How to Make Your Employees More Productive At Work

One of the biggest struggles that small business owners face is how to make employees more productive at work. This task requires careful balance because a business owner or manager needs to get as much work out of employees as possible without seeming dictatorial or engendering resentment.

Here are some steps to make your employees more productive at work without killing morale:

Set High Goals

When setting your expectations for employees or the company, set your sights high and make those goals known. Though you should provide words of encouragement and guidance when necessary, don’t set the process for employees to meet their goals. Instead, let employees determine their own processes (within reason) so they can meet the high expectations you’ve set for them. This may seem counterintuitive, but many managers have been surprised at employees’ capacity to hit their goals when left to their own devices.

Let Employees Drive Innovation

Your employees are your boots on the ground – they’re the ones with a battleground-level view of how your business is operating. If they have ideas for improvement, listen to them. More importantly, encourage employees to look for ways to improve your operations and to speak up when they identify potential efficiencies. No one manager can keep a constant pulse on all areas of a business, so rely on your employees to help you make your business run better.

Encourage Collaboration

Many employees have special skills that can be applied across departments or disciplines. To better exploit these skills, let employees start and lead their own teams. Encourage employee leadership but be careful that employees avoid creating fiefdoms or becoming dictatorial.

Schedule Regular Reviews

As a manager it’s important to set aside time with each employee. This should happen more than once per year with full-time workers – once per quarter is best. However, this time is just for reviewing an employee’s performance. Instead, the purpose of this time is setting the stage for the next quarter’s expectations. The is also an ideal time to discuss an employee’s professional growth, as their growth in the company ensures that they are directly invested in the success of your company.

Most importantly for managers, though, these quarterly reviews open the door to new ideas from your employees. They’re an opportunity for you to learn first-hand of current or potential pain-points so that changes can be made. Reviews also help you refine internal processes and identify good candidates for potential management positions.

Make Sure Employees are Invested in Your Success

As a business owner or manager, one of the best things you can do to increase your employees’ productivity is to make your successes their successes. Make sure that your employees know you want them to continue advance within your company – to take advantage of opportunities for professional growth and take on new responsibilities.

Just as importantly, be sure to reward employees when your company performs well as a result of their hard work. Your appreciation doesn’t have to be demonstrated through profit-sharing – having a catered lunch for employees after a particularly-productive week boosts morale, shows your appreciation, and gives employees something to look forward to.

Making employees more productive is a constant struggle for business owners and managers – especially those of growing companies. However, giving employees free rein to expand their own productivity, improve processes, and investing them in your success just some of the things you can do to make sure you increase employee productivity and help them meet your expectations. We hope you liked this article from Capstone Financial Planning.

Author: Steven McMeechan is a strategic marketing and communications specialist with over twenty years’ experience in senior marketing management roles across a range of industries including Information Technology and Financial Services. He works for Capstone Financial Planning and lives in Melbourne Australia.