Essential work productivity tips for businesses

In the past, we’ve argued for the use of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software toward improving productivity. From helping your employees remain efficient in automating repetitive tasks, there are indeed many ways it can help you thrive. However, there are many more ways to ensure productivity, whether they overlap with CRM or otherwise. And here at MoversTech we fully grasp the need for increased productivity that all businesses share. As such, in this article, we’ll explore 5 essential work productivity tips for businesses you may put to use.

Essential work productivity tips: why and how

There should be no question that increased productivity has multiple benefits. It lets you maximize your Return on Investment (ROI), and it helps refine your operations and internal collaboration and drive sales. Productivity is an invaluable metric because it spearheads all your efforts across the board.

In essence, there are two approaches to increasing productivity; working harder and working smarter.

Working harder

Simply expanding your teams, increasing working hours, or otherwise putting in more effort can of course pay off. However, underlying factors that might undermine your productivity will persist and have your efforts yield diminishing returns. Consider the following, among others:

• Poor time management
• A disorganized workflow
• Low morale or team dissatisfaction

No amount of extra work alone will eliminate those factors. Furthermore, many small-to-midsize businesses (SMBs) simply can’t afford the resources or risk to do so. Whether they’re already struggling with customer relationship management as a small business or simply don’t have the sustained growth to afford it, working harder can only do so much.

Working smarter

In contrast, working smarter is a strategic, affordable approach for everyone. Technological advancements such as CRMs can help refine your digital marketing strategies, allowing your marketing departments to afford more time. At the same time, they can help consolidate your communications and improve your internal cooperation. With such a foundation, you can then consider more ways to strengthen your time management, build team morale, and ultimately increase productivity.

While working harder requires effort, working smarter requires perception and planning. Optimizing time management alone is the cornerstone of all essential work productivity tips for businesses, precisely because it works. And with a few key changes and optimizations, it’s well within reach.

Essential work productivity tips: 5 key steps

Having established how working smarter is the safer goal, let us discuss 5 essential work productivity tips for businesses that you can work towards today:

#1: Streamline your workflow

First and foremost, improving productivity hinges on streamlining your workflow. In this regard, consider the following practices:

Consolidate your databases and ensure easy access

Nothing disorganizes your workflow as much as disjointed, out-of-date, or otherwise disorganized databases. Especially if you rely on asynchronous communication such as emails, the amount of time that can be wasted on this step is staggering. In this front, consider CRM; CRM’s core features include a consolidated, cloud-based database that’s easily accessible by all your authorized employees.

Prioritize tasks and delegate them accordingly

Similarly, spreading your workforce too thin can reduce productivity. Instead of trying to tackle every task at hand at once, prioritize the most urgent or intensive tasks. Secondary, easier tasks can sidetrack you and thus reduce productivity due to wasted time.

Focus on one task at a time, and automate when possible

Finally, streamlining your workflow entails focusing on one task at a time; ideally the most urgent one at hand. Consider automating secondary tasks if possible to avoid distractions and derailments.

#2: Use technology to improve efficiency

On the subject of automation and technology, there are many innovative solutions that can help improve efficiency. Few work productivity tips are as vital as employing technology wherever possible. Consider the following processes, among others.

Automate data entry

Manual spreadsheet entry can needlessly drain your time and reduce your efficiency. At the same time, it’s prone to human errors and redundancy. Consider migrating from spreadsheets to CRM to save valuable time.

Automate marketing emails

Similarly, manual email outreach is inefficient and time-consuming. With the right software, you can set custom triggers for outgoing marketing emails and automate this process.

Consolidate your social media and communication channels

Lastly, managing multiple channels can be incredibly time-consuming and stressful. Maintaining a digital presence and proper, open internal communication channels is vital, however. Software solutions like CRM can help consolidate such channels, unclog your schedule, and improve your productivity.

#3: Track individual performance

Proper tools and coordination aside, employees need discipline and clear, established goals to work towards. An iron fist won’t boost morale or productivity, of course, so the wiser course of action is to simply hold employees accountable while ensuring they’re on board with your business goals.

In this regard, you can set clear daily, weekly, and monthly goals and lay them out at every appropriate opportunity. Measure individual employee performance based on those goals, through CRM or otherwise. And, of course, motivate your teams to meet them. In this way, you can ensure you’re promoting a productive mindset across your departments.

#4: Eliminate distractions and timewasters

By the same token, distractions and timewasters can hamper productivity. Those can be found everywhere in your workplace, physical or digital.

On-premise distractions can be as simple as noise; keep the office doors and windows closed to avoid losses of concentration. Digital distractions are far more pervasive, however; encourage your employees to keep their phones away during work hours. Social media notifications, messaging apps, and similar distractions are very avoidable by exercising discipline in this regard.

#5: Improve working conditions and ensure team satisfaction

Finally, what’s arguably the most essential work productivity tip is to improve your workspace. There’s a reason why business juggernauts do it; a satisfied workforce is a productive workforce.

Among others, pay attention to a few key workplace factors:

• Keep your workplace temperature on the warmer side
• Use lighter colors to incite productivity
• Use minimal décor
• Promote clutter-free workspaces

Changes as simple as these can help your employees psychologically, and thus let them be more productive.

Conclusion

Thus, while working harder may be a reflexive response, working smarter can be more productive in the long term. With the aforementioned work productivity tips in mind, we hope you have a clearer idea of how to do so – smartly and efficiently.