Still using the whip to get your subordinates to perform better? Elon Musk, meanwhile, is giving his employees 35% off movies, and Google is giving free food with beer and wine on Fridays. We have compiled a selection of 10 life hacks on how to increase the efficiency of your employees - get ready to break the mold.
Motivating bonuses
Do not rush to increase salaries in the hope of improving staff efficiency. A 2015 study by recruiting resource Glassdoor shows that people are more motivated by bonuses than salary increases.
Social media is an unexpected ally
Do not allow employees to sit in in social networks so as not to be distracted? But in vain. According to the data high school managers in Lake Forest (USA), managers who constantly use social networks, on average, close 1.6% more deals. The figure is small, but it proves that the active use of social networks in work time not only does not reduce productivity, but even slightly increases it.
Angelo Kiniki, professor of management at Arizona State University:
- Time spent on Facebook seems pointless, its ban seems logical at first. But when people go to work, do they sit and work hard for 8 hours straight? No, our minds cannot handle this level of concentration. And Facebook, personal correspondence and cooler conversations are great ways to clear your mind.
Let them decide what to do
It is necessary to control the staff, but within reasonable limits. Accelawork CEO Robbie Slaughter recommends giving more freedom: let employees decide how to distribute their working time. Then they can work as efficiently as possible. Well, if they cannot control themselves, do you need such workers?
Your task is to set clear indicators successful work. Here's a tip from Jim Matters on how to get it right.
Yes, you pay for the office, fork out for expensive equipment, but this is not a reason to force people to sit there all the time. If a person falls ill, let him work remotely: he will do the job and not infect people - there is an increase in the efficiency of the work of the staff! And even if the employee is healthy, but just wants to work from home, he should not be forbidden to do so. According to an experiment conducted at Stanford University, Remote workers complete 9.5% more tasks.
Yes, and modern CRM-systems allow employees to work remotely, because the data is stored in the "cloud". In addition, some of these services, such as keeps records of working time and monitors the tasks of each employee. So you will not have any difficulties with organizing remote work.
Source: invisiblebread.com The bottom speak - the top hear
The company should not have communication barriers between management and subordinates - otherwise, any emergency situation that requires consultation with management will slow down work. Head of Marketing at YP David Krantz advises responding to letters from subordinates within 24 hours. You also need to regularly set aside time to communicate with the team. According to the data software development company for staff motivation Officevibe 4 out of 10 employees become less active if they don't get feedback.
No stress
Contrary to jokes and stereotypes, stress does not at all help to be more productive and does not increase the efficiency of the staff. According to the American Stress Institute, 65% of people have experienced problems due to work stress, and 12% even got sick because of it. Create an atmosphere in the office in which it will be pleasant and calm to work: even such trifles as inconvenient software or slow computers can unbalance an employee.
Source: invisiblebread.com Don't be afraid to praise
In order to improve the performance of employees and employees, it is important to verbally encourage them. Survey data from the aforementioned Officevibe shows that 83% of employees believe that rewards for Good work and recognition more valuable than prizes or awards.
Praise is important not only from management, but also from colleagues: 76% of those surveyed said they feel more motivated when they receive a compliment from a co-worker. So improving the efficiency of the work of employees is a collective matter.
It is a mistake to assume that the more an employee works, the better. University of Toronto research has shown that when you allow yourself to relax and take a break, you are more efficient than a colleague who is working even during his lunch break.
Any organization sooner or later faces the problem of increasing production efficiency. And it is not always about the economic component.
What methods to prefer when organizing such work is decided by the management of the enterprise. Based on knowledge of internal and external environment, the features of production processes, it is possible to develop a plan that will lead to the achievement of the intended goal.
What is meant by performance efficiency?
Enterprise efficiency is an economic category. This concept means the performance of the company, which can be expressed in:
- growth in production rates;
- reducing costs, tax burden;
- reducing the amount of emissions in environment;
- labor, etc.
There are also scientific work, which define the effectiveness of the organization as the effectiveness of an operation or project, in which the resulting product or new action brings more money than was spent. Or these manipulations save a certain amount of resources, which also exceeds the costs of the work associated with their implementation.
Efficiency Conditions
In most cases, in an effort to improve the efficiency of the organization, management expects to get a certain financial result. But this does not always reflect the strategic future of production. Therefore, it is believed that it is more correct to achieve growth rates. We can say that it was possible to achieve economic efficiency of production if:
- the resulting financial result is higher than that of competitors;
- the organization allocates sufficient resources to carry out production or management changes;
- rates of growth financial indicators will be higher in the short term than competitors.
This approach constantly motivates the search for solutions that increase the competitiveness of production. This is important in order to carry out work aimed at strategic development.
It is also important that each structural unit of the organization should be concerned about finding ways to increase its economic efficiency. After all, if one of them does not work well, the organization will not be able to improve its performance as a whole.
