For any business, finding out how to increase office productivity is a permanent goal, but one that seems impossible to fully accomplish. However, in recent years, research has begun pouring in on how to boost your efficiency in a rapidly changing climate, so there’s plenty of ways to improve.
Еven with more and more people working from home, there are still many actions you can take. Here are our top six productivity tips and tricks that will help your team move forward.
1. Kanban boards for visual representation
Twenty-first-century offices are hectic places, with most workers wearing multiple hats and teams handling various projects at the same time. You can find detailed explanations of how to increase office productivity with Kanban boards with Bitrix24’s free office productivity software.
The first thing your team should check in the morning, a Kanban board is a fantastic way of representing the progress of your projects. Use subtasks to further segment your work and cut it down into manageable chunks.
As people finish their tasks, they can be assigned to the next worker in the chain, without the need for an email back and forth. While it might take a bit of getting used to, a Kanban board is a fantastic way of keeping people on track.
2. Start your day right
Create a company culture where you all take advantage of the “power hour”. Once your team has worked out their priorities for the day, get right to it in the first hour.
You may have heard of the two-minute rule. As your team sort out their daily to-do list, they’ll quickly notice many jobs can be done in less than two minutes. These include things like sending emails, posting a prepared image on social media, or setting a meeting agenda.
Getting these quick tasks done in your power hour means your team have their tasks fresh in their mind and their morning energy has not started to slip away. The secondary advantage of a morning power hour is the sense of accomplishment it gives, so start as you mean to go on.
If you don’t finish all your short tasks in this hour, make sure to keep your list. This is what you need to pull out when you find yourself between larger tasks.
3. Manage your notifications
There’s no doubt that some things are urgent, but the vast majority of pings and beeps feel urgent no matter what. We respond to notifications like Pavlovian dogs who get no treats, and it’s killing productivity.
All kinds of different office productivity tools with notifications have a do not disturb mode, so, as a leader, make it your company’s culture to give important tasks the respect they deserve. Of course, when it comes to collaborating on work, real-time communication is essential in remote working, so turn those notifications back on.
4. Automations for office productivity
There are endless ways of including automation in your workflows. This can be from simple tasks like forwarding emails to whoever needs one, to complex jobs like writing out entire job quotes. Generally, the more time you spend planning and setting up automation, the more time it will save you in the future.
Take the time to look through different ways of automating your common processes. If you can imagine an easier way of doing something, the chances are someone in the tech world has already invented it.
You can integrate two different apps to really get things moving. For example, you can link your call center to your customer database, keep records of your transactions, or archive all your meeting notes without you lifting a finger.
5. Let’s get physical
Add to that brain space you’re saving by outsourcing your menial tasks by getting your team active. In recent years, more and more employees have been requesting exercise space for activities like yoga. Why not take a survey of your team and see how you can implement a bit of physicality into your lunch break?
Regular exercise has a dual benefit in the office–long-term and short-term. Most importantly, it is great for your mental well-being. Being aware of your team’s mental health is essential for every company out there at the moment. An extra bonus is that online exercise classes are even easier than doing them in the office if your team is working remotely.
So how does this increase office productivity? Midday exercise can perk up your team after lunch, and help you stay focused. With this renewed energy, you could even put in another power hour in the afternoon.
6. Breaks: short and often
We’ve looked at how you can get bursts of productivity in the office, but how can you optimize the hours in between? You might have heard it before, but encourage your employees to take short frequent breaks. It’s a great productivity hack that is an integral part of many tools.
Why not experiment with the Pomodoro Technique? Working in bursts of 25 minutes followed by short breaks of 3 to 5 minutes, it keeps your team active and focused, rather than stagnant and lethargic. A secondary benefit of the Pomodoro Technique is overcoming procrastination, which is often caused by a large task appearing daunting.
So, what are you going to try?
All of the methods above are tried-and-tested ways of how to increase office and company productivity, but it’s inevitable that some will work better than others for your teams. For example, if you are running gyms, your personal trainers probably won’t need that midday exercise shot.
One method that stands out, however, is the use of automation and integration. While it could be seen as not worth exploring now, it is worth recognizing how many companies have gone bust due to a lack of innovation in the past. Companies that use technology to increase productivity today will be those that are ready for the changes that are sure to come in the future.
For more information on how to increase office productivity, Bitrix24 explains how you can unlock your performance potential.
