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Driving Employee Productivity In The Digital Age - Ultimate Checklist For Hr Managers
There are a lot of factors that contribute to the success of an organization. The outbreak of COVID-19 and global lockdown and chaos has almost disrupted every business worldwide in 2020. In order to achieve success, businesses are reassessing the most efficient method and business strategies to build their workforce as the world moves towards a more digital age, ensure smooth operations during the COVID-19 outbreak and prepare for the future. Despite advances in technology such as AI, automation, machine learning outsourcing, and other software systems in the workplace, employees still make up the vast majority.
Undeniably, an organization's success is heavily influenced by the productivity of its employees. Thus, employers and HR should provide employees with as many opportunities as possible to improve the workplace environment. Often, HR teams may find it very challenging to motivate their employees to stay productive. The productivity of your workforce isn't as simple as tracking their breaks or limiting the amount of time they spend on social media. However, the responsibility for boosting productivity should fall more heavily on employers and HR managers than on employees. The topics like "how to enhance workplace productivity" and "strategies to elevate employee productivity in the remote work setup" could be the most searched online by HR managers in today's world.
It is true that businesses can only improve employee productivity by using some effective methods. Is there a way HR managers can improve employee productivity while saving time in the digital age? This article will explore some of the essential HR tips to improve employee productivity at an organization. Before going forward, let's talk about how digital transformation can boost productivity in the workplace.
What is Digital Transformation?
The term "digital transformation" may sound like a trendy new buzzword, but it is fundamental to an organization's success. Digital transformation involves integrating new technologies with existing business methods to transform all aspects of the enterprise. Businesses can transform employee and customer experiences and adjust how they operate internally as a result of implementing technologies like AI. A digital transformation is more than technology; it involves more of a cultural shift than changing an organization's traditional and static working style.
Why Digital Transformation is Important for Businesses in 2021
Despite what appears on the surface to be the best method of adjusting to post pandemic's new normal, the use of digital transformation is now more critical than ever before. Since 2020, businesses around the globe have become reliant on technology every day without even giving it a second thought - from online interviews on collaborative platforms to apps used for ordering lunch.
Businesses have ramped up their efforts to adapt to this sudden shift by leveraging digital transformation, which is critical to addressing the disruption of work and business ecosystems. According to the World Economic Forum's Future of Jobs Report 2020, in the wake of covid-19, around 93.5% of companies are looking to accelerate digitalization. For companies to remain competitive, efficient and meet rising demand, they must scale digital processes. Technology and trends in the digital transformation era have played a critical role in the growth of remote work.
Having a digital workplace leads to the improvement of operational efficiency and procedures.
Boosting Productivity with Digital Transformation
Investing in digital transformation will increase profits among workforces, suppliers, and customers. Indeed, every employee wants to stay satisfied, empowered, engaged, productive, and successful at their job. If you don't help your workforce succeed with all the services and collaborative platforms, then digital transformation won't be significant.
The study "Employee Engagement, A review of Current Thinking " - conducted by Gemma Robertson-Smith and Carl Markwick states that engaged employees do better, stay with the company longer, and act as brand ambassadors for the organization. A productive working environment is only possible when people, technology, and practices are combined to create a harmonious digital culture. Taking advantage of digital transformation is critical to improving employee productivity. This ensures that they are a crucial tool for creating efficiencies that could dramatically affect how an organization stays afloat.
There are five reasons why digital transformation is crucial for any business looking to grow and boost employee productivity.
- Boost employee collaboration and coordination
- Enhance employee satisfaction and flexibility
- Enhance the efficiency of operations
- Ability to manage projects seamlessly
- Put the security of the organization first
Digital Adoption Solution: A Necessity to Enhance Employee Productivity
HR professionals must be aware of the challenges they may face at their workplace and learn how to overcome them. It's essential to make sure that the employees feel fine and comfortable in the workplace, as this leads to better quality work, which, in turn, helps to elevate your business ROI to the next level.
