Know the success and importance of hiring an excellent virtual employee for your business and other valuable benefits! Listen as we shared this great conversation with Ask Josh Patrick of The Sustainable Business Podcast!
Looking for more information on how you can start hiring your virtual employee? Schedule a free call appointment today so I can help you with the process.
Many times, we often hear the phrase ‘Do the Impossible!’ But is it beneficial to execute a backbreaking work to secure and measure productivity effectively? Whether you manage a huge enterprise or a startup, ideally, reaching goals is an intrinsic part of growth. We are going to share with you some of our best tips to measure productivity. Whether monitoring in-house or remote staff, having clear KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) will help move the needle of your business.
Focusing on the tasks that will create the impact can also be difficult unless you set the standard. Therefore, it is important to clearly communicate those goals and standards to your team and regularly monitor them.
For a business focused on developing growth, here are 3 elements to effectively measure productivity:
The Clock Isn’t Always the Basis:
Time well spent is more important than the volume of time for certain tasks. While certainly, time management is a very important skill, some tasks clearly require mental processing. These types of task cannot be rushed as if they are, the outcome will not be optimal. Understanding what the best outcome is for the time spent, is a much better measurement of productivity than breaking down the task into a minute by minute increments. Judge the results of the labor and not the amount of time spent.
The good old 80/20 rule applies in every area of life but is very important in business. Approximately 20% of what you do impacts 80% of your end result. Stephen Covey talks about spending time in the Important/Non-Urgent category of tasks. It is important to recognize this while measuring your productiveness. For example, if 20% of what you do is training people, establishing a good connection to the team, and sharing best practices, you’ll have the chance to influence them towards success by multiplying the values and the productivity of the business. It also allows you and your staff to have an approach of working on things that have the highest return on their investment of time. Busy does not equal production in most cases.
Keep Track of Everything:
By tracking the time spent and the results of the day, it allows each of us to make sure we are spending our time wisely. Each day our virtual staff provide us with a written report that helps us track their performance and allows us to see how productive they have been each day. Are they accomplishing the objectives?
KPIs need to be reviewed regularly. They need to reflect the overall goals of the position. For our business, we review then at least quarterly since the economic environment changes fairly rapidly.
Achieving your business goals is the primary objective. Human capital is one of your largest investment of resources. It is important to make sure that you have policies and procedures in place to measure the effectiveness of you and your team.
If you have ever wondered how we run 7 businesses while maintaining our sanity – schedule a call to see if we can help you get out of the weeds and have more of a life. Cheers!
In today’s world, good communication skills are necessary for the business owner and their staff – whether internal or virtual. Yet, good communication is an art that needs to be practiced and refined. In fact, if we really give attention to the people we talk to, it becomes clear that we can learn from each other just by having a normal conversation if we first seek to understand.
Although there are many principles involved in good communication skills, we wanted to highlight the important ones for you. Here are some factors of good communication skills:
A good reporter knows how to listen. Of course, nobody wants to spend their time talking to someone that doesn’t give their attention to what you’re saying so be present at the moment and give your full attention. Stop all your other tasks and ask relevant questions to assure understanding. Conversely, you don’t have to focus too much on what you’re going to say next after listening, instead, you can exchange thoughts by responding relevantly and smoothly.
For important conversations have them face to face if possible. We work with clients who have virtual staff located around the world. When there is an important conversation, hop on Skype and have a video call. This allows you to better connect than over email or messaging. Eye contact is the first to communicate your thoughts which serve as the window for your feelings toward your interest in a conversation.
Be Clear & Concise
Too often people say what they think you want to hear rather than delivering a clear message. Making your point in a roundabout way can confuse the conversation. If need the other person to understand, then speak plainly and ask for understanding. This is different from being blunt and rude. You want to deliver your message in a way that is easily understood and then allow the other person to respond.
Once you have had the conversation, appreciate where they are coming from and share your appreciation with them. Whether you are the initiator or receiver, good communication is a gift. When we are able to have a clear understanding of each other’s perspectives, we can begin to develop deeper relationships even when we agree to disagree. We are all different. We have different social upbringing, different cultures, different communication styles. This is what makes a stronger organization. Understanding and appreciating our difference, allows us to work more effectively together.
Take time to develop your ability to connect to people by collecting a few ideas from this article. Gain more confidence by practicing and expanding your social circles, and as you go along, you’ll find it simple to connect with just about anyone in any situation. This strength will then take you towards an abundance of new opportunities that would not have been available otherwise. That’s the advantage of good communication skills.
If you'd like to learn more about how virtual employees can help increase your business productivity, feel free to book an appointment with me today and I'll help you all throughout the process.