Profit.

At the end of the day, that is the metric for knowing how well your company is performing. One year reduced to a single number - a single number defining if it was a good year or a bad year.

So, how much profit has your company generated within the last year? And assuming it was a good year – what were the contributing factors?

Your level of productivity is measured in achieved KPIs. So, if you don’t meet the targets, this must mean that you haven’t been productive – or does it?

Boiling down productivity to one metric, you risk being unable to maintain your profitability for the coming year - simply by not knowing what contributes to productivity.

Your survival guide to understanding productivity

What I will highlight throughout this article is that productivity cannot be assessed in a vacuum.
But merely that productivity is a product of company culture aiming at fostering collaborative work.
Collaborative work is at the moment realised via online interactions, but the essentials remain relevant.
Reading this article, you’ll understand why collaborative work is essential for your KPIs, and how to apply this to your daily work once returning to the office.

Even as many are working remotely due to the current situation, the need for back and forth between colleagues - in physical premises or online - has never been more important.

Productivity is not created in a vacuum; it’s a team effort

For your yearly evaluation, the company will assess if you have reached your KPIs and the extent to which this has contributed to overall growth.

Being evaluated individually is no new phenomenon and individual performance is often the decisive factor of you getting a raise or a bonus.

So, were you a contributing factor or a prohibiting one this year?

How well you do is dependent on collaboration

The intriguing aspect of performance evaluation is to dig deeper into this single-sum-number that is the basis of your evaluation. Companies are result-driven, always focusing on the end goal – growth. Company growth ensures that you keep your job and grow into better positions, improving your competences.

Truth is that your growth is dependent on the level of sparring and collaboration with your colleagues.

Not only will you grow by having difficult tasks presented, but indeed with the sparring and idea-sharing from your colleagues.

Your professional competencies are dependent on the people you surround yourself with. You’ve been hired to deliver results within a specific area of business. And on your own, you are very well-equipped to execute and deliver.

But with input from colleagues, you may increase your level of productivity, as their input can potentially optimise processes that were slowing you down.

Did you know…

Two heads are better than one.
That inspiration often comes from juggling ideas with others.
Get-togethers facilitate idea generation.
Follow-up meetings will shape your idea.
The unstructured back-and-forth with colleagues will shape an idea into a strategic direction

Productive collaboration step by step

Productivity is the measuring metric, where collaboration often is the enabling factor. Interacting with your colleagues will create an end goal that is much more nuanced and potentially risk-free as different perspectives and opinions have been raised.

The first step to sustain collaboration is to ensure an open and sharing culture.
Once achieved, it is important that the company ensures space in which collaboration happens.
The most common space known these days are meetings and seating arrangement.
Basically, if you’re seated near colleagues that you need for idea-generation, you often don’t need meetings as you have the possibility of simply discussing while sitting next to each other.
Should there be a need for a more extended discussion, and you need to avoid disturbing colleagues, invite them for a spontaneous meeting in a separate meeting room.

This way, you get the best of both worlds – you avoid being in meetings all day, but should you need a meeting room, you can invite your colleagues in for a quick meeting.

How to sustain productive collaboration in your company

All in all, the facilities within your organisation have a tremendous impact on the level of collaboration. To realise productivity, you need spaces that allow for large discussions while respecting the others around.

Let’s say, like a meeting room?! No, don’t book in advance, be spontaneous. Just go for a quick meeting and shape that idea you’ve had in your head since this morning.

Collaboration is a no-brainer, but without access to the right facilities, it may just stay in your head – with the risk of it never being shaped, nuanced and improved.

So, ask yourself; does your company sustain or hinder collaborative productivity?