Undoubtedly, if a company prioritizes employee productivity, it will be able to achieve new heights. In this post-pandemic era, almost every organization strives hard to increase employee productivity to accomplish their business goal. The work environment of every organization is different, which makes it hard to generalize. With companies shifting their work culture in line with the new normal, they become more dependent on technology. Undoubtedly, remote workforce will deal with numerous challenges if they are using enterprise applications. Most probably, employees only have little guidance about these software applications. This will eventually lead to employee disengagement and decreased productivity and affect the organization's growth.
According to the Gartner survey, more than 70% of organizations will employ digital adoption solutions across the entire technology stack in 2025 to overcome insufficient user experience for applications. Thus, embracing digital transformation indeed allows businesses to ensure essential functions during and after an emergency.
In today's digital era, it can be a challenge to enhance employee productivity. Social networking and constant distractions around the workplace reduce employee productivity. This affects your business directly. Implementing advanced technology trends in the workplace will yield some unexpected results. But what else can do to improve employee productivity?
Indeed, an effective HR strategy can help a business increase employee productivity significantly because it has a clear and focused plan.
If you are an HR manager, here are the strategies you must consider to enhance your employee productivity.
Read More: How to enhance employee experience and engagement using collaborative tools?
Strategies To Boost Employee Productivity
- Provide a better work environment
It was during the outbreak of COVID-19 that several companies learned how environmental factors affect employee productivity. Most of the companies were forced to implement a work-from-home culture for the safety of their workforces. Several employees have found that remote work has boosted their productivity, as they were comfortable with the environment. On the other hand, another group of people had difficulty adjusting, as they faced many distractions like poor internet connectivity, family distractions, and other household duties. This clearly explains that workspaces can either make your employees more productive or make work more difficult. Thus, HR needs to provide employees with a better working environment, regardless of their location. A better work environment can increase productivity for your employees.
When working in an office environment, it's important to ensure that employees have space for deep or silent work and a place for taking calls and collaborating. In the case of a remote team, HR agents can ensure that everyone has the tools and equipment they need to work from home.
With a digital workplace, HR agents and managers can list all tasks that need to be completed, assign them to the appropriate team members, and set deadlines for them to be completed. Having a transparent and autonomous work environment makes all employees feel responsible and aware of their responsibilities - Provide flexible work schedules
People work differently in terms of their productivity cycle. Thus, HR agents have to allow flexible schedules rather than forcing 8 am to 5 pm office hours. The HR team has to conduct meetings with each employee and ask whether they are comfortable with their duty time. If they are not satisfied with their current working hours, ensure flexible working hours, especially if your team is working remotely.
In this way, employees can maximize their productivity. It also allows the employee to think clearly and stress-free, reducing overall stress levels. - Engage, motivate, and retain your employees
A company's most important asset is its dedicated and efficient workforce. Keeping employees happy and connected is another way to boost productivity. HR teams need to ensure that their efforts and plans to modernize the workplace environment support employees in being happy at work, satisfied with the overall working environment, and that employers and employees are in harmony.
If employees are engaged, motivated and satisfied at work, they will remain dedicated to the company's mission and contribute significantly to its implementation. Their everyday tasks will also be completed before their deadline as well as with perfect quality. - Invest in employee training and development
If you want your employees to perform at their highest levels, you must understand the skills they possess. Every employee is not expected to have tremendous talents for any task. In most cases, it can be quite inefficient to assume that employees will immediately learn their jobs. Therefore, rather than expecting the new hires to accomplish tasks with no guidance, it is essential to provide online or offline training to the workforce to do their jobs properly.
Thus, they can carry out their tasks independently, and your time will not be wasted later answering simple questions or fixing mistakes. By undergoing training programs, employees can expand their knowledge base and improve their job skills, making them more effective at work, resulting in a positive impact on the organization.
