How to Create Better Productivity in the Workplace

 It doesn’t matter if you are working remotely or heading back into the office, we all would love to have better productivity in the workplace. As we are all heading back to work in one way or another, we have a chance to change the way things are done in order to make it a more productive and satisfying place to work.

I was recently listening to one of my favorite podcasts, “Dare to Lead” by Brené Brown. On the show, she interviewed Priya Parker - author of The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why it Matters. This episode literally stopped me in my tracks as it was such 

an important conversation about the real, the big, and the small challenges we’ll see as we return to the workplace, and the opportunity we have right now to ask how we can make work better than ever.

THE LANGUAGE OF LEADERSHIP

For decades, we’ve been doing work a certain way, which means it can be tempting to rush back to the formats we’ve also known. “I’m worrying about people skipping those conversations and just focusing on the logistics,” Parker shared with Brown about her fears around the return to work. “We actually have an opportunity to pause and to ask, how do we want to do this now? What are the meetings we’ve longed for? What are the meetings that were cancelled and literally everybody quietly celebrated, right? Also, what are the meetings we should actually not bring back, because they actually could have been an email?”

THE WEEKLY FLOURISH

Remember, your people are actually the ones who LIVED this experience, so don’t be afraid to go to them for answers. According to Parker, other ways you can be more considerate on how to return to work with intention, include prioritization and owning your communication. 

Tip 1: Choose three centering activities 

Many organizations will now have some workers remote and some in-person, which will fundamentally change what it means to gather on a day-to-day basis. That means, it’s important to take an individualized approach to what your team needs most to connect right now. In this New York Times article, Parker shares a few questions to get you started: 

• What did you long for when we couldn’t physically meet? 

• What did you not miss and what are you ready to discard? 

• What forms of meetings did you invent during the pandemic, out of necessity, that surprisingly worked?

• What might we experiment with now?

Tip 2: Name the elephant in the room 

For example, in the podcast Parker and Brown talk about the awkwardness of handshakes versus bumping elbows during initial back-to-work greetings. The way we interact has been completely challenged due to the pandemic, which means the way we engage has shifted as well. Instead of trying to guess what’s appropriate, just ask. Naming is a powerful tool to help make things less awkward as we navigate this new territory. We’re going to have to continue to test new norms out and we have to be able to talk about it.

GUIDANCE FOR PRODUCTIVITY IN THE WORKPLACE

We are in a moment of creativity. A moment where learning to ask the right questions and thoughtfully listen to your people is truly a make or break for the future of the workplace. Creating the space to have productivity in the workplace thrive will make a big impact. We love working closely with organizations and managers to help them prioritize, communicate, and engage thoughtfully so they can make decisions from a place of awareness and intentionality about what the future of work can look like for them. The first step is to book a call so we can learn more about your goals and how we can support you.

When you stop and take a moment to think about how to have better productivity in the workplace, you can create an environment that people are happy to work in again.