Feeling Unproductive? Blame Your Coworkers.

Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on your outlook) work doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Apart from the novelist holed away with his manuscript, most jobs require that we interact with other people on a daily basis.

This can be great; collaboration often boosts both creativity and performance. But on the flip side, coworkers can slow us down, at least according to a recent productivity study by task management platform Taskworld.

Related: Distracted and Overwhelmed Employees Are Costing You Big. Try These 3 Fixes.

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The study, which surveyed 1,000 U.S. adults age 18 or over, found that 50 percent of the workforce believes their coworkers' productivity directly impacts their own. And slacking employees can have a domino effect -- nearly half of respondents (48 percent) blame deadline missing coworkers for corresponding decreases in their own productivity.

Why? Chronic deadline-missers aren't just frittering away their own time: Nineteen percent of respondents reported that they spend one to three additional hours per week nagging coworkers to get their work done (or, in survey speak, "following up on the status of projects and tasks"), while a whopping 75 percent report frequently waiting on coworkers to complete a task.

For Subscribers

FOR SUBSCRIBERSCBP leaders cut out of Trump ad buy decision

FOR SUBSCRIBERSAmerican passenger drafted goodbye texts to her family as Flydubai plane plummeted

FOR SUBSCRIBERSCornell rape allegation pushes embattled New York prosecutor into national spotlight

FOR SUBSCRIBERSAbdul El-Sayed tries to woo MAHA voters as Democrats seek inroads with RFK’s supporters

FOR SUBSCRIBERSKratom-like substances are popping up in a typically benign supplement

FOR SUBSCRIBERSGOP super PAC increases its spending for Sen. Jon Husted in tough Ohio race

FOR SUBSCRIBERSRecords reveal tumultuous marriage between slain New York Times executive and wife

FOR SUBSCRIBERSFrom clean energy warrior to ‘wall of shame,’ James Talarico reverses on a fossil fuel money pledge

FOR SUBSCRIBERSCongressional staff planned official trip with luxury stops in Italy and France weeks before election

FOR SUBSCRIBERSA harrowing ordeal aboard an Israel-bound plane

FOR SUBSCRIBERSOpenAI CEO Sam Altman to skip congressional hearing on rogue AI agents

FOR SUBSCRIBERSKey DOJ lawyers departed Trump ‘grand conspiracy’ probe amid pressure to produce, source says

FOR SUBSCRIBERSTrump’s new AI chatbot often links to a site launched under Clinton 26 years ago

FOR SUBSCRIBERSAt MAHA summit, industry CEOs the movement once vilified take the stage

FOR SUBSCRIBERSThis Paralympian has two goals: Win medals and give away $500,000 to her teammates

Like office germs, it appears that unproductivity is contagious. 

Related: How Music Affects Your Productivity