Key tools for boosting business productivity
Small business productivity starts here
In this article you will learn about:
Why productivity is crucial for a small business
How to calculate how productive your business is
Tools to enhance your business’s productivity
How tools like Microsoft 365 can help your business become more productive
Productivity is crucial for the success and sustainability of any business, regardless of its size. That’s due to the fact that, if your investment in resources (time, money or labour) isn’t exceeded – or at the very least matched – by your company’s outputs, your profit is likely to be affected. In this article, we look at the factors that impact productivity, how to address these and, finally, how to use tools to boost your productivity.
Why productivity is important for a small business
Productivity is all about managing your time to make you more efficient. Meetings, emails and admin chores can get in the way of doing the things you need to do in order to make money. Tools that help you manage your time more effectively can increase your productivity by allowing you to find a way to spend less time on chores that aren’t central to your core.
Productivity is also about how well you use your resources to make your product or service. When you use your resources efficiently, you will save time and money. But the opposite is also true: when you use your resources inefficiently it may cost you money. Take document version control, for example: if all the employees using a document edit it from the same place and everyone can review edits in real time, it becomes easier to keep track of the changes made. However, if everyone reviews the same document independently, it will require a lot more time and effort to get to a final version.
How to calculate productivity
Many tools and techniques can be used to indicate just how productive your business is. You could look at the company’s revenue per employee, downtime, the number of parts produced, employee turnover rate, gross profit margin or customer satisfaction. While there's no shortage of measures, it's important to prioritise what is most important to your business – in other words, what is most likely to drive your productivity – and then make sure that you have tools to measure this accurately.
If you're running a plumbing business, most of your income is linked to how many clients your staff are able to service per work day. Measures such as average revenue per employee, average new referrals per employee and average travel time per employee may help you keep track of how productive your business is.
Tools that may improve productivity
The following Internet-based tools may help you use your time more efficiently:
RescueTime helps you save time by keeping track of how long you spend on various tasks. You can set productivity goals and even record your computer activity time so you can see if you’re spending too much time surfing your socials, for example.
Boomerang for Outlook and Gmail is great for people who are easily distracted by incoming mails. Use it to block off a time that you will devote to emails, so that you can focus on the task at hand.
Evernote offers an online platform for all your notes, making them easy to sort and organise.
Trello presents a dashboard so that you can map the progress of various projects underway in your business. Use simple groupings like "To-do", "In progress" and "Completed" to get started.
Wave is an accounting tool that makes it easy to keep track of your company’s financial activity.
Microsoft 365 is an essential tool, providing platforms that make it possible to liaise with colleagues and partners (such as Teams), as well as programmes like Outlook, Excel and Word, where you can co-author documents, and OneNote, for sharing files, and OneDrive for saving notes.
A final thought
There are several apps available, all addressing various aspects of productivity, so spend some time thinking about the areas you need to improve and try to find a tool that addresses this challenge directly.
Key Takeouts
Implementing online productivity-boosting tools can free you up to focus on the core business of your company and help you become more successful.
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