THE EFFECT OF CYBER-LOAFING ON EMPLOYEES’ PERFORMANCE: A CASE OF HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTES (HEI) IN KHYBER PAKHTUNKHWA

Abstract

The use of Internet hailed as a technological instrument which led the expansion of significant opportunities for organizations and the improvement of workers’ productivity. Internet not only changed the base of businesses to be conducted but it also improved the nature of work. Internet has many benefits, for instance reducing costs, limiting product cycle time, facilitate information access, and promoting products and services more efficiently, internet has also adverse effects on the performance of workers in different organizations that include workers’ anxieties about privacy, productivity loss, and institutional liability results from workers’ outbound and inbound Internet activities. The current study was conducted to explore the effect of Cyber-loafing on employees’ performance: a case of Higher Education Institutes (HEI) in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The objectives of the study were to examine the effect of Cyber-loafing on the job performance of the employees of universities and to compare the effects of Cyber-loafing on the performance of employees of private and Public Sector Universities. Primary data collected from the employees of 08 different universities including 04 public and 04 private universities of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Total 353 questionnaires regarding Cyber-loafing are developed for 353 employees and descriptive statistical techniques and quantitative approach was applied. The findings of this study concluded statistically significant inverse relationship between cyber-loafing activities and employees’ performance in both private and public universities. The magnitude -.391 of employs performance explains that employees performance is inversely affect by 39.1% because of cyber- loafing activities and overall value of Cronbach’s alpha is .857 which indicates a high reliability. This study recommended high control over sources of cyber-loafing and development of software to block such sites like YouTube, Facebook and other social websites as well as apps related to entertainment and cyber-loafing, implementations of rules and regulations of punishment on using such types websites and apps during duty hours and vigilant check is necessary to control the cyber-loafing in the universities/institutes/ organizations.