Skip to main content

Posts

Business Efficiency? Try Effectiveness first.

One of the popular terms we hear is about increasing efficiency for organisations. Many public sector bodies are tasked with 'efficiency gains'. Businesses need to be efficient, but raising effectiveness naturally drives up efficiency. So why don't we start there instead? Firstly, we can be efficient at the wrong things! Looking for efficiency savings typically means that we look to become better at the things that we do. Some tasks (or functions) could be removed meaning that the resources don't even have to be deployed - an instant efficiency gain. More effective means less of the unnecessary. We can redesign how we operate and take out the elements that don't help our cause. There are some things that help our customers and some things that are there for some historical reason. Some things we have to do in order to get our job done, we can look at changing how we work so that these tasks can be removed over time. Effective systems remove delays and e

Less theory and more action

There is so much information available on how to make changes work that it can sometimes be difficult to know where to start. There are internet chat forums stuffed full of people trying to work out where to start. We can get tied up with the perfect application of theory, so perhaps it would be best to give ourselves a cut off point and just get started. Waiting for the perfect plan is never a good option. There will always be another perspective or another viewpoint that will alter your plan. Having a considered plan that will give great results implemented is far better that waiting for the 'perfect' plan. To compound this, there will always be something new appearing to distract you from making changes. There will always be a new technique to confound your plans. Whether the technique is really new, or a repackaging of a previous tool / set of tools is irrelevant, more techniques do not lead to more results. Too much information can also cause confusion. If you

Do less better

We have so many options to choose from when it comes to improving our business. One of the most amazing things to happen however is that nothing gets done. Focus is the key and by doing less better you can get so much more done. There is a Chinese proverb “if you chase two rabbits, both will escape”. When we focus we increase the likelihood that we can get a project or task to completion. We gain momentum and we are able to complete more projects in the same period of time than if we applied a shotgun approach. Efficiency increases when we focus on single improvements, we don’t have to remember where we got to on the project, we are always up to speed and therefore we don’t waste time trying to work out where we need to be. Decision making becomes simple when there is only one focus. We can discriminate easily and our choices always support getting the job done. When we choose only one thing to focus on we improve our chances of getting results. This of course doesn’t mea

Make Use of Parkinson’s Law

If you haven’t come across Parkinson’s Law it is “Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.” You have probably seen this in action in a variety of situations, but not usually in your favour. We can however use this principle to drive up our improvement effectiveness and our overall efficiency. If we split our tasks into two groups we can use this law to great advantage. The first group would be tasks that will advance our cause, system changes or creating new methods of running our businesses. The second group would be day-to-day activities, including project tasks of a more general nature. If work expands to fill the time available then by giving less time to the second group of tasks we find ourselves with a potential efficiency gain, we will be able to get more done in a shorter period of time. We must, however, take care not to give too little time to the second group of tasks as then they simply won't get done. Likewise we can use the first

Is your work interrupted?

Even with our best intentions we may find that we are unable to complete a task in one go. If this is the case then the way that we leave the task can determine how much time is wasted getting up to speed when we are ready to complete the  task. If you get many interruptions in your day to day working then coming up with a way to close down / pause activities can save you a lot of time, especially if you need to delegate the task later. The simplest analogy is that of a book mark. If you spent your time trying to find where you are up to in your book each time you started you would waste time that could be spent reading. If you had a specific intention for reading the book then you could make a note of that on the bookmark, for example, so that you could get straight back into why you reading the book. The same is true in the workplace. Two ideas come to mind. First, make some protected time in your day and only start tasks that you know you will be able to finish. Seco

Keeping the work flowing

Have you ever noticed those small tasks that you just don’t get round to? Have you ever noticed what a big problem these small tasks cause if they haven’t been dealt with for some time? Improving the way that work flows through your department or   team can help with the overall efficiency of the business. Recognising the small tasks and coming up with a routine to make sure that they get done on a regular basis can mean that when you have to focus your energies onto some burning issue you can feel better that the tidal wave of problems that can come from not doing the little things won’t happen. If you find the habit of keeping the small things moving a struggle then why not consider using a ‘complete by date’. If the job hasn’t been done by a certain date then it becomes the number one priority regardless of whatever else is on the ‘urgent list’. Completing the action before the complete by date is the aim of the game. Small tasks are often over-estimated in terms of the

What's the last step?

When we are nearing the end of a project we sometimes finish prematurely. By this I mean that the last step on a project often isn't the last step needed in order to be as effective as possible.  If you were installing some new pieces of equipment the final step might be implementation of a maintenance program. Usually the commissioning of a piece of equipment is seen as the last step, but the ongoing usefulness of the equipment needs to be considered. Leaving people with usable instructions should also be considered. Installing new software programs and then leaving the users to muddle through is not always the best plan. Clear concise instructions might be the final step. Once a change has been made hand holding people through a period of infancy might need to be considered. The handover, exchange of responsibility and ramping up of volumes handled through this recently changed aspect may need to be looked at again. If you're near the end of a project why not