalog launches Work isn&rsquo;t Working campaign to stop the great productivity scam</h2>
The research conducted with Cornell University&rsquo;s Ellis Lab is released as part of Qatalog&rsquo;s Work isn&rsquo;t Working campaign, which launches today at <a href="https://language.work">https://language.work</a> to help companies redesign their work environments amid huge structural change in how people work.
&ldquo;Fixing our chaotic work practices will take a thoughtful, two-pronged approach, not a half-baked hybrid work plan, or even worse, a command to return to the office full-time,&rdquo; comments Rauf. &ldquo;Firstly, we need to press reset on the technology that underpins our working day so it creates focus, not chaos. We&rsquo;ve been blessed with powerful new tools at work, but fooled into using them in the wrong way &mdash; it&rsquo;s time to fix that. Secondly, we need a mindset shift that breaks from pre-pandemic 9-5 norms and embraces a radically new working culture rooted in trust.&rdquo;&nbsp;
The campaign offers a <a href="https://language.work/change-now/" rel="follow">Modern Work Index</a>, where people can benchmark their own workplace against core principles of trust, flexibility, focus and belonging, find out what needs to be improved, and get practical advice on how to do it.
&ldquo;The old rules no longer apply. The 9 to 5 is dead and so too is the presenteeism that comes with it. Companies are waking up to this and, in a war for talent, are racing to create new working norms rooted in trust, flexibility, focus and belonging,&rdquo; Rauf says.&nbsp;
About the study
The study was conducted in partnership with the Ellis Idea Lab, Cornell University. The academic team specializes in organizations&rsquo; behaviours in the workplace and advised on shaping an objectively rigorous study into how the adoption of digital tools in distributed teams is impacting workplace behaviours. Three separate surveys were completed, each by 1,000 US and UK workers in March 2021. Survey participation was limited to respondents currently working remotely in some capacity.&nbsp;
Press contact: <a href="mailto:qatalog@thisisoutcast.com">qatalog@thisisoutcast.com</a>&nbsp;

Do digital tools make us more or less productive at work? Technology cheats workers out of time, focus and creativity, Qatalog research warns amid sweeping workplace transformation.

Work isn't working | Qatalog

Exclusive data from Qatalog and Cornell University’s Ellis Ideas Lab reveals that the uncontrolled adoption of digital tools is killing productivity at work.

Qatalog launches language.work with Cornell study

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Qatalog and GitLab reveal that 42% are sleepwalking into unknown hybrid work model that drives a bigger wedge between workers who can hardly get on the same page in the first place</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">The 9-5 is dead, but hybrid breathes new life into confusion at work where around 50% of people complain of drowning in tools and around 60% have no idea what their colleagues are doing</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Plague of workplace software has crushed expectations of fair work as employees drown in Zoom calls and Slack pings; hybrid offers unique opportunity for a radical reset</li>
</ul>
APRIL 27, 2021, INTERNET &mdash; Work infrastructure company Qatalog has teamed up with remote work pioneer GitLab to dissect the state of remote work and the implications for companies considering a transition to a hybrid work model. Drawing from the experiences of 3,000 people across six continents, the 2021 GitLab Remote Work Report, sponsored by Qatalog, reveals that 42% have already gone hybrid, even as positive sentiment towards fully remote work rides high, with around four in five saying they&rsquo;re satisfied with their remote work set-up.&nbsp;
The apparent satisfaction with remote belies a more challenging reality: distractions rank as the biggest pain point in daily work, closely followed by excessive meetings; and six in 10 complain that their colleagues work in silos. Now, as companies consider unchartered territory with hybrid, they risk creating more confusion between in-office and remote teams, amplifying the chaos of modern work.
&ldquo;Modern work is driving us to distraction. Status check-ins over video, after-hours pings, endless notifications &mdash; it&rsquo;s fuelling burnout.&rdquo; commented Tariq Rauf, CEO and founder of Qatalog. &ldquo;Hybrid is unchartered territory and threatens to amplify this chaos even further. Companies should approach with extreme caution and develop clear plans about how they will restore focus for workforces split between kitchen tables and headquarters.&rdquo;
<h2>Hybrid delusion tempts companies into more chaos</h2>
As lockdown restrictions begin to ease in countries like the US and the UK, employees are splitting their time between home and the office, with 42% of employees stating that they already have a hybrid set-up. The allure is that hybrid promises the best of both worlds, offering the flexibility of working remotely alongside the value of face-to-face interactions. Just under half (45%) of remote workers are concerned about not seeing their colleagues in person, so it&rsquo;s no wonder they&rsquo;re already heading back.
While many are tempted out of their pajamas and into their suits, the vast majority of people say they enjoy the remote working experience: four in five would recommend remote working to a friend and 81% of people are satisfied with the level of productivity. People cite increased productivity, efficiency, and employee morale as the top three benefits of working remotely.
<h2>Hybrid is poised to turn cracks of modern work into fissures&nbsp;</h2>
Employee satisfaction with remote work jars with the reality of it. People complain of muddling through a maze of software tools and on-screen distractions, as well as uncertainty about what their colleagues are actually up to. Nearly half (48%) of respondents report wasting time searching for documents and files across multiple tools, and six in 10 say that tool overload is causing silos.&nbsp;
This problem won&rsquo;t go away with hybrid, which introduces more barriers between teams and projects, adding confusion to the chaos. For example, employees enjoying an impromptu watercooler chat in the office are leaving remote workers in the dark about plans made on the fly. Just over a third (37%) report that their organization does a good job of aligning work across projects in the remote environment, and this risks becoming even more complicated with hybrid.
&ldquo;As hybrid goes mainstream, it threatens to turn the cracks of modern work into fissures.&rdquo; commented Tariq Rauf. &ldquo;Already, it&rsquo;s hard to get everyone on the same page. Now, hybrid brings about even more fragmentation, adding confusion to the chaos.&rdquo;
<h2>Opportunity to reset standards as email and video continue to dominate</h2>
Our expectations of what a fair work environment looks like are low. While around three quarters (71%) of remote workers say their organization does a &ldquo;good job&rdquo; of balancing asynchronous and synchronous work, they still rank distractions as their biggest irritation about working remotely and nearly half (48%) default to video meetings when collaborating remotely.&nbsp; What&rsquo;s more, the majority of people (53%) start their day in their inbox, eclipsing the 6% of people who use project management tools, implying that email is still king and that new models of collaboration haven&rsquo;t yet been adopted en masse.&nbsp;
Confronted by the reality of a chaotic workplace replete with overflowing inboxes and unnecessary meetings, companies are taking stock of how stressed their employees are. Now, the decision to either stay all-remote or experiment with hybrid offers a rare opportunity to reset standards to restore focus for burnt-out employees.
&ldquo;We&rsquo;ve allowed ourselves to become accustomed to Zoom fatigue, after-hours pings on Slack, and email overload. It doesn&rsquo;t have to be like this,&rdquo; commented Tariq Rauf. &ldquo;With Qatalog, we&rsquo;re inventing an entirely new way of working for this new age. For our customers going hybrid or staying remote, we&rsquo;re removing the millions of friction points to give them more time to focus, and clearer context for better decisions.&rdquo;
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Qatalog and GitLab reveal that 42% are sleepwalking into unknown hybrid work model that drives a bigger wedge between workers.

Hybrid work poised to fuel burnout | Qatalog News

Qatalog and GitLab reveal that 42% are sleepwalking into unknown hybrid work model that drives a bigger wedge between workers who can hardly get on the same page in the first place.

Qatalog newsroom