By Manpreet Singh
One of the hardest things to figure out as a small business owner is how to improve work performance in your office. Whether you have a 15 or 40 person office, it can be hard to get everyone to perform at maximum efficiency. At TalkLocal, we understand how serious this problem can be, especially for an up-and-coming business. Here are some tips that helped us improve work performance in our office.
Cut down on miscommunication
The lifeline of a productive office is communication. The problem is major breakdowns have a potential to occur between workers over issues such as roles, tasks, positions, and responsibilities. If someone doesn’t know what their job is or how to complete it, they’re not going to be productive. If you don’t want to have an office full of people blankly staring at a screen, you need to define roles and establish a chain of command. Make sure everyone knows who to report to, who they can go to if they have questions about a task, etc.
It’s a good idea for all employees to have an idea of what everyone’s job or department entails in the office so they can go to someone if they need help in that given area. If everyone is aware of what’s going on in the office as far as the location of resources, who their boss is, or what department handles what, you’ll find your employees will work at a much more productive pace than an office plagued with miscommunication. Without an idea of how important a given task is, the employee will have no idea how to balance his workload and will become less efficient in how quickly he can complete his tasks.
Delegate effectively
Another thing that can slow down productivity in the office is an ineffective delegation of tasks. The usual model of work delegation involves the manager or department head assigning tasks to those below them within their department. Problems can arise when you assign tasks to a person who lacks the skills to complete it, or whose skills would be better used at completing another task. Don’t give the marketing guy the task of creating the graphic for the holiday newsletter. Another problem which can occur in the delegation process is failing to communicate the priority level of the task.
Challenge your employees
Monotony can cause any employee to become bored with his job; this leads to large amounts of unproductivity. The tasks that used to get your employees full attention begin to get less and less of it because they become easy and almost second nature for them to complete. The solution to this is to constantly challenge your employees. If you see them finishing their tasks at a quicker pace or just sitting around idly, give them a new responsibility or assign them to complete a task you need done.
What keeps people focused on the job is the challenge it gives them; the success they will feel when they complete a new task; the satisfaction of completing a hard day’s work. If you keep challenging your employees they will stay focused, remain productive, and grow into more valuable assets to your business.
At TalkLocal, we know the importance of keeping our employees productive. We strive to have 5-star office communication, management that understands appropriate delegation of tasks, and employees who are constantly challenged with new responsibilities.
