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Leading a team is difficult enough. There are different personalities to manage, miscommunications between team members to deal with and ensuring that the workload is split evenly between everyone to consider. If you find there is a need to also increase productivity, it can feel like you are in a nightmare. With a bit of effort on your part, however, your team can enjoy a productivity boost.
We'll take a look at five easy ways you can encourage your team to work a little bit harder in order to get the job done.
1. Don't micromanage
If you know that your team isn't quite working to their full potential, it can be tempting to try and find out what the problem is through micromanagement. You might think that by following everything that your employees do, you can get to the bottom of why there might be productivity issues. However, this very rarely works because it tends to have the effect of demoralizing your staff. The best thing to do is to inject motivation into your team by giving individual staff members ownership over their jobs. This can be a great boost to their self-esteem, which in turn could boost their productivity.
2. Communicate with your employees
Giving staff ownership over their jobs doesn't mean that you should let communication slip. In fact, if you want to make sure your staff are being productive it is never more important. Miscommunication can lead to staff doubling up on work efforts or mistakes being made that can really take a toll on productivity. Regular team meetings are one way to make sure everyone is talking to each other. You will need to take charge of these to ensure everyone is on the same page.
3. Team building
If you have a happy team, you will find they work better together, which should mean that productivity levels look after themselves. Team building activities are great for allowing employees to escape the monotony of everyday work and really focus on relationships. Exercises also help your employees begin to understand everyone's strengths and weaknesses. This can be really useful when it comes to finding the best way to split up the workload in order to improve efficiency.
4. Create the right environment
Since we know that the happiness of your employees has a positive effect on their productivity levels, you need to be sure that you are providing the right kind of environment for them in the workplace. This means making sure that they are comfortable throughout the day so that they have the energy and capacity to keep on working hard for you. Ensure that the lighting in your workplace is right so that they feel energised all the way through the day. You should also ensure that any furniture you have is comfortable and offers your employees the support that they need. Consider adding in some personal touches to your environment too so that employees know they are appreciated. Maybe have a fruit basket or introduce some plants into the office, just little things that tell your staff that they are important to you.
5. Incentives
Offering incentives can be a really great way to boost productivity instantly. You could introduce a little friendly competition, maybe by offering a prize to the team member who does the most work or comes up with the best idea. If you don't think competition would be healthy within the team that you manage, you might want to think about offering the entire team a treat if they achieve a goal that you set. It all depends on the team that you are looking after. Decide on the best way to incentivise them based on how they work together.
