Stop Struggling With Efficiency: Here Are Some Top Tips

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |Efficiency Top Tips|Stop Struggling With Efficiency: Here Are Some Top TipsWhen any business owner is trying to juggle their responsibilities, it can be difficult to focus on efficiency. Yet, it is important to know that every business needs to be efficient in order to achieve goals, generate more sales, and see greater success.

If you are a business owner that struggles with efficiency and a high output of work, then here are some top tips.

Speed up manufacturing processes

Should you be a business that sells products, then you will see a huge increase in sales if you increase your manufacturing output. To achieve this, you will need to invest in the right tools and materials.

For instance, if you create uniquely printed t-shirts, then you can speed up the manufacturing process by investing in the best materials, such as printable HTV. This will make your apparel creations much easier to help increase the number of t-shirts you can produce in one day. The more t-shirts you can produce, the higher your sales will be. Hence, your business will attain greater efficiency.

Schedule meetings if necessary

Business meetings might seem essential if you have things to tell your team. But, holding long and regular business meetings can eat up the time that your team could spend working.

Hence, it is a good idea to only schedule meetings if they are necessary. When you do plan a meeting, always ensure that it is as short and concise as possible so that it doesn’t use up too much time. If you hold a lengthy meeting, it might hinder your team’s motivation and, therefore, hinder their productivity and output for the rest of the day.

Create daily lists

Every business will have a list of tasks to achieve each day and each week. Likewise, every business will have more and more tasks to do. Hence, keeping a list will ensure that nothing gets missed.

To ensure that each daily task is complete, a list can help a person become organized. Ticking off each completed task can offer employee satisfaction, which can increase their motivation. In turn, they will feel encouraged to continue with their efforts to ensure that they tick every task off before the end of the day.

To maximize the efficacy of daily lists, it can help to set timings for each task. This can ensure that you don’t spend too much time on one task and maximize your working hours.

Delegate tasks to the right people

Every business will have employees that have strengths in certain areas. Hence, to maximize efficiency and the results of a business, it is a good idea to delegate tasks to the right people.

There is little use in offering a marketing task to someone that specializes in finance, and vice versa. Hence, always make sure to offer the right responsibilities to the right people.

Simple changes to your business can ensure maximized efficiency and business output. In turn, you will recognize more leads and sales, which will help your business attain its desired success.

Raise Employee Morale With These Tips

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |Employee Morale|Raise Employee Morale With These TipsYou’ve clicked on this post because you’re interested in learning how to raise employee morale in your business. You’ll soon see a range of useful tips to try, but first, we want to explain why employee morale is important.

If employee morale is low, it means nobody has the motivation to work hard. Your productivity decreases and you struggle to make sales and gain new customer acquisitions. On the other hand, if employee morale is high, everyone is fully motivated to work towards the collective company goal. Productivity goes through the roof, ensuring you make lots of new sales and gain loads of new customers.

Keeping that in mind, here are the tips to help you maintain and raise employee morale all-year-round:

Feedback sessions

A good way to raise employee morale is by holding one-on-one feedback sessions with each employee. Talk to them about their performance and let them know what they’re doing well at. This praise will really keep them in a good headspace and let them realize that their work is being noticed by you.

At the same time, it’s a good way to provide constructive feedback on things they might not be doing so well at. Be sure to go hard on the praise before and after giving some constructive criticism. The whole aim of these sessions should be to help your employees get the most out of their talents while also boosting morale by giving them a metaphorical pat on the back.

Share the success

Has your company achieved something special lately? Did you hit your sales targets for the month? Have you had a positive article posted about your online? Victories should be shared with your employees as they helped you achieve them.

Sharing success lets everyone feel part of the team. Again, it’s recognition for a job well done. Employees will appreciate that their work is being noticed – and they’ll also feel extra motivation as there’s proof that what they’re doing is good. You create a company environment that’s full of positivity because the successful moments are shared as a collective. Thus, employee morale goes through the roof.

Do things as a team

Often, employee morale is low because the whole team feels disjointed. People don’t feel as though they have a place, so their attitude changes. You can help people feel more like part of a team by doing things together. There are loads of different ideas you can choose to put this into action.

For example, go on a monthly meal together as a team. Or, go out for drinks as a group. You could even host your own party or gathering on special occasions. Find party rentals to get loads of cool games and activities, and it will be a great team bonding session. Things like this will help people get to know one another and feel more attached to the business. It’s impossible to have low morale if everyone gets on and there’s a friendly atmosphere in the workplace. These events or gatherings will help you achieve this.

Create a fun work environment

Lastly, employee morale will go down the drain if your work environment is terrible. Nobody will have high morale if they don’t look forward to going to work. On the flip side, if your work environment is fun and cool, employees will look forward to work.

