For employers, March Madness, the men’s college basketball tournament, marks the arrival of several annual rituals: employee-organized office betting pools, a potential dip in employee productivity and a decline in Internet speed, as employees watch live streaming broadcasts of the tournament games during office hours. March Madness also provides a team building opportunity for your workplace.

According to John Challenger, chief executive officer of Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc., an outplacement company that tries to predict the impact of March Madness on workplaces, “March Madness and the subsequent office pools have been going on long enough, that employers can no longer claim to be caught off guard by the annual event. Some have tried to squash these pools, most simply ignore them and others have found ways to embrace the tournament as a team-building and morale-boosting opportunity.”

This year, Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc. estimates that workers distracted by March Madness could cost employers as much as $1.8 billion in unproductive employee time during the first week of the tournament, alone, based on 20 minutes of daily time wasting. Other sources cite up to 100 minutes per employee of tournament watching time during March Madness.

A 2009 Microsoft/MSN survey found that 45 percent of Americans planned to enter at least one college basketball pool last year. Challenger anticipates that employee activity is highest between Selection Sunday, March 14, and the end of the first round, March 19. During this time period, people research their teams, fill out their brackets, bet in office pools, and watch games online during work hours, costing employers the estimated $1.8 billion.

“As the tournament moves beyond the first and second round, the impact on the employer decreases, since few games are played during office hours and workers can no longer make adjustments to their brackets, thus eliminating the need to research teams,” Challenger added. During the first two days of the Tournament (Thursday, March 18 and Friday, March 19), approximately half of the 32 games are played during business hours.

In a 2010 survey by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), two-thirds of employers do not have policies regarding office pools, fantasy sports leagues, or gambling in the workplace and less than 4% (according to Fox News) had ever disciplined an employee for participating in these events. Around 66% of employers monitor some aspect of Internet connection, but many fewer block actual sites.

Challenger suggested that employers might consider using March Madness as an annual team building event. “Companies can use this event as a way to build morale and camaraderie. This could mean putting televisions in the break room, so employees have somewhere to watch the games other than the Internet. Employers might consider organizing a company-wide pool, which should have no entry fee in order to avoid ethical and/or legal questions.”

It’s a bit late to plan a lot for this year, although snacks and televisions in break rooms are easy to pull together quickly, but making March Madness a company team building event might work well for your future tournaments. March Madness isn’t going anywhere any time soon; so, why not take advantage of the events as a spring celebration?

(Information from a Challenger press release, Fox News, and SHRM.)

Image Copyright Streeter Lecka / Getty Images

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March Madness Costing Employers originally appeared on About.com Human Resources on Tuesday, March 16th, 2010 at 02:53:50.

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