The do’s and don’ts of office productivity
- Do embrace a collaborative and diverse workplace culture
Organisations that succeed display strength of combined diverse expertise by harnessing each team member’s strength to boost productivity. Let everyone’s true colours shine. Let the creatives be creative and lets the nerds be the nerds. If everyone had the exact same skill set, the potential output of an organisation would be extremely limited.
- Don’t have to many meetings
Too many meetings that go for too long and involve too many people without any form of written agenda compromise workplace productivity. Aim to schedule less unnecessary meetings, reduce the time spent in meetings, invite only the relevant staff members and take the time to write an agenda.
- Do give positive feedback and appreciate good work
Be attentive to the effort, growth and output of your employees, give them the recognition they deserve. Positive and constructive feedback boosts the three m’s – morale, motivation and mood.
- Don’t “CC” everyone into every email
Email others in a mindful way, and expect the same from them. Staff members are often overwhelmed by the number of emails they receive daily, some of which are completely irrelevant. Keep a tidy, organised inbox and stay on top of your emails.
- Do create a healthy company culture
The evidence is clear and undisputed: the characteristics of an organisation affect the mental and physical health of workers. A great analogy for the relationship between an organisation and the worker can be viewed as symbiotic. Symbiosis in nature, describes a close relationship between two organisms from different species, that mutually reply on each other. An example of a symbiotic relationship, is the one between the honey bee and flower.
In the workplace a symbiotic relationship would be one where: both the employee and employer come together in a cooperative fashion, resulting is a healthy, productive workplace
Aligning goals –A hallmark of a successful company culture is where employees’ goals are properly aligned with the company’s goals. This means that the company’s values & goals need to be transparent. This will ultimately result in good relationships, high morale, trust, personal commitment and a profitable bottom line.
- Don’t make everything urgent
When everything feels urgent, this urgency comes with a heavy toll. Pressure, stress, mistakes, rework all resulting in reduced productivity. Urgency is often false and things often seems urgent because of others’ reactive workstyles where everything is left the last minute. By focusing on prioritising by importance, rather than urgency, the necessary tasks will be seen to in the correct timeframe.