Despite the wish for there to be endless hours in a day, there’s a limit to what you can accomplish in each one. You and your team are human, with the need to recharge or refocus in between tasks. Undoubtedly, you’ll face obstacles and distractions as well as triumphs. Still, you want to be as productive and efficient as possible. While most people don’t come to work to waste time, team efficiency can peter out without a plan.
Establishing a strategic focus is important regardless of where and how the group works. But in environments where there’s a mix of in-person and remote work, having a strategy isn’t just important — it’s imperative. This focus connects team members, gives them purpose, and extends the support they need to elevate their performance. Here are some ways to improve your team members’ efficiency no matter where they work.
Get Everyone on the Same Page
Data about strategy alignment says two-thirds of employees realize how their performance impacts team goals. That’s an encouraging number, since it reveals people tend to be in sync when they’re in the trenches together. What’s not as hot a number is the percentage of employees who know how team goals match the company’s objectives. Only 53% can say they know this.
You might say, “Well, it’s at least a little over half. How is that so bad?” The problem is, approximately 47% of people are chugging away at tasks they’re not sure are making a difference. They don’t know how they fit in with the company’s overall direction, which can contribute to demotivation.
Not knowing what an assignment or a broader role hopes to accomplish may also lead you to spin your wheels. You’re doing work, but you’re not really going anywhere. You might have to redo assignments and put them aside for a “later date” that never comes. There’s nothing efficient about that.
Without strategic alignment between the top levels of the company and the front lines, various teams can get out of sync. To achieve alignment, it’s up to leadership to get everyone on the same page by communicating priorities. Design the road map, hand it out, and regularly check in to let everyone know where progress stands.
Provide Sufficient Training
Naturally, remote employees will face unique challenges with learning curves and collaboration. They may only know some of their team members through a camera and a face on a cropped photo. Hybrid employees have an advantage over 100% remote teams since they get some actual face-to-face time. However, they might still experience challenges getting the knowledge and resources they need when they’re remote.
No one will solve puzzles as efficiently as they could if they have to find where all the puzzle pieces are first. Employees will become frustrated if they spend more time figuring out how to do something instead of actually tackling it. They’re more likely to lose confidence, possibly abandoning tasks they don’t have the resources to understand. A lack of proper training can eventually lead to turnover, which isn’t efficient for anyone.
An American Society for Training & Development study revealed a clear link between training and team performance. Observing two companies, researchers found that one organization invested three times more than the other did in training. The company with higher training investments saw a 57% increase in sales and a 37% profit bump per team member. The results show knowledge can be power, and teams with enough resources develop clear advantages.
Use All-In-One Communication Tools
Simply “communicating” isn’t enough to ensure understanding. Scattered bits of information and cryptic messages can instantly turn an easy task into a complicated one. Say a project lead drops a short message into an assignment’s comment thread in a project management tool. The person responsible for completing it looks at the message and becomes confused. What the message says doesn’t provide enough details for the employee to grasp what they need to do.
A real-time conversation may help facilitate better understanding. More thorough explanations and step-by-step guides attached to the task might, too. But if you don’t have an established single means of communication, you’ll keep running into the same problem.
That’s why having a dynamic communication tool is so critical. Your team members need a way to streamline voice-to-voice conversations, video calls, instant messages, documents, and asynchronous comment threads. Team members could be in different time zones and locations, making communication more of a challenge. All-in-one tools remove those obstacles and keep everything in one place. People get the exact details they need to move forward efficiently.
Establish Standard Workflows
Creating defined workflows seems obvious, but it is something leaders can overlook. Not having established workflows is like trying to cross a four-way intersection without traffic controls. No one is sure whether they should go and in what order. As a result, the drivers hesitate or go when they shouldn’t. Everyone gets nervous and may even think about turning around.
It’s not an efficient way for a team to function. And it results in duplicate work, missed deadlines, and unclear roles. Your workflows should provide guidelines for each step in the process. Take a marketing team as an example.
If you routinely create video commercials, you could establish a workflow for doing so. It would start with a manager’s strategy, distributed through a creative brief. The creatives then come together to brainstorm ideas. From there, a copywriter develops the script before handing it to the video and graphics team. The idea is to ensure every team member knows when to jump in so they’re not waiting for direction.
Making Teams Efficient
In 2022, average year-over-year productivity per worker declined for three quarters in a row. It’s the first time since 1983 that successive drops like these have occurred. This isn’t because people aren’t working, but because the fruits of the labor aren’t there. Some observers attribute the decline to increased stress, burnout, and financial worries. Remote and hybrid work are also cited as culprits.
While these can be factors, the real driver of productivity is culture. It’s everything from the presence of strategic alignment to effective communication, resources, and procedures. If you want to improve your team’s efficiency, start there.
