You’re trying to get your staff engaged, you’re doling out tokens of appreciation left and right and you are a memo machine, but all of these attempts at facilitating productivity aren’t cutting it. If productivity is not where you need it to be, you might be working on the wrong side of this equation. Management will often consider what they can do to improve productivity, but they might neglect to take a look at what they’re doing that might being killing productivity. Stop these office productivity killers today!
Stop Micro-Managing
Whether you know it or no, you may be a bottleneck of productivity. If the buck always stops with you, where it has to be reviewed, stamped, copied filed and approved, that buck doesn’t get too far too fast. Take a step back and encourage staff to take the initiative and empower them to make their own decisions. Learn what to let go of and help the work flow, don’t impede it.
Stop Being Vague
Do you suck at communicating? If employees are constantly asking you to further define each task, you may not be clearly communicating your expectations. If you are constantly wondering about the lack of common sense and listening skills of your employees, it might not be them. It’s quite possibly your problem. Take a hint! Are you clearly defining expectations, goals and responsibilities? It turns out that people do a much better job when they know what their job is.
Here is a great tip from Allison Green, management advice pro,
“A good test: If you and your staff member were both asked what’s most important for them to achieve this year, would your answers match? If not, chances are low that you’re going to get the level of performance you’re hoping for.”
Stop Being a Stickler
Productivity takes a dive when workers are out of the office. They’re human beings with live outside of the cubicle. They have sick kids, car problems, personal lives and can actually get sick themselves. When management makes telecommuting options available, work doesn’t have to stop. Don’t be such a stickler about personal days, vacation time and sick leave. Make options to complete work from home readily available. More work will get done when employees are given the option to work remotely.
Stop Skimping on Training
As a training software company, we are partial to this one. We see first hand what the proper training can do to an organization, and it is a proven worthwhile investment. Belts have been tight for a while now, and training programs have ended up on the cutting room floor. You can’t expect an uninformed and untrained workforce to produce without the proper tools. If you want productivity, you have to invest in your workers.
Improving productivity in the workplace is just as much about what to do, as it is what to stop doing. Management can follow all the “How to Increase Productivity” guides they want, but if poor and inhibitive practices are already in place, the how-to won’t get you very far.