How to Harness Your Employees’ Time

The name of the game in this current business century is being more efficient. For years, it was ok to hire employees who simply came to work, did what they wanted at their own pace, and then went home after punching the time clock. We already have robots and other machines to do the menial tasks. That means the only thing your employees should be focusing on is using their time to the best of their ability. It also means you need to look for ways to free them up so that they can do more in less time and accomplish more for the organization. Use these simple tricks to get more out of your employees.
Happy employees working

Work Less Often

While it will seem counterintuitive to make your employees work less, the reality is most employees waste countless amounts of time. They not only feel they are entitled to breaks, but management and companies often agree. You can use the restroom. You can grab a cup of coffee. Some employees still smoke, and others will just take a walk around the office to wake themselves up. Throw in the checking of Facebook and personal email, and you can quickly see why the average employee will only work a fraction of the hours that they are supposed to be working while at the office.

According to the Atlantic, this is supposed to be an easy problem to fix. Make them work less often. Part of the reason employees are so comfortable with taking breaks is because they already know they are going to be stuck in their chair or their cubicle for multiple hours at a time. Who cares if they burn a few minutes here or there? But, if you can tap into the situation where you can allow them to work less (maybe cut a few hours out per day), then you will be surprised to see they could wind up accomplishing more than they do in their current time. The reason for this is because they feel more productive and want to race to the end of the day.

Avoid Any Wasted Steps or Events

When you consider all of the essential and necessary communication during a typical business day, then you should realize how much wasted time and communication there actually is. Yes, your employees may want to socialize with others, but you aren’t paying them to stand around a water cooler and gossip. One of the best possible solutions to maximize time is to get into the mindset of removing anything that eats up their time. This includes making them take steps away from their desk and walk away from their work.

A tremendous solution to this is to implement the business video conferencing solution for IT by BlueJeans. You can instantly get your employees on the other end of a conference call, share screens, share data, and even invite more parties into the mix. However, the one thing you don’t have to do is waste minutes away from the desk where they could be improving the organization instead of doing anything of value.

Productive employee

Cut the Email

It has long been thought that email revolutionized the workplace. It did. It gave every employee with a company email a never-ending process and task. However, when employees can cut out their constant stream of emails, they are able to accomplish more because they have far fewer distractions. When you consider all of the potential things that could be done when you weren’t having your attention pulled your inbox, you can quickly see why email should be a part of the business day, but should only be scheduled for a few times and not allowed to be a constant stream of busywork according to Inc.

Work on the Biggest One First

While some people like to check off boxes, the problem with that strategy is you could waste an entire workday, work week, or even more time just on doing busy work. You need to be comfortable with having your employees rank the most important items on their to-do lists and focusing on those first. It’s not just about going for low hanging fruit and clearing up the problems. It is absolutely about doing what will provide the greatest results possible for the business. If it is a small item and it is important, then it will get done. However, taking care of the things with the greatest potential benefits and outcome is always the top priority.

Takeaway

There are so many ways to get ahead in business, but your number one focus needs to be on actually working with your employees to make them better. If you only try to make changes and tweaks yourself, you are limiting your impact. But, if you set up a landscape where your employees’ time is maximized, then they truly will be working for you instead of for a timeclock.

Remember that implementing human resource software will help you to stay on top of employee matters, and leave everyone feeling far more organised. Human resource experts Cezanne HR provide a service which allows your workforce to work smarter and achieve more.