American workers are still Luddites

American IT workers are at the top of their game and know what they are doing with computers. Actually, this is false.

American IT workers are innovative and ready to try new things to create better computer systems. Sorry, that's wrong again.

A Forrester Research study, reported by ComputerWorld.com, is showing just how flawed U.S. IT workers really are. According to the online survey, IT workers are stuck in their old ways like desktop PCs, Microsoft Office and email. Employers are partially to blame, because they fail to understand and respond to smartphone and social networking technologies, the study said.

Here are some highlights from ComputerWorld.com about the 2,000 workers, who use computers and the Internet at work:

• Only one in three information workers use a laptop at work and one in nine use a smartphone.
• 76 percent use a desktop PC most of the time. One in five share a PC with a co-worker.
• Email is king over instant messaging. Almost 60 percent say they email hourly, while 75 percent have never used IM at work.
• Three-quarters have never used web conferencing tools.
• Less than 20 percent of information workers say they visit social networking sites for work.

These results are alarming and raise the question of whether employers should be working harder to get their employees onto new high-tech tools or whether they should sit back and just rely on the tried-and-true old ideas that should be fading into the sunset instead of being used every day at the workplace.

For more on the lack of cutting-edge tools for IT workers:
- check out this ComputerWorld.com article

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