A recent survey carried out by India's Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry found numerous workers used a myriad of social networking sites at work and that they did so excessively.

On average, workers spent an hour on day on sites like Facebook, Myspace, Orkut and Linkedin and these sloths were practically responsible for a 12.5 percent drop in productivity. Mind you, this was a proper survey. It questioned 4,000 corporate employees aged 21 to 60 in India's largest cities.

Nearly half of the workers accessed Facebook during working hours, and four out of ten admitted they built their social networking profile from work. Some 83 percent of workers believe it is quite ok to surf at work during work hours, and unsurprisingly 84 percent show some signs of internet addiction.

Several social network studies concluded the usually benign practice had very negative long term financial effects. Although most surveys were not very comprehensive, probably because researchers spent most of their time on Facebook, it is clear the phenomena is having a serious impact on productivity and companies' bottom line. Hence, don't be surprised to see a Facebook in your office soon.

More here.