The pie charts compare proportions of time used in office for various activities in the US from 1980 to 2000.
Overall, it is clear that the distribution of time changed significantly, with phone replacing grapevine as the primary activity by 2000. Additionally, e-mail emerged as a new form of time expenditure in the second year, while time spent on phone saw the most substantial decline.
In 1980, phone represented the highest proportion of time spent at 32%. This was followed by paper documents and meeting, which accounted for 20% and 16% respectively. The remaining three activities – grapevine, face-to-face communication and other activities – comprised smaller shares, ranging from 15% down to 2%.
By 2000, the hierarchy of activities was reshuffled. Most notably, grapevine overtook phone to become the main activity, leaping to 26%. Conversely, phone dropped sharply by 20% percentage points to stand at just 12%. Meeting slipped to 6%, while paper documents registered minor decreases by 10%. Finally, face-to-face communication and other activities held steady at 15% and 14% respectively, and a new 7th activity, e-mail, entered the chart at 8%.
