Business is getting more and more difficult every year.  The external environment changes more quickly; the competition intensifies; costs keep rising; the regulations and bureaucracy are ever more burdensome. 

To move our companies forward, we must become ever more productive. 

As leaders, there are six fundamentals that we need to do daily to make our teams more productive and move our companies forward.

Make the Team Better

• Train and coach good team members to become better tomorrow than they are today. 
• Bring on good talent that complements and makes the team stronger
• Return under-performers and malcontents to industry to ensure that the team consists only of good performers and good teammates
• Create a strong positive winning team culture

Give Clear Direction

• Paint a clear vision of the future so the team knows where it is heading and understands the ‘why’ of what it is doing
• Give clear direction when assigning tasks and responsibilities so that they cannot be misunderstood.
• Prioritize the work assigned so the team is focused on the most important work to be done.

Follow Up and Hold Accountable

• Follow up with the team regularly to ensure that they are doing what is needed and to remove any roadblocks preventing them from doing their work effectively.
• Hold the team accountable for their performance.

Improve the Feedback Loop

• Get feedback from the team on how the work is progressing in order to bring issues to the surface and to understand what the team is doing daily.
• Act on the feedback to improve the work and to signal to the team that their insights and suggestions are valuable and worthwhile to share.
• Work with the team to find opportunities for continuous improvement, big or small.

Increase Time on Task

• Time on task is perhaps the easiest way to increase our team’s productivity.  If we were to ask how many hours in an eight-hour day that our team is working on productive tasks, the common consensus is likely to be around six hours.  Increasing from six hours of productive work to 6 ½ hours of productive work can easily lead to an 8% increase in productivity.
• To increase time on task, we need to protect our team’s time so that they have the time to get the work done.
• We need to streamline and simplify processes, leading to a focus only on what creates value by minimizing non-essential work that can suck the team’s time.
• We need to limit distractions and interruptions.  As leaders, the biggest challenge for us will be to limit the constant interruptions that we impart on our teams.

Improve Our Meetings

• Ensure that our meetings are productive by having an agenda, preparatory work, a limited number of participants, and a limited time for the meeting.
• The single most effective way to improve the quality and productivity of meetings is to have everyone come prepared to the meeting with their thoughts and ideas written down and ready to discuss.

Conclusion

As leaders, everyone of these six fundamentals is firmly within our control.  Mastering these fundamentals for ourselves and our teams will lead to dramatically improved productivity and effectiveness that will move our companies forward even as the challenges that we face become more difficult.