So, you need to try and make your workplace a relatively fun place to be. Think about little perks you might be able to introduce. Simple ideas work really well. For instance, install a coffee machine in the office so people can constantly get free drinks whenever they want. Maybe have a little chillout area with beanbags and comfy chairs and encourage your team to take breaks. Yes, breaks actually boost productivity – think about that! You could even go a step further and have a table tennis table or pool table for people to use when they’re not working. If people enjoy where they work, their morale is likely to be a lot higher than those that don’t.

Just like that, you can increase the morale of your employees in the workplace. To reiterate, employee morale is more important than you might think. If your business has been struggling, it could be down to the way your employees approach work. Morale could be low because people don’t believe in the company or feel like they enjoy working there. Use the tips above to rewrite the script and create an office that’s full of highly motivated employees!

Strategies To Help You Maximize Productivity In Your Business

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Development Article |Maximize Productivity|Strategies To Help You Maximize Productivity In Your BusinessAn unproductive business is far worse than not having a business at all; it may be utterly dreadful for your profits and sales; if your firm is not lucrative or profitable enough, you will most likely have to close your doors.

All of your efforts will be in vain if your firm is not productive enough to gain the advantages of your work. Because of this, making guaranteeing your organization is as productive as it possibly can is pretty vital. As long as you can manage to do so – and there are various ways to do this – your chances of establishing your company and producing a profit are greatly boosted.

Continue reading to discover some of the methods you may boost the productivity and success of your organization.

Enhance the well-being of workers

The use of systems and being organized, as well as the application of business knowledge to become better at what you do, are all critical components of enhancing productivity. But these factors account for just half of the equation.

Every other component revolves around your employees, and no matter what type of tools you have in place or what kind of training you give, it will all be for nought if you fail to address one key factor: their well-being.

A happy employee is always going to be more productive than a dissatisfied employee. Their passion for working with you will be contagious, and they will be willing to put forth effort in their job. Most importantly, they will be loyal, knowing that they will be appropriately rewarded for a job well done and that, if they have any problems, they may share them with you.

It is doubtful that an employee will be as productive if they are unsatisfied, think they are not being listened to, or believe their needs are not being handled. Employees will only execute what is needed of them and nothing more, and they will be significantly more inclined to hunt for employment elsewhere, which will be costly to you and disruptive to the firm as a whole.

In order to achieve this, you must first guarantee that your personnel are as happy and fulfilled as possible in their jobs. How you go about it will be influenced by the type of the company, your budget, and the location of everyone’s office.

Make use of organizational resources

The usage of organizing tools in your business may considerably boost your productivity and efficiency.

It is simple for duties to be neglected or forgotten when you do not have any integrational, automation or other equivalent solutions to aid you to comprehend where everyone should be and what they should all be performing right now. When this happens, productivity declines.

Not only will your workers be unclear about what they should be doing and when it should be done (which feeds into their general well-being, as stated above), but you will also be unsure of when to verify that the responsibilities have been performed, or even who to ask in some cases.

When you apply specific organizational tools, everyone may feel much more at ease in their duties since they will all grasp what they are intended to be accomplishing at any given time. They will know how to integrate with Ingenico and any other new workflow procedures you have in place. Additionally, your clients and suppliers will be satisfied as well, because no order, payment, or work will be ignored, and your reputation will flourish as a consequence.

4 Hacks For Managing Your Team Virtually

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |Managing your team virtually|4 Hacks For Managing Your Team VirtuallyManaging a team was hard enough before 2020.

With modern culture forcing many to work from home, management styles have changed. With meetings and catch-up sessions taking place via computer.

If you are a manager, this was hard to adapt to in the beginning, and as it goes on, it can be tough to think of ways to keep your team motivated.

How can you ensure that your team stays on target and continues to produce? Below are some key strategies to help you and your team to thrive.

1. Allow flexible working

Remote working has allowed many businesses to expand. You may now be responsible for managing workers from around the globe.

This is great for the business. Though it can make working in synch tricky. When you are heading to bed, your staff located in different countries may be waking up.
This is where offering flexible working can help. Look to accommodate different time zones. While also allowing your team to strike a better work/life balance. Try not to take anyone out of their natural work rhythm by forcing them to comply with your time zone, as work output will drop. This is also where a virtual office setup can help. By having tasks displayed on a webpage, they can be accessed with ease from around the globe. So, your international team can work even when you are sleeping.

2. Make the office virtual

This can be tricky in the short term. In the long term, it simplifies the working environment.

Aim to sign up your workers to a group email address. Invest in online meeting software that allows you to also send out invites. You will also need to set up a virtual mailbox. Many location-based offices regularly receive mail. So, you will need to update your business associates about your e-post box.

If you aren’t sure where to start, look at sites like theworkstation.co.uk for advice.

3. Progress reports

Many people don’t want to micromanage their teams, but with the lack of a physical workplace, what other options are there?

