A Cup of Tea Can’t Make Employees Productive, But A Positive Work Culture Can!

Many of us believe that a productive day can’t begin without a cup of tea.

While I step away from my work desk to take a break from writing this post and rejuvenate myself, I see my colleagues indulged in idle chit chatting over cup of tea. People sitting in office cubicles and sipping cups of tea one after another is a common sight in every workplace.

A cup of tea or coffee can keep your employees awake, but not productive. Yes, you heard that right.

Tons of free snacks, multiple tea breaks or a Foosball table for that matter are merely some perks that your employees may feel happy about. These perks may keep employees enthusiastic, alive and active at workplace, but this wouldn’t add much to their productivity.

A positive, encouraging work culture is all that’s needed to make employees productive.

Here are five tips to make a work culture positive and ensure employee productivity remains optimum. 

Know your people well

Employees are more than what they write on their resume. You hire them by judging their capabilities. But once they are in and start working for your team, you forget to get back to them and discuss their challenges and limitations. That’s where the main problem occurs.

Productivity can only be increased, if managers know their people well. Their aspirations, capabilities and challenges must be known. Employees appreciate when they are offered guidance to overcome work-related challenges.

Taking interest in personal issues of team members make them feel understood and valued. The positivity at workplace encourages employees to be more productive and care more about the company’s progress. 

Help employees to reach their full potential

A work culture where employees are pushed to exceed their limits always thrives success.

Encourage learning and growth among your people. After all, success of a leader depends on employees’ success. So, let them learn and grow in a culture where ongoing training and development is a top priority on managers’ calendar. 

Make them feel passionate about work as well as life. Dissatisfaction in any of these two (personal or professional life) will pull down the performance in the other. Encourage employees to explore their potential and support them throughout.

Improve efficiency by giving feedback

Employees won’t feel encouraged and valued, if their achievements are not acknowledged in the first place. Conduct feedback conversations to tell employees how well they are performing and what are the areas that need improvement. That’s why Performance reviews are essential.

Use pulse feedback approach to openly put forward views on an individual’s performance and behavior.

Frequent performance feedback = Timely performance improvement = High productivity and efficiency

Don’t let meetings kill productivity

Meetings often kill productivity and take up a significant part of an employee’s work day. How often do you sit in conference rooms and tell yourself, “What a waste of time! I would have done something better in this time.”

Well, a meeting without a purpose ruins the meaning of the entire exercise. Meetings are necessary. They can be meaningful only if they have an agenda. According to a new Clarizen/Harris Interactive survey, 67% of participants accepted that they spend up to 4 hours per week getting ready for their next status update meeting. That isn’t a great thing, right? 

Few quick tips would be – reduce the length of meetings, invite fewer people who really need to be a part of the discussion, ask everyone to show up on time, interrupt people who start discussion on topics that are not relevant to the agenda, or ask participants to prepare in advance for the meeting.

Offer flexible work hours

A regular 9 to 5 work day is too mainstream. Unless there’s no urgency or the need to be present at specific hours in office, allow employees to have flexible work hours. It maintains a perfect work life balance.

Some people feel more energetic during the day hours whereas others get ore creative ideas in the evening. Let employees create their own work schedule, if it makes them productive and more satisfied in the job roles.

 According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Americans spend 8.8 hours a day in the workplace. This time is clearly more than what we spend on our one-day sleep, average 6 to 7 hours. The point is, people spend more time at workplace rather than they do with family (and on sleep). And as a major part of day is spent at workplace, the activities and happenings at work affect mood of individuals. An employee can stay motivated, focused and enthusiastic only when the work environment is stress-free, positive and encouraging. Create a work culture where employees thrive and excel, and not remain unproductive and unhappy.