Business owners often have to juggle many tasks to keep their business running. One of the most important things a small business owner can do is stay productive and not get overwhelmed by all the different responsibilities they are juggling.
However, running a business is not just limited to making yourself productive. It is equally necessary to make your team productive too. To ensure that your business runs smoothly, you need to be able to trust the people that you are delegating your work.
Without this, it is very difficult to get anything done, and the business will suffer in terms of productivity. Fortunately, there are some ways that can help both small businesses owners and their employees run a more productive workplace.
Understand and Prioritize the Tasks
The first thing you should do to boost the productivity of your workspace is to understand and prioritize the tasks. Prioritizing the tasks will help you focus on the most important tasks first and achieve your end goals efficiently and quickly.
Prioritizing your tasks is also a great way to avoid feeling overwhelmed. Moreover, it helps you to manage your workflow effectively as you can easily segregate the important tasks among your team.
Equip your Team Members with Necessary Tools and Resources
The second thing to do is to equip your team with the necessary tools and resources. Doing this will help them be more productive, which in turn boosts productivity for the company as a whole. It might take some time before you can get everything set up, but it’s worth the investment.
When we talk about the necessary tools and resources for the employees, there are some that are indispensable:
● Asana and Trello. These and many others on the web are best to keep your tasks in check. You can use them to assign tasks and mark them when they are complete or ready to review.
● Clockify.This is another brilliant tool that assists you in keeping a check on time. It helps in analyzing the time taken to complete a task.
● Google Suite.Google Suite is a combination of all the important tools that you can use to manage your work and communication. It includes docs, sheets, slides, meeting apps, messenger, video downloader etc.
Other than these, you need to provide your employees with powerful laptops or PCs supported by a fast internet connection. Further, equip your office space with machines like a photocopier and a coffee maker for added convenience. If you follow a BYOD policy, please ensure that every single employee complies with the rules.
If you allow employees to work from their personal devices, you should make several requirements. First, teams should have robust anti-virus solutions, protecting them from viruses. Additionally, a VPN app should be selected to ensure safe browsing, and a video downloader secure file exchange, and prevent eavesdropping.
Discover what your team is good at
Another key thing to keep your team productive is to discover what they are good at. This will help you delegate tasks that suit each employee’s skillset and strengths, which in turn makes them more efficient as well. Further, you can also give them responsibilities that they are comfortable with that will allow them to grow professionally.
Get Rid of Distractions and Time-Wasting Activities
Workplaces can never be ideal. There are surely some elements in a workspace that divert employees’ attention, and you need to take care of them to ensure maximum productivity.
Things that you can do to boost productivity in the workplace are to eliminate time-wasting activities. It includes activities like unnecessary meetings, work that doesn’t need your attention, being on social media when it’s not necessary, and surprise mobile notifications.
Make it a rule to keep all the phones in your workplace in silent mode. Moreover, to ensure that employees do not miss something urgently, allow them to catch up with their notifications for 5 minutes every hour. It will keep them focused for most of the time as they know they can catch up later.
Learn from your team
If you are a business owner & struggling while formulating a process to enhance productivity, it is best to seek help from your employees. As they are the people who are well aware of every detail of the process, they can provide you better insights on how to streamline the overall process. Ask them for feedback on their work, what issues they are facing, what they are comfortable working on, etc. Based on the answers, you can reassign tasks and create a fresh yet efficient workflow.
Allow your team to Take Breaks
Breaks are one of the key boosters of employee productivity. They can help your employees de-stress and can also improve job satisfaction. Hence, allow your employees to take at least 5-15 minutes of break every 1-2 hours.
Final Words
You’ve got the knowledge, experience, and drive to succeed. All you need is assistance from these tips on how to enhance your productivity. Yes, it’s hard to stay productive with all the distractions that come your way. But there are some methods to deal with these distractions too.