Despite our greatest efforts, global productivity grew a scant 1.32% in 2016. This statistic should be particularly concerning for small and medium business (SMB) owners and employees whose livelihood depends on a productive business. With more than half of Americans either owning or working for a small business, creating two out of every three new jobs in the US every year, productivity has never been more critical. While 71% of workers say they have a proactive mindset and are excited to work, workers lose three to five hours of productivity daily due to interruptions from colleagues, noise levels, emails, and many other common workplace distractions.
Every worker knows that productivity is the key to success, however, a productive work environment can take many forms. This is particularly true of the small and medium business community. Employees work from a home office, local coffee shop, shared workspace or storefront. With this variety of working scenarios, people can’t afford to be distracted by disturbances around them, and time management is crucial. SMB employees need to unlock their potential by assessing the four primary work modes and taking steps to improve them: Concentration, Conversation, Collaboration, and Communication.
Concentration
A central tip for being productive is to set clear expectations. Every morning, write out what priorities must be accomplished that day or week and schedule how much time each task should roughly take. In an age where the workday never ends, it’s important to take breaks throughout the day. Experts believe that working for 50-90 minutes is the ideal productivity timespan, with a 20-minute break in between.
Noise canceling headphones are another must-have for concentration. The ability to tune out noise is incredibly helpful when trying to cross items off the never-ending to-do list. The key to concentration is total silence, right? Quite the opposite. Most would agree that music has a powerful effect on our well-being, while also increasing concentration. Studies show that listening to soothing sounds lifts our mood, calms our nerves, and enhances memory recall, concentration, and processing.
Conversation
While non-work related conversation should be kept to a minimum during the workday, SMB workers should always try and answer the phone. In today’s competitive environment, one quick phone call could make or break a business. Especially when an estimated 80% of a company’s future revenue is likely to come from 20% of its existing customer base. Keeping the current or potential customer happy must be the top priority of the phone call. With this statistic ingrained in SMB employee’s minds, having quality, productive conversations is critical. A few tips for achieving optimal concentration throughout a customer call are to stay hydrated, change your posture, take a deep breath and listen.
Selective hearing? Listening intently to a customer is pivotal to the success of the call. A TED talk by Julian Treasure, an international speaker on sound and communication, revealed that 60% of our communication time is spent listening, yet we only retain about 25% of what we hear. One way to address this is by implementing a popular listening strategy known as RASA—receive, appreciate, summarize and ask. With a bit of practice, every conversation will be a memorable, productive and retained conversation.
Communication
We can’t overlook the role of technology in ensuring productivity. This means using unified communications (UC) tools, such as video conferencing, instant messaging and desktop sharing. Up to two-thirds of SMBs will either expand UC or replace existing systems with UC in the next 1-2 years. With SMB employees working from just about anywhere, these tools are essential for collaborating with other remote workers. More broadly, digital has come to the forefront for SMBs, with our research revealing that a third of SMB owners note half of their company’s revenue stems from digital sales. As more small businesses work and live online, they are being pushed to get “up to speed” on all things digital – including communication and collaboration.
Collaboration
Working amongst peers can stimulate creative ideas, breed a fun work environment and engender positive energy. But it can also hinder productivity, with unnecessary meetings, phone calls, and distractions. As these distractions occur, longer hours are needed to make up lost productivity, causing added stress and burnout.
There is a trap to be aware of when attempting to avoid this collaboration distraction: meetings. Meetings are the killer of modern work life. Think about your time in meetings. How much of that is spent setting up, making introductions, dealing with technical issues or waiting for information that is not yet ready? This time could instead be used making actual decisions that affect and drive business. While meetings certainly serve their purpose, when possible avoid them in favor of a one-on-one approach. A study by the University of California details that, once thrown off track, it can take people as long as 23 minutes to return to the original task. This means that effectively utilizing and designating meeting time for collaboration is critical to productivity levels.
Productivity is a challenge no matter how you slice it. But finding the concentration tools that work best for your work environment is critical to the success of your company. Small and medium enterprises have a lot riding on their businesses and limited resources, so it’s crucial that they follow the 4 C’s of productivity to ensure that they are working to their fullest potential.
