A business’s productivity is measured by how many man-hours it takes to complete any given task. Here are some tips for improving productiveness and helping your business soar to new heights!

Workplace Conditions

There are three major factors that make up workplace conditions.

• Physical conditions:

1. Lighting
2. The space in which the employees are required to perform tasks
3. Location
4. The tasks they are physically required to perform

Improving conditions such as lighting and physical comfort will highly impact employee morale. Most people working in an environment with natural lighting have shown improvement in mood, energy, and mental health. Along with lighting, the comfort of your personnel is extremely important. Allowing your employees the flexibility to work where and how they feel comfortable—for example, by allowing them to work sitting or standing at their desks—can also greatly improve their overall performance and productivity. These simple changes in the workplace will yield outstanding results!

Interpersonal Relationships

1. Interactions with customers, vendors, other employees, and management
2. Making phone calls, constructing and answering e-mails, and other activities that require dealing with others

If your employees are constantly harassed either by superiors or clients, they are less likely to want to work hard. However, with incentives or simple positive reinforcement, employees are more likely to feel that the positives outweigh the negatives. Most people like to feel appreciated for their work, and this appreciation doesn’t always come in the form of money. Show them that their hard work isn’t going unnoticed with a simple “Way to go!” On another note, maintaining a respectful work atmosphere will also do wonders for this aspect of workplace conditions, reducing employee turnover and keeping your employees happy and, more importantly, productive.

Structural Job Characteristics or Job Performance Expectations

1. Scheduling
2. How an employee is reprimanded for mistakes or infractions
3. The level of independence that is granted to an employee in the decision-making process
4. Overall structure of the business

If employees feel like they are treated fairly, even when being reprimanded, they will be more cautious in the future. Being mindful of how you schedule your staff is also extremely important. Allowing your staff to choose their schedules, within reason, will also yield a better outcome when it comes to how well they will perform throughout the day.

Communication

Communication is the basis of human interaction, and, as mentioned above, respect is very important within any type of human interaction. Why is this important? Well, if your employees feel respected, they are more likely to feel that they can express how to improve the workplace and contribute ideas for new business ventures, among other things. By hosting weekly staff meetings, you will find that your personnel will begin to feel more invested in the growth of the business since they now feel part of the bigger picture and not just a cog in the machine.

Right Tools

The right tools will go a long way. If you have less than adequate equipment, this can cause high levels of frustration, reducing overall productivity. Having faulty phones, Internet connection, and fax system will go from being an annoyance to a catastrophic decline in performance. Make sure your office space—including equipment and resources—is up to date to ensure all the atmospheric changes you made will not be dampened by these issues.

While you set the lighting and move the beanbags around, let us here at ON DRIVE TECHS help you acquire the right phone system to keep your business communications running in tip-top shape. For more information on how to switch over to our top-of-the-line business voice services, online fax, and backup Internet service, contact us today, toll-free at (866) 258-0064 or send us a message via our contact form here.