8 ways to boost workplace productivity

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New research from totaljobs has revealed that UK workers waste nearly an hour and a half of the working day being unproductive. This is costing British businesses on average, £4,467 per employee every year which equates to an annual cost of a whopping £22 billion.

If you’re worried that your workforce isn’t being as productive as it should, below are some great ways to boost motivation and morale. 

Offer incentives

By offering employees incentives such as bonuses, prizes or a team night out, this helps them to feel valued and far more motivated to reach a specific goal.

Provide a comfortable place to work

If someone finds their workstation uncomfortable, this can have a huge impact on productivity. Good ergonomics and a healthy office environment makes employees happier and less distracted so make sure there are proper procedures in place to ensure that everyone’s desk is set up correctly.

Encourage education and training

No matter how much we love our job, anyone would get bored doing the same thing day in and day out. Having nothing to aspire to can also make us complacent and de-rail motivation. Encourage your employees to continually improve their skills by offering training in both their personal and professional development.

Ask for feedback

Even if an employee is unhappy, chances are they won’t say anything. In fact, managers often don’t know that a member of their team is struggling until they hand in their notice. To prevent this situation arising, ask employees for their feedback on a regular basis, even if it’s done anonymously. As well as making staff feel valued, this also ensures that issues are dealt with before they turn into a big problem.

Promote a healthy work-life balance

Establishing a good balance between work and home prevents employee burnout and the mental and physical consequences that come with this. There are a number of ways you can encourage a healthy work/life balance including:

• Don’t make employees feel they have to reply to work emails outside of office hours
• If you notice the same people are regularly doing overtime, find out why this is. If it’s because they’re struggling with their workload, find ways to reduce this
• Encourage staff to take their allocated holiday allowance
• If team members have a particularly long commute into the office, consider remote working once or twice a week
• Introduce flexi-hours so those with children can juggle their home and work commitments

Encourage staff to be healthy

A healthy lifestyle helps us to feel more confident, stay motivated and keeps illness at bay which means fewer sick days. There are a number of ways you can encourage your employees to be healthy such as offering discounted gym memberships, ensuring the canteen always has healthy options and even starting up your very own company teams for activities such as football or endurance events.

Give employees more responsibility

When we’re not being micromanaged, we feel more valued and believe it or not, we’re far more likely to motivate ourselves.

Encourage team-building events

When we’re in the office, we tend to stick to our own team because we work and sit with them every day. By organising company-wide events, this encourages people to mingle with a wider variety of people and helps to foster a sense of community and belonging.

If you’re looking for more great ways to engage your workforce, please feel free to contact Choralis Consulting and we will be more than happy to help.