Reducing Business Distractions Starts With You

11 Oct Reducing Business Distractions Starts With You

I was approached, not too long ago by a business owner who had an employee that was spending too much time on her phone, while she was at work. He had tried to put rules in place, but that didn’t seem to work. And, though she was getting her work done, her phone use was starting to become a bit excessive.

He was at a loss. She was a good employee that firing her seemed harsh, but nothing seemed to be working to get her to cut back on her surfing the internet on her phone.

Are you in a similar situation? Do you have employees that are distracted when they should be working?

The fix is simple… and it isn’t firing them (just yet – at least).

If your employees are finding the time, during work hours to do other things outside of work, then you are not giving them enough work.

You should expect, and your employees should have, enough work to fill the work day. If they do not, then naturally they will do other things like shop online, watch cat videos, take longer than normal breaks – you name it.

This is why it is imperative that you have well communicated and firm performance guidelines. Perhaps you expect your employees to contact 20 new customers a week, or complete a research project every week, whatever the required daily or weekly deliverable identify it and hold your employees accountable with fulfilling this.

The next thing, tracking. How will you know who is really performing and who is not, if you are not actively tracking their output? When you have a work requirement in place, monitoring which employees consistently meet the benchmark and which don’t will be easier later, for you to determine which parts of your team cannot hold their weight.

And, lastly, have consequences, both positive and negative. What do employees get to look forward to when they achieve a goal or meet a weekly output requirement? And, what should employees expect when they do not achieve the expectation? Having these in place can further incentivize everyone to stay on track.

I challenge you this week to identify where in your business may there be room to assign more work? Where are your employees most distracted? Hone in on these areas now and fix them before you keep paying money in salaries for work that is not getting done.