John Heywood once said “many hands make light work.” This concept is true, even for businesses.
Collaboration and productivity go hand in hand. No matter how productive and successful your company is, it can always be improved through enriching collaboration.
When COVID struck and many companies moved to remote working, some teams struggled with collaboration. Companies strained to patch communication gaps to keep their teams on track.
Collaboration is essential for excelling in any field. In fact, companies that encourage collaborative work practices are five times more productive.
Why collaboration in the workplace is important
Teams, who work in unison waste little time and cultivate the best ideas. They’re efficient with deadlines, product planning, and don’t dally on redundant, repetitive tasks.
The more efficient a team is, the higher the company’s ROI is. In fact, highly-connected teams have demonstrated a 21 percent increase in profitability. Also, more efficient teams can meet deadlines more easily and, ultimately, produce a more polished end product.
As a matter of fact, even the perception of collaboration helps. Employees who feel and believe they are collaborating with a team, working on the same project, show higher engagement levels, less fatigue, and are more efficient.
How workplace collaboration improves workflow
Workplace collaboration is more than employees being able to communicate with each other. They also need the ability to easily share resources, experience, and expertise.
Below, we’ve listed four ways to improve workplace collaboration and, therefore, productivity.
Better team productivity and problem-solving
Many minds may make light work, but they also make smart work. With more eyes on a project, there are more team members to spot loopholes or shortcomings. Once these problems are discovered, teams pool their experience and resources together to come up with the best solution.
Eliminating organizational silos
Each and every employee has a different background and every employee has a different speciality; even if they have the same job title. One developer will look at software differently than the next because of their past: what products they’ve worked on, which secondary institution they graduated from… Even employees from different departments can significantly influence an end product.
Assigning teams instead of individuals to a project breaks through organizational silos: the separation between types of employees.
Improved business execution
Again, back to the word efficient: teams, who collaborate are more efficient and execute projects more thoroughly with minimal wasted time and effort. However, to ensure teams are as efficient as possible, make sure each employee knows their role and responsibilities for each project.
More efficient remote teams
As mentioned earlier, even the idea of working on a team can have a significant impact on employees. Now that many employees are working out of office, it’s important to maintain their sense of connection and comradery.
Tips for enhancing your workplace collaboration
Optimizing your workplace collaboration cannot be overrated. Companies have seen substantial increases in productivity by giving their employees the tools and simplicity they need to focus on teamwork.
“Online collaboration tools and digital workplaces facilitate increased productivity by up to 30%.”
To get you started, we’ve listed four tips for enhancing collaboration in your workplace.
Reducing inefficiencies in meetings
In most companies, inefficient meetings are a huge waste of time. In general, the average manager spends 35 to 50 percent of their workdays in meetings.
Four problems that make meetings much less efficient than they can include no-shows, squatters, overcrowding, and the struggle of finding an available meeting room.
Investing in a meeting room booking system can go a long way. With Joan 6, employees can not only check the status of and book meeting rooms remotely, but the wall-mount display helps wanderers and squatters know if the room is available or not.
Take advantage of alternative communication channels
Since COVID, we’ve become well versed in alternative company communication tools. Some teams have even made team groups on WhatsApp just to stay casual and chat about non-work topics. Yammer has also grown substantially and is a popular enterprise social networking service.
In general, employees are 20 to 25 percent more productive in companies with clear, effective communication channels. To the point: the value of communication cannot be overestimated; invest in the right communication tools for your company.
Hot desking
Studies have shown that at least 80 percent of employees will want to work from home at least some of the time after COVID. In response, many companies are resorting to hot desking to avoid squandered real estate.
Like meeting rooms, employees can waste a lot of time searching for available workspaces and desks. Joan’s desk booking app can work wonders for keeping employees on track with minimal wasted time and energy.
Simplify the file sharing process
In most large companies, each department has set up its own file sharing system. One group might use Sharepoint, another might store documents in OneDrive, another might use G Suite… By now, most teams aren’t on the same file-sharing system.
Employees are wasting time searching for the right files, not to mention getting permissions for each file sharing program. Streamlining your company’s file sharing process can save misspent time and resources.
Takeaway
New tools to save time and money are released every year. It’s essential for all companies to stay-in-the-now and keep up to date on the latest tools that can save employees time and the company money.
According to Dynamic Signal, “63 percent [of employees] have wanted to quit because ineffective communication interfered with their ability to do their job.” Ensure your company is one of the strong ones by investing in top-of-the-line tools like Joan that make collaboration in your company a breeze.