The Ledger No. 60: Increasing Productivity in the Workplace

Welcome to The Ledger where we sum up the latest finance and accounting news and trends for you. On this week’s entry, we’re diving into the topic of increasing productivity in the workplace, and why more productivity leads to higher profits and improved client relationships. Read on to explore how employers can encourage workplace productivity, why employee engagement doesn’t always equate to better productivity, how to focus on quality over quantity and why companies should invest in workplace well-being.

Entering the Flow State: How to Encourage Workplace Productivity

We’ve all been there – you sit down to begin your shift and when you look at the time you realize that hours have passed since that initial clock-in. It’s a common occurrence that happens when you enter the ‘flow’ – a term coined by psychologists that describes when people are so wrapped up in their activities that everything else fades around them. But while this state of zen seems like a dream for many employees and employers alike, how do we get there? For leaders, it’s critical that you create the right conditions that will allow your workers to actually find their ‘flow’. Here’s how:

• Finding flow. Distractions are inevitable, whether you’re a parent working from home or you live in an area with incessant noise. As an employee, you need to create an environment that allows you to be the most productive; and as an employer, you need to make sure your team has the tools they need to overcome their productivity barriers.

• Flourishing the flow. Can you work in a place that you love while loving the work you do? Absolutely! In fact, they’re intertwined. Consider this: Studies have shown that happy people are more productive. By allowing our employees to enter flow, we’re giving them the opportunities to grow in their career and become more effective in the workplace.

• Creating space to flow. Most of the time, flow is stumbled upon accidentally. You get assigned a task that you’re passionate about or that keeps you on your toes. But how to you create a space for your employees to find their flow? There are a few ways – assigning tasks that are challenging without being overwhelming, assigning tasks that meet a clearly defined goal and giving feedback immediately for their efforts.

Your employees want to work in a place that empowers them to find their flow. Moreover, flow is a quintessential aspect of business and can ultimately make or break a company. For more on increasing productivity in the workplace, check out the full article on entrepreneur.com.

Engagement Doesn’t Always Drive Workplace Productivity

Thanks to the pandemic, employers are scrambling to make sense of their workplace culture as employees everywhere are demanding more flexibility, healthier environments and better benefits. Unfortunately, these demands are being met with company initiatives that drive employee engagement and happiness. And although those things are great long-term, do they really solve the underlying issue – productivity? The truth is, companies are wasting money, time and effort on the wrong thing. In doing so, they’re losing sight of factors that actually drive productivity. According to Gallup, only 20 percent of employees are actively engaged, which means the remaining 80 percent are feeling at odds with the efforts. In short, workplace engagement does not equate to productivity. So what makes an employee more productive?

• Investing in better tech

• Automating tasks

• Encouraging team efforts

• Cultivating company culture

• Trusting your employees and letting them fail

• Offering flexibility

As you can see, productivity goes far beyond employee engagement. To dive deeper into why engagement and productivity don’t always go hand-in-hand, increasing productivity in the workplace, and how to make an employee more productive, head over to forbes.com to read the full article.

Focus on Quality, Not Quantity

How to you create more profits in your business? Do you increase prices? Decrease overhead expenses? All might seem like viable options, but have you considered productivity as an expense? Tanya Dalton, best-selling author and founder of inkWELL Press Productivity, believes that productivity is key to augmenting a company’s performance. She outlines a few tips on how to make your business as productive as it can be:

• Cut overhead. Look through your expenses and ask yourself, “Does this add value to my productivity?” If it doesn’t, cut it.

• Stay competitive. It’s not about just filling a seat. A happy employee contributes to the business’s bottom line.

• Get clear KPIs and OKRs. Focus on impactful results – the ones that will move the company forward.

• Do fewer things that make a more significant impact. You don’t have to focus on everything to get results. In fact, focusing on those that will have a key impact leads to a bigger impact on your profit line.

Productivity comes in different forms, but one principle remains true: quality wins out over quantity. To understand this principle further, check out the complete article on forbes.com.

Winning Through Well-Being: Optimizing the Way We Work

Times might be changing, but the link between workplace well-being and productivity remains a mystery. Last year alone, 69 million people quit their jobs. Is it because they were offered a higher salary at a different company? Or perhaps it’s because the other job affords them flexibility. Whatever the case may be, employers have an obligation to foster a healthy workplace culture and to ensure that their employees are set up for success.

Gallup’s annual survey of US employees highlights the first decline in 10 years of actively engaged workers – 34 percent of employees reported feeling engaged in their job, down from 36 percent two years ago. Take it however you’d like, but the truth is, these numbers carry a significant impact: well-being and work are interconnected. Moreover, how we work matters. Experts around the globe have shared their thoughts on this topic:

• The Progress Principle. “The more frequently people experience that sense of progress, the more likely they are to be creatively productive in the long run.”

• Unitasking. “People who multitasks for a continuous period of time end up totally exhausted and stressed out. Studies show that multitasking stresses our central nervous system, specifically the brain.”

• Tools. Research done by Salesforce found that 92 percent of those surveyed said technology was one of the ways well-being could be improved at work.”

Workplace well-being today is a team sport, not an individual struggle. To explore more about the link between well-being and work, head over to fastcompany.com to view the full article.

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