English equivalent of Konkani proverb "kam natilo achari bhurganchi kule tasto" (When jobless, a carpenter takes to even filing children's buttocks)

English equivalent of Konkani proverb "kam (job) natilo (not having) achari (Carpenter) bhurganchi (Children's) kule (buttocks) tasto (files)" (When jobless, a Clueless carpenter takes to even filing (as if with a file) children's buttocks).

Example:

The rain has just stopped. In an organization where there is lot of monkey business, even when there is expectation of a heavy downpour in few hours, an inexperienced, inept Chairman of the company orders the supervisors to engage their workers to clear the street from rainwater with mops, repaint the street with traffic lines around the company, etc. instead of seeing that there is no business and one should push the right buttons..instead of this busy work. One can say, "When jobless, a clueless carpenter takes up the stupidest stuff -- funnily said as filing children's asses. The emphasis is on a clueless management decision of wiping up the rain water instead of investing efforts in better corrective action when your company is in ruins (does not have business and/or is near bankruptcy), usually you would scramble to get more business not get involved in meaningless jobs especially when you know there is non-stop rain during the rainy season.

A phrase that describes this is busy work.

Busy work (also referred to as make-work and busywork) can refer to activity that is undertaken to pass time and stay busy but in and of itself has no actual value.

This wikipedia entry has a picture of mopping outdoors, just as the OP described. The caption reads

Chores such as mopping outdoors can be busy work.

Your sentence might read: The inept Chairman of the company orders the supervisors to find busy work for their workers.