Do you know how your employees get their tasks done?

Effective employee management is a delicate balancing act. On one hand, consisting of the right organisational culture, good atmosphere, respect, and trust. On the other hand, consisting of corporate structure, efficient systems, and right skills in place. Both areas are equally important and are enough of a challenge when all employees work from the same place. However, since a lot of businesses have moved permanently to remote or hybrid setup, effective employee management has become more complicated. To do it right, companies need to understand how their employees work in new circumstances.

Management often does not know what their employees are currently working on, or at what level of efficacy. Are any of the employees outperforming or underperforming? What could be the cause of it? How much does the team’s performance need to improve in order to achieve better business outcomes?

Harvard Business Review has recently done a study among 14 teams of 4 Fortune 500 companies. The researchers asked the managers about their teams’ work. On average, either the managers did not know or could not remember up to 60% of the work their teams do.
The study implied that hybrid or remote employee management is very difficult without use of the right technology.
We certainly agree with that.

Without the right solution in place, the management of remote/hybrid employees:
– does not see when the employees work and how long they work.
– does not see the results of work on every day basis.
– does not know what tasks employees are currently working on and what they are going to work on next.
– does not know if the employee needs help or has the availability to help others.

The lack of knowledge and inability to answer the above questions pushes organisations to seek out external solutions that can provide this data.
Employees, however, often perceive this move as a management’s need for surveillance and it raises their concerns about privacy. It can also make employees think that the system will be used to redress them for underperforming. Employees may feel like they will be controlled and judged, rather than the process they take part in or the tasks they complete. This can result in dropping morale, decreasing productivity, problems with meeting deadlines, and shifting responsibility to colleagues.

That’s why it is very important that companies wishing to monitor their employee’s productivity, provide detailed reasoning and explain the implications for employees. Clear communication on this matter is very important to maintain a good relationship between employees and the management.

Monitoring systems can also come with many other functions that can make employees’ work easier. OPX for example provides a scheduling module and automated task allocation based on every employee’s skillset. As a result, the task queue remains under control and employees do not get stuck, as they are assigned tasks that they are able to complete. Simultaneously, the management has a clear overview of resources available and upcoming tasks. That allows them to identify the need for increased resources and training during busy times much in advance. As a result, the business runs smoothly, and employees are not distressed or overwhelmed with work.
If the management uses the monitoring tool to understand better how the employees work, set realistic targets, offer leadership, training opportunities and constructive feedback, then the system implementation is most likely to result in:
– Improvement of timekeeping
– Increased work quality
– Productivity boost
– Growth of engagement

Our previous implementations prove that the future of any work environment depends on identifying the right tools and techniques for managers.
OPX provides a set of such tools and helps to manage employees more effectively. If you would like to learn more about OPX – see this page.