Loose lips sink profits, survey finds, but strengthen relationships

Even though many workers didn’t have office water coolers to gather around and shoot the breeze during the coronavirus pandemic, small talk still managed to cost U.S. employers approximately $1.5 trillion in lost productivity, according to a new study by a telecom company.

TollFreeForwarding.com surveyed 2,000 workers in the United States and United Kingdom to find out how much time they devoted to non-work small talk during office hours. The company found that U.S. workers engage in small talk for nearly two hours — one hour and 58 minutes, to be exact — per day. British workers aren’t quite as gabby but still manage to flap their gums for an hour and 45 minutes every day.