Can you hear me now? I hope not - News that Works - employees using cell phones - Brief Article

HR Magazine, August, 2002 by Terence F. Shea

When your workers cluster outside the building a few times a day, they may not be lighting up as much as they're dialing up. More and more employees, seeking privacy for personal calls, are taking breaks to use their cell phones.

About 44 percent of U.S. adults who have wireless phones use them at work for nonbusiness calls, according to polling by St. Louis-based Maritz Research, a marketing research firm. Those callers, nearly two-thirds of them men, are "finding a way around the system" as employers increase their monitoring of employees' use of company phones, says Paul Pacholski, a division vice president at Maritz.

And it's not underhanded, Pacholski adds. In fact, in some circumstances, it seems downright efficient. Cell phones, he says, enable employees "to conduct personal business while they're eating lunch or simply walking down the hall for a meeting."