Tech Tip: Why Every Employee Needs 2 Monitors

Do your employees have two monitors at their desks? A Microsoft research study shows that employees with a dual-monitor setup increased their overall work performance by 9%, and by as much as 50% on certain tasks, such as cutting and pasting.

Mike Foster, an IT guru and Vistage speaker, says, “Dual monitors can pay for themselves quickly with increased worker productivity. Users who try two monitors and see how productive they can be never go back.”

How do you set up two monitors for one computer? Have someone on your IT team set up your second monitor so that it becomes an extension of your primary monitor. You should be able to move your cursor from one screen to the other. Once you are set up, practice using your email program on the left monitor and your other applications on the right monitor. Explore different configurations until you find what feels comfortable. You may want to keep applications with private information on the smaller monitor or whichever one is less exposed to people walking by your desk.

“You can easily drag applications (like your web browser, email, etc) from your main monitor to the spare monitor,” says Foster. “This doubles the amount of information you can see at the same time.”