When starting a business, you do it with a high level of optimism, zeal, and dedication. You want to see it grow, expand, and succeed while generating the maximum possible income. However, you also know that for you to get to where you want, you cannot achieve success alone. You will need to employ and work with different types of people for different tasks within and without the organization.
Of course, hiring the best candidates from the job market and outsourcing services from some of the best providers in the industry will mean increased productivity and profitability. However, this is just part of the puzzle solved. As with anything else, success comes with maintaining consistency. If you guessed right, productivity is one of the things you will want to ensure is consistent, preferably on an upward trajectory. A decline in productivity often means lower efficiency, reduced profits, and plummeting growth.
With this having been mentioned, here are some tips on how to make sure the productivity of your business doesn’t decline.
1. Embrace Technology
Every business needs streamlined operations, and in this age and day, one thing is for sure. Ensuring streamlined operations means embracing modern technology solutions. This also means choosing the right technological solutions for your business needs. If you run a fleet management business, an efficient system that addresses the challenges faced by fleet managers will come in handy. Such a system will save you time and money while boosting your team’s productivity by a huge margin. A system with integrated monitoring solutions such as GPS and ELD will help monitor your drivers and the fleet easily, ensuring that everything flows smoothly and can be accounted for.
In a nutshell, the right technology can help keep your processes and operation on track, avoiding delays and minimizing costs. It can also help speed up customer response time, thus improving customer service. You will also need a professional website for your business so that you can enhance customer relations. Purchasing systems can offer competitive pricing by opening up highways for potential suppliers. You just need to utilize the right tech for your business, from procurement to CRM, accounting, payroll, and everything in-between.
2. Provide a Good Working Environment
Productivity is what every entrepreneur is after, but some challenges come with this mind-blowing tactic in business. For one, you have to create an inspiring environment for your employees. Without a doubt, the work environment will reflect in their job performance even as the employees are subject to a company’s productivity. It is two-way traffic. As the employer, you must ensure a smooth sail by being subject to holding necessary meetings, giving a structured and efficient workflow, updated technology and equipment, clear and achievable goals, among other factors.
3. Implement Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
This is a motivational theory by Abraham Maslow portrayed in the shape of a pyramid. It explains how we can fulfill our needs as humans in a specific order. As an extension of the previous point, it is best to create an environment that supports, inspires, and motivates your employees’ potential. Here is a sneak peek at the hierarchy:
- Physiological– Pay on time and give them adequate facilities
- Safety– Safe environment, quality health benefits, and pension
- Belongingness: Make the employees have equal access to the company, embrace diversity and collaborations.
- Esteem: Reward them when they perform exceptionally well. It motivates the rest to participate in team contributions and want to be recognized.
- Self-Actualization- provide mentorship programs that will make the employees explore their potential.
This law changes when you have to apply it in the business field since, in this case, you are glued to attaining productivity.
4. Train and Upskill Employees
Your employees are not toys, neither are the machines. You need to invest in them to achieve the desired results. Use their strengths to your advantage and strengthen their weaknesses by taking them through training. Employee training and development in the workplace will help ensure that members of staff are placed in areas where their strong suits are maximized. Also, a trained employee becomes more efficient in the workspace despite his weakness. Offering online safety courses will ensure that the ball keeps rolling even when an employee goes on leave or has an issue that will make them not attend to his delegated duty. After all, taking breaks to refresh with a mental pause is mandatory for your employees. Training, by all means, ensures that productivity levels are top-notch.
Finally, what is a business without setting goals, targets, and deadlines? What is setting the above mentioned without working towards them? There are many procrastinators even in the work industry, and to deal with such, if you are one, you will need to get a second set of eyes- an accountability partner who can help you stay on track. Reward yourself when you achieve and punish yourself when you do not perform. All the same, do not be hard on yourself. No… be specific, simple, and realistic about your goals. Have a to-do list and reminders to help you hit your targets. Accountability is equal to productivity.