To keep an eye on your team, ask for progress reports. Weekly if you have a deadline coming up.

It is worth having daily meetings. For a more in-depth progress report, it is worth doing so every week. Make progress reports a part of the week and have them towards the end. Like on a Friday or Thursday.

This will help you to keep track of where your team is relating to productivity. While also providing a set structure for them to work to.

4. Organize 1-on-1 meetings

A working group is essential to the overall function of the workplace. However, among all the meetings and tasks, individuals can get lost.

Aim to host monthly meetings with each member of your team. This will allow them and you the space to better assess them. Without the stress of doing so in front of the rest of the team.

This will also allow you to look at their capabilities, and, of course, enquire into more personal issues, such as their health. If necessary, you can add or deduct tasks from them to make them more comfortable.

How To Improve Your SME’s Approach To Technology

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |SME approach to technology|How To Improve Your SME’s Approach To TechnologyLet’s face it; almost every business now benefits from modern technology. Sadly, the vast majority fail to unlock their full potential. Given that tech features have become more vital than ever thanks to the pandemic, now is the time to put things right.

Here’s how you can transform your approach to tech in just 10 easy steps. The improvements for your business will be incredible.

Step 1: Invest in a fluid approach

When developing a new IT strategy, it’s imperative that your systems are ready to evolve. Managed services ensure that your hardware systems, data, and software licenses are aligned with your needs. Better still, they can be reviewed and altered at regular intervals as your business grows.

There is nothing worse than satisfying today’s needs but limiting tomorrow’s success. Being ready to adapt is key.

Step 2: Build flexible working environments

Over the past two years, you have probably been forced to embrace versatility. Work from home schemes and other flexible solutions have enabled companies to survive. However, many workers now prefer this way of work. Cloud-computing and real-time team messaging apps facilitate this. It can aid productivity and staff satisfaction.

It will also open the door to using ad-hoc remote workers for short-term agreements and one-off projects.

Step 3: Utilise automation

Automated tech has completely revolutionized modern business. Using equipment that is connected to the Internet of Things promotes fast, reliable operations. Manufacturing plants and warehouses can benefit greatly from this move. However, automation also supports stock management and order fulfillment.

One of the great things about increased automation is that it allows workers to focus on more crucial tasks.

Step 4: Don’t forget the human touch

While automation can make your business run smoothly, you must not forget that consumers expect a human touch. Humanizing the company website is a great starting point. It will make users feel closer to the brand and can remove any confusion. Adding a live chat facility to connect them to a real agent can work wonders too.

Interactions with your brand are supposed to be enjoyable and comfortable. Keep this in mind, and you won’t go wrong.

Step 5: Pay extra attention to maintenance

Employees need the right equipment to complete their jobs to the highest possible standards. Still, it’s not enough to simply ensure that they work well on day one. Scheduling maintenance that avoids unwanted downtime is one of the smartest moves you can make. Not least because it will keep products in good health.

Operational efficiency isn’t only important for productivity speeds. It also prevents employees from becoming disinterested.

Step 6: Invest in your employees

It’s one thing to support your business with the best equipment, but it counts for little if your employees don’t know how to use them properly. Therefore, regular training courses are an essential addition. Aside from making them familiar with new tools or ideas, it ensures that all workers take a consistent approach.

Besides, upskilling your employees keeps them mentally engaged. In turn, they’ll be keen to get more out of the tech features.

Step 7: Adopt eco-friendly moves

While many people assume that technology is an enemy of the environment, it doesn’t have to be that way. In fact, using solar energy and recycled materials can have a telling impact. Similarly, opting for paperless tech can cut down on the amount of resources you use. It’s an ideal way to use tech in an efficient way.

Aside from efficiency, corporate responsibility through greener processes will aid your brand image.

Step 8: Look to save money

Every business decision is ultimately a financial one. Long-term savings are often the main incentive for adopting new tech tools in the first place. You can use modern tech to price compare all proposed purchases or service subscriptions. Meanwhile, ideas like 3D printing can save money during prototyping. Embrace it.

By reducing your expenses, you will be in the best position to stay competitively priced. It can often aid your sales.

Step 9: Use tech to form client relationships

By now, you will have embraced digital marketing in one shape or form. Success isn’t only linked to awareness, though. You want customers to feel engaged with your content and loyal to the brand. Using video marketing and social media to provide a look behind the scenes is crucial. Again, it humanizes the brand.

Collecting data on client trends and behaviors will also help you adapt your marketing and customer care efforts.

Step 10: Protect your business

Finally, modern tech doesn’t only create new opportunities. It also presents potential dangers. Managed IT can include cybersecurity, but you must not overlook other dangers. Copyrights and patents are very important. Non-disclosure agreements can also be stored digitally.

Should an ex-employee try to profit from your ideas or innovations, you’ll be able to take the appropriate action with ease.