What Your Business Can Do to Increase Productivity and Time Management in the Workplace

Productivity and time management are essential business elements that can directly impact employees and projects. Making an effort to improve these two things can greatly increase the value of your workplace. Increasing productivity and time management in the workplace can include things such as improving your office design and lighting or making sure that you and your employees are using up-to-date technology, software, and security patches. If you are a business owner or project manager, consider implementing some of these solutions to make positive changes in your workplace.

Use Up-to-Date Technology

Technology has permeated all aspects of our lives, both at work, at home, and on the road. However, many of the most common workplace issues are also related to technology. There is a big difference in efficiency between using outdated technology from a decade ago versus using current, up-to-date technology on a daily basis. For example, Straight Edge IT points out that IT issues consume your time, energy, and brain power, which can really eat up a lot of precious time for your business. Taking the time to update your company's software, switch out old hardware, and patch outdated security features can go a long way to increasing your productivity and improving your workplace time management.

Get Rid of Time Wasters

Time wasters are low-value activities that hamper your productivity and add nothing to your workday. Not only do time-wasters lower productivity, but they can also increase stress and errors toward the end of a project. When the built-up procrastination leads to stress-inducing time crunches, most employees wish that their time was spent more efficiently. According to 5S Today, using systems like the Toyota Production System can help you identify areas of your day that could use optimization. To get rid of time wasters, consider rearranging your schedule, prioritizing certain tasks, or even delegating some non-essential routine tasks to someone else.

Stick to a Schedule

Sticking to a schedule is essential to establishing the discipline within your workplace to get things done. According to Any.do, setting up and sticking to schedules is one of the most important elements of time management. Schedules can help reduce confusion and stress throughout your business by giving employees a sense of purpose and a positive work ethic. Building an efficient and productive work schedule can help you improve productivity while helping your employees establish positive work habits and limit time wasters.

Set Daily Goals

Being able to set challenging but attainable goals in a business is an essential element in accomplishing your business's long-term vision. Whether you are a remote employee or a project manager, you need to have a direction in order to accomplish your long-term objectives. Setting long-term, short-term, and daily goals is akin to setting up your stepping stones for success. Setting up goals helps to break down complex projects into manageable chunks that you can accomplish in an established order. Daily goals are the essential stepping stones that you and your team can follow within a day to keep you on track.

Take Regular Breaks

Even when the workload is at the heaviest during a project, it is important to make sure your employees take regular breaks. Taking the time to take breaks can help employees mentally recharge. Taking a few steps back can actually help employees see the larger picture to solve problems and come up with solutions. If you or your employees have difficulty pacing themselves, Dejal recommends using an app to remind them. Ultimately, scheduling regular breaks into your time management could end up increasing productivity and reducing careless errors.

Use Collaboration Tools

Choosing the right collaboration tools for your team is essential to make sure that project management goes smoothly and on time. This is essential if your project team is working remotely from different locations. Project collaboration tools range widely in price, features, application, team size, and project types. With software available as both apps or desktop software suites, it is important to do some research to select the right tools for your business. Some collaboration tools include monday.com, Backlog, or MeisterTask, and their features vary from customized workflows, kanban boards, project wikis, brainstorm maps, document filing, and more.

Be Reachable

In the current work environment, employees can often be working remotely, in different states, or perhaps in different parts of the world. This means that being reachable is essential to keep up productivity and meet deadlines. One of the key ways of meeting project expectations is to make sure employees are reachable no matter where they are working from. If you are trying to find ways to keep your team together on the same page while working in different geographical locations, implementing a single internal communication protocol can be a great way to make sure everybody is using the same software and working toward the same project goals and deadlines. Software such as Skype, Slack, Wrike, and Facetime help make communication simple and reliable. The key is to make sure that everybody is using the same software.

Delegate Tasks

Delegating tasks is a simple but efficient way to boost productivity and time management in a business. Not only can delegating tasks help to shift some of the burden off an overloaded employee, but it can also help empower future leaders that can be a boost to your company's future generation. When delegating tasks, it is important to make sure that newer employees receive the proper training and support to ensure that their tasks are done correctly. This may include providing feedback and requesting frequent updates.

Improve Workplace Environment

While the workplace environment can be dependent on many factors, such as budget, company values, and leadership style, for the past few decades, more and more studies have correlated employee morale and productivity to better-designed offices and improved working conditions. Improving the work conditions for your workers can range from providing ergonomic keyboards and computer mice to a better-lit office space. Such changes can greatly change the working environment to improve morale and concentration.

Finding ways to increase productivity and improve time management is one of the most important aspects of any business. Business owners and project managers can find that adopting a few strategies and improving some aspects of the workplace can go a long way toward improving the quality of work and increasing efficiency in the workplace.

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