Did you know that 48% of employees report being productive less than 75% of the time?
This can lead to real issues when it comes to the long-term success of your business. For example, it means that they are not working effectively or to the best of their potential, which is sure to impact the quality of the work they produce. This can set you behind your competitors, especially when it comes to innovation and customer satisfaction rates. In addition to this, poor productivity rates can cost your business a lot of money.
In short, poor productivity will stand in the way of your success, so you must take action to combat this as quickly as possible. Read on to find out more!
Find ways to boost morale. Low morale and poor productivity rates go hand in hand. This is because it’s hard to work effectively when you’ve lost any passion you had for your work. As such, you may notice a positive uptick in productivity rates through working on boosting morale. This can be achieved through:
- Ensuring your employees feel appreciated in the workplace
- Running an effective workplace wellness scheme
- Encouraging camaraderie over competition
- Rewarding employees who do a good job
- Checking in on a regular basis
- Offering support to those who need help, as opposed to penalising them
If you aren’t sure what else you can do to make your team happy, try asking them directly for feedback and insight. This way, you can make sure you’re implementing changes that are sure to bring a smile to their face moving forward. It also shows them that you care about them on a personal level, as you’re tailoring your support directly to them.
Use technology to your advantage. In the modern world, one of the easiest ways to increase productivity rates in all areas of your business is to use specialist technology and software. This can help you keep track of tasks and employee performance, providing you with the insight and data you need to implement changes moving forward. For example, you can help your janitorial staff work more effectively by implementing easy to use cleaning inspection software. This will save your team a great deal of time when it comes to managing their workload and planning out their schedule.
Set clear targets and goals. Sometimes, the reason why your team may not be working all that productively is because they’re unsure of what they’re working toward. For example, they may be focusing on their day-to-day tasks as opposed to the bigger picture. As such, you may notice that they begin to work a little more diligently when they’ve been given clear goals and targets to work towards. Alternatively, you may want to get a little stricter when it comes to setting deadlines, as opposed to allowing them to complete tasks on their own time.
Check in with your team regularly. Checking in with your team on a regular basis can help to improve productivity rates, as it means that you’re able to work collaboratively with employees who may be struggling to keep up. This way, they feel properly supported, and you can put the relevant systems or provisions in place to help them get back up to speed again, whether that’s introduced through additional training, on-site mentorship or new tools and technologies. This can also help you prevent employee turnover, which can have a negative effect on your productivity rates.
Final thoughts. In an ideal world, your team would work productively 100% of the time. However, this is simply not realistic, as there are many different factors that get in the way of working productively, from burnout to technical errors. However, there are plenty of steps that you can take as a business owner that will help ensure poor productivity rates do not stand in the way of your long-term success. This includes:
- Finding effective ways to boost employee morale so that they remain focused and enthusiastic
- Using technology to your advantage so that your team are able to make better use of their time
- Setting clear targets and goals so that your employees have something tangible to work towards each day
- Checking in with your team regularly, so that you can provide them with support and assistance when necessary
By implementing the steps outlined above, you’ll notice right away that productivity rates begin to climb. This means tha you can make sure you’re exactly where you need to be when it comes to pushing your business forward.