Relevant Article: How to train your employees in the post-pandemic era? - Invest in new technology and tools
When you have successfully recruited and retained top talent, outdated tools and technology can severely hinder productivity and create disappointment among your most skilled employees. The technology landscape is rapidly changing each year, making it imperative to frequently update the tools required to ensure smooth business operations.
In today's digital age, fortune 500 companies and small businesses alike use robust software, applications and tools to simplify complex workflows and processes. They have features and capabilities that make repetitive and time-consuming tasks such as gathering and sorting information or paying bills faster and easier. Automation increases productivity and reduces human-made mistakes by delegating repetitive and tedious tasks to powerful computers. As a result, keeping the technology to do the heavy lifting allows your employees and you to focus on more profitable activities. - Avoid micromanagement
If you're a manager, you may feel pressured to exert complete control over your team's activities. In many cases, this pressure manifests itself as excessive control over your employees' activities, tasks and workflow. When you try so hard to get the results you want, micromanagement occurs.
Micromanagement is all about repeatedly checking up on your team members, criticizing them frequently, and taking over work delegated to them. This can often create a negative impact on employee morale and performance, which will eventually destroy employee productivity. To avoid being viewed as a micromanager, make sure that your goals, deadlines, and feedback process are clearly stated to your employees while remaining accessible to their concerns. - Ensure seamless communication and collaboration
As technology trends continue to evolve, communication has become as easy as a button click. Undeniably, a productive workforce depends on good communication and collaboration. A collaborative work environment fosters innovation as it harnesses the best of two or more individuals. Teamwork and efficiency are key components of a successful workplace. In a world where remote work is the new norm, cloud and mobile technologies remain crucial to ensure that employees access the resources they need to stay connected and be productive. It takes longer for an uninitiated group to start and complete a common goal. A well-coordinated and collaborative group of individuals can change the whole situation. The entire process speeds up, and the outcome is better than what everyone expected.
These days, many communication and collaboration platforms, such as Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Slack, Google Meet, and G-Suite, enable your remote teams to work together no matter where they are located. - Be clear and focused on your goals.
Without a specific goal, it is impossible to expect employees to be productive. Employees will be less productive if their goals are not clearly defined and obtainable. Therefore, the team manager's responsibility is to ensure employees' responsibilities are as clear and limited as possible.
Managers can record goals in reminder and calendar apps and set daily, weekly, and monthly reminders to keep them top of mind. Routinely reviewing important work goals helps you form a habit of reviewing progress. In addition, it allows you to recognize potential problems before they become major problems. - Exchange feedback with each other
It is impossible to increase employee productivity if the employees don't realize they are ineffective. In this light, performance reviews are essential. Measure your employees' performance, then have one-on-one meetings to let them know what they outshine at and what needs improvement.
Whenever you evaluate your employees, ask them what you can do to help them improve. There may be occasions when they prefer a little more guidance on certain tasks or prefer a little more creative room. Feedback provides you with clear, quick ways to help your employees enhance and encourages a culture of open dialogue that will promote long-term growth. - Employee Appraisal
To motivate employees to be more productive, give them a reason to be so. One of the most crucial HR strategies is performance appraisals. When you acknowledge your employees for a well-done job, they will feel appreciated and strive to do better. Human resources managers rarely implement employee appraisal programs to boost employee productivity. Employee appraisal programs will help employees become more focused and motivated and increase the likelihood of their organization's success. Thus, HR managers need to consider employee appraisal programs.
Conclusion: Digitization is the key to the future
Productivity is a measure of how much work is produced by an employee during a given period. Employee productivity management can be a challenge for Human Resources managers, which may inspire them to develop strategies to boost employee productivity. Indeed, a smart HR manager will always find a way to enhance employees' productivity.
Keeping employees and customers productive and engaged needs a digital transformation to address current and future work environments. Your technology must work seamlessly with your employees, partners, and clients to be successful today. A productive work environment and well-integrated IT can enhance your company's competitiveness, enhance customer experiences, develop employee productivity, and improve security.
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