Top Ways Company Leaders and Processes Are Killing Productivity

3465

Top Ways Company Leaders and Processes Are Killing Productivity

Every company strives to maximize productivity, and when that doesn’t happen, they tend to look toward employees and what they’re doing wrong or could be doing differently. What business leaders need to realize, however, is that a lot of productivity problems aren’t the fault of employees.

A lack of productivity is frequently related to actions leaders, and company executives are taking, as well as business processes. If employers can get out of the way of employees, so to speak, productivity can be improved, as can the company’s bottom line.

The following are some of the most common productivity killers in the corporate world.

A Lack of Clarity

If there was a number one productivity killer that so many companies face it’s a lack of clarity. In businesses there tends to be a lack of boundaries across departments, people from different departments may be working in areas they aren’t meant to be, and there can just be a sense of chaos and confusion.

Each department needs to have clearly defined roles, and employees do as well. The more clarity you can create, the more productivity you’ll foster.

Redundancy

It should go without saying that redundancy is a productivity killer, but there’s still so much of it happening in the corporate world.

Company leaders need to ask for employee input as to where redundancy exists and then find places where it can be eliminated through automation and technology. For example, are you using the right invoice automation software, or is your AP department still doing things manually with spreadsheets and receipts?

A lot of corporate leaders don’t take the time to ask, so they just don’t know where redundancy is problematic and can be eliminated.

Too Many Meetings

Meetings can be productive at times, as can collaboration, but companies that are stuck in a rut of having meetings just because it’s how they’ve always done things are going to face productivity problems.

There doesn’t need to be a daily or weekly meeting if there’s nothing to discuss, and if people seem to be bored with meetings, this is a red flag that politics are more important in the organization than productivity.

Not Focusing on Reporting

With the abundant of available software solutions, it should be easy for company executives and leaders to have full visibility into workplace processes.

It’s important that leaders are making decisions based on analytics rather than emotion. When business leaders rely on data-driven decisions, it’s going to help highlight inefficiencies and ensure that decisions are smart and efficient.

There’s No Transparency

Finally, you may think that guarding company secrets is beneficial, but a workplace culture of secrecy and a lack of transparency leads to unhappy employees. There’s more focus on gossip, and that lack of trust can ultimately diminish employee productivity.

If you can work toward a transparent culture, there will be more trust between employees and their leadership, and that will, in turn, improve their level of job satisfaction and ultimately productivity is likely to grow as well.