Increasing Productivity in your Business

When you are running your own business, it can be easy to become overwhelmed with the day to day tasks leaving you spending more hours at the ‘office’ than you would like. The thing is, we all want to make sure our business is as successful as possible so it can be easy to dedicate more time than you should make sure everything is taken care of.

This isn’t good for your work-home balance or your stress levels and mental health. Whilst these two issues aren’t the same, with increased stress levels can come anxiety, depression and an inability to be able to work at your best. With a recent study showing at least one-half of entrepreneurs showing symptoms of one or more mental health conditions, it is important that you find the right balance and move to work in a more efficient way to help reduce your workload and the time you spend working.

Increasing Productivity in Your Business.

Increasing productivity is essential to make sure you can meet your targets, grow your business and keep on top of your workload without dedicating your whole life to work. Implementing different ways to boost productivity in your business can have far-reaching consequences not only for you but for your staff and your home life too. So as well as making sure your company is performing as well as possible due to increased levels of efficiency, you can also help create a work-life balance that allows you time away from your job to relax and recuperate.

In this post, we’re going to discuss the different methods you can employ in your company to help you be more productive and stay on top of everything you have going on.

Technology.

Making sure you have the appropriate technology for your business needs is one of the best ways to help boost your efficiency at work. There are many different ways and equipment you can use to be able to streamline your working and communication process to be able to run your company. Having a reliable infrastructure and the correct software can make managing staff, schedules and projects flow more easily with people being to access everything they need easily. Applications such as Slack, Chanty, Flock, Tribe, Skype can be great additions depending on your business needs. As can project management tools such as Basecamp, Asana, Wrike to help keep your team up to date.

Make sure any equipment you need to do your job is being used correctly, for example, using fax services online to be able to send documents easily when you need to. Reduce the time spent waiting for things such as printers, by investing in more modern systems to reduce wasted time. Invest in online planners that can help plan your calendar and sort through to-do lists to help you focus your time on work that needs your attention more urgently to help you work more efficiently.

Keep on top of the new trends by determining which new and emerging trends and the software will benefit your company the most. Of course, this will differ greatly for different sectors and industries however knowing what is available for your needs is essential, as is applying the correct tools to help you achieve maximum efficiency every single day.

Make sure to bear in mind that any staff members will need training on all new systems and technology implemented to make sure they are able to use it to its full potential as quickly as possible to ease any transitions. It is said that employees are able to easily pick up new ways of learning with the correct training. So make sure everyone using the systems is trained fully so as to not lose any productivity.

Outsourcing.

Outsourcing is something that is often overlooked by small business owners, however, this could be exactly what you need to be able to increase productivity by removing tasks that take up a lot of your time. It is also a great way to keep on top of areas you may otherwise neglect due to lack of time or knowledge and skills in that particular area.

There are many different tasks that can be outsourced in any company. So it pays to have a look at what will work for you and your company. One of the most popular ways to outsource the running of websites and social media accounts for your business. These can be time-consuming especially if you don’t have the know-how to do this yourself.

But they’re not the only task you can outsource in your business;

• Website content/blogging
• Call handling
• SEO
• Personal Assistant duties
• Customer Support
• Payroll
• Accounting
• Taxes
• Human Resources
• Artwork
• Research
• Recruiting

Often these tasks can be time-consuming taking your focus away from where it needs to be especially if you work alone. But you shouldn’t dismiss outsourcing if you have staff either. It takes money and time to train new members of staff to do a job which you can outsource to a company who has people already experienced and qualified in these particular areas. 

Staff

One of the best ways to increase productivity is to start with any staff members. Look at the jobs they are doing and how they are doing it. By implementing new technology and delegating correctly you can see a massive improvement in the work that is being completed during the course of a working week. With staff productivity levels seemingly declining, you want to make sure your staff are doing the job you are paying them to do in a timely and efficient manner.

That being said, there are many ways of achieving this to make sure your staff are happy in their work and want to do their job when they come to work. So creating a positive working environment is a must. How you do this is something you can discuss with your staff, so not only are they comfortable at work but they also know that their input into the inner workings of the company is encouraged and welcome.

Getting to know your staff members individually, can have huge benefits for your company when it comes to increasing productivity in your business and also efficiency too. Knowing their individual skill sets and what they need to be able to do their jobs means you can delegate tasks easier to more suitable employees should you need to. 

Staff training is also essential as you need your staff to not only be competent but also, confident themselves in doing what you need them to do to fulfil their job roles. Whether for business purposes so they have the correct and up to date information for your industry to help them stay on top of the current trends and to also relay to customers too.

Self Care.

Making sure you and your employees are in good health is essential to being as productive as you can be in the workplace. Regardless of your industry, no one wants to have employees off due to frequent absences for sickness. Whilst no one can predict illnesses, taking the steps to ensure you and any staff members are in good health is a great way to help reduce this. In2017 the average days taken off sick in each year is 5.5. if you have 10 employees this is nearly two months worth of working days lost.

The best way to do this is to reduce demands on staff members and make sure they are getting ample time away from work to relax and look after themselves. Applying pressure to come to work regardless of health can be counterproductive. Not only do you run the risk of extending the time they are ill for you, but you can also increase stress levels and potentially spread anything contagious such as colds, cases of flu and stomach bugs to other staff members.

So be flexible over sickness days, including mental health days as our mental well being is just as important as our physical well being by allowing flexibility when you can over working from home or making up hours another time. Allowing staff members to swap shifts if they can is something else you can offer as is delegating out their workload so you don’t fall behind and they don’t have to worry about catching up when they are back to work.

Also, if you do have employee sickness, don’t forget about your staff members who are in work and soaking up the extra workload. Making sure your staff know they are appreciated and their efforts haven’t gone unnoticed can keep up morale and make them more likely to want to pitch in in the future as well as knowing that should they be in the same position, others will step up for them too.