Tools for increasing efficiency
Ways to improve the efficiency of the enterprise are very diverse. The main ways to increase the profit of the organization are as follows:
- cost reduction, which can be achieved by reducing the price conditions for purchases, optimizing production, reducing staff or wage levels;
- modernization of processes or the entire production, which allows to achieve an increase in labor productivity, a decrease in the volume of processed raw materials, waste, automation of most operations;
- changes in the organizational system that can affect the management structure, principles of customer service, communication, etc.;
- strengthening marketing communications, when the task is to maximize the growth of sales of goods, changing attitudes towards the organization, finding new opportunities for production.
Each of these areas can be detailed and has its own methods of work. The entire management system in the company must be set up so that at any level, employees take the initiative, leading to increased economic efficiency.
Often, a set of measures that should increase the efficiency of work affects all blocks of activity at once. Such a systematic approach allows you to use a synergistic effect.
Factors Affecting Efficiency
If the management of the enterprise is interested in achieving improved results, it must analyze information about the state of the external and internal environment. Then it will be clear which of the existing factors should be used for the benefit of future strategic development. These include:
- Minimum resource usage. The less technology, equipment, personnel are used while maintaining the volume of output, the more effective the organization.
- Increasing the efficiency of personnel by optimizing the structure, improving qualifications and training, searching for more competent personnel, changing the motivation system.
- Increasing the efficiency of personnel by improving their health and improving working conditions. Measures aimed at solving these problems lead to a reduction in the number of sick days (savings in the employer's funds), increased productivity and employee loyalty.
- Strengthening socio-psychological factors. The use of decentralization tools in management can be a good impetus for development.
- Application of results scientific and technological progress. Ignoring modern technologies or excuses from their implementation due to the need for investment lead to a decrease in competitiveness and possible liquidation later. Fearing an unfavorable economic situation in the current period, companies often block their way to development in the future.
- The use of diversification, cooperation and other strategies that allow the use of existing resources in different projects.
- Attraction of investment capital and other mechanisms of third-party financing. Even privatization can open up ways to improve the efficiency of an enterprise.
All these factors lead not only to the growth of economic, but also managerial efficiency. In order to track the effectiveness of the work being done, it is necessary to outline the timing of the control and the indicators that will be checked.
Separately, we will dwell on the factor of improving the health of employees - for the reason that few employers have so far paid due attention to this. Meanwhile, taking care of the team directly affects the company's profits. For example, according to a study conducted as part of the HR Lab. – Laboratory of HR Innovations”, a smoking employee spends 330 working (!) hours per year on smoke breaks. If his salary is 50,000 rubles a month, then it turns out that in a year the company loses up to 100,000 rubles in wages, plus about 40,000 rubles in taxes and social contributions; plus the cost of sick leave, which smokers, according to statistics, take more often. And if the employee's salary is higher, then the costs are even higher. And if there are dozens, hundreds of such employees in the company?
In order to eliminate this extra cost item and increase the efficiency of smoking workers, companies can be advised. (At the link you will find a calculator with which you can calculate how much your company will save if employees stop smoking.)
Where to start?
To understand what work needs to be done to improve production efficiency, a thorough analysis should be carried out. The head of the company must have a rationale for future management decisions, therefore, it is required:
- collect statistics for previous years on product output, its sales, the number of employees in the state, wage fund, profitability, etc.;
- find out industry averages or competitors' performance;
- to compare the economic performance of the enterprise and other market participants;
- depending on which indicator is more behind, analyze the factors that led to such a result;
- identify responsible persons for the development of measures that should change the situation, and the time frame for achieving new indicators.
It is possible that management will have to make many decisions about itself. For example, to transform the functions and, the distribution of responsibilities, the scope of delegated powers, the methods of working with personnel and the transfer of information within the company.
What can hinder efficiency gains?
Even if the management sees the point in the changes that should lead to an increase in the efficiency of the company, the results may not be. Oddly enough, the problems are psychological perception management changes, as well as their legal support.
For example, the introduction of new technologies and the installation of equipment almost always results in a reduction in staff. Naturally, the employees of the enterprise do not want to be left without work. Their task is to delay such changes as much as possible. They can also resort to economic arguments, saying that the reinstallation of equipment for some time will require the cessation of work.
From the point of view of legislation, the process of dismissal of employees is strictly regulated. If procedures are violated, the enterprise is doomed to bear additional expenses which reduces economic performance.
In order to overcome all these resistances, you need to think through a system for notifying employees about changes, demonstrating positive sides from implementing changes.
Additional difficulties may be related to:
- with a lack of funding or the inability to access investment sources;
- with the lack of competencies among the employees of the enterprise, which does not allow the implementation of the plans;
- with no system strategic planning in the organization and analytics for previous years of work.
To achieve economic efficiency, systematic and large-scale work will be required. We cannot exclude the need to involve third-party specialists who can save time on implementing changes.
In general, with a competent approach and the use of reasonable measures, it is possible to increase the efficiency of each enterprise, regardless of the situation and at what stage of its development it is.
