Most people have work that varies in intensity. Sometimes the work is almost overwhelming, and there’s no time for things other than the immediate task at hand.
Other times, not so much. These can be opportunities for those advocates of “management by walking around”.
If this style fits your situation, a conscious effort of looking to eliminate excuses can be a fertile area for productivity improvements.
One good example of this occurred during a manufacturing consulting situation, where several workers were observed “standing around”. The reason was there had been no material delivery to their equipment, so they could not perform their primary mission.
Many supervisors, suspicious of goofing off, might work on these idle workers and encourage them in some way to find something useful to do. The root cause, however, was a delivery function that was not keeping up. If and when it does, the “standing around” disappears.
This is an easy win-win if you look for root causes rather than react to the initial situation. Situations like “water cooler” conversations can lead to significant gain opportunities for those paying attention.