Saturday 29 November 2014

Just occasionally ...

This blog is concerned with regional, national and organisational productivity. Rarely do we 'stray into' personal productivity - largely because I think it is more or less irrelevant in terms of raising those other productivities - they are based on the effectiveness and productivity of processes and systems - not individual people,.

However, I read recently that an air passenger - on a  plane with a new WiFi service - had been landed a hefty bill (over $1500) for what he thought was fairly modest usage.  It set me thinking about 'strategies' to use that travel time to good effect.

Of course there are the 'air warriors' who reach for their laptop 5 minutes after takeoff and clatter away for the rest of the flight.

Not me!  I use the time for .... thinking, .... even daydreaming.  I find such quality, free time very rare - but it is a precious resource and shouldn't be wasted on menial e-tasks such as email, spreadsheeting or the like.

So think before you take your laptop out - then put it away and continue thinking.  It will pay dividends.

If this still sounds too much like 'work', try ... resting.  That also pays dividends.

Saturday 22 November 2014

Give Me Some Distractions

I recently had a day off - by 'off' I mean no fixed appointments.

I decided to work from home - but I found I got little done.

I found the peace and quiet, the lack of telephone noise, the absence of colleague chatter quite disconcerting.

Is it because I need those things to remind me I am 'at work'?  Or do they, in some more meaningful way, change the 'atmosphere'.

Is it like teenagers who prefer to 'study' to the sound of loud music.  Do such obvious 'distractions' blot out real distractions and help us focus?

Saturday 15 November 2014

What do we mean by ...

I was in Italy recently ... and I used public transport quite a bit - trains and buses.  All the journeys I made were on time, and to schedule.

Of course, public transport is subsidised in most European countries - by governments as part of the national infrastructure.   This set me thinking about the nature of 'productivity' at this national, overarching level.

For example, the national railway could be 'inefficient' but could contribute to productivity in other sectors (by moving goods and people efficiently to/from factories and workplaces).

Similarly, at organisational level, we must not take decisions that are sub-optimal - that look to be 'right' in a smaller context, but might be 'wrong' when looking at a 'bigger picture'.

Saturday 8 November 2014

Do things differently

At the end of your next day at work ask yourself ... "If we carry on working like this on these tasks, how will we be different - and better - in 5 years time?"

If you cannot answer that, you need to do some things differently - or some additional things. Otherwise nothing is driving change.

Organisations that stay the same get overtaken.  The best organisations have a continual programme of review, change and improvement - making incremental (and occasionally large) improvements to processes, systems and tasks - and to the skills of their people.

Saturday 1 November 2014

Productivity or Quality?

I have been in discussions many times with businessmen and advisers about whether firms should concentrate on their productivity or their quality - which has the biggest impact on success?

Of course the quick answer is "Both" - they are not mutually exclusive!

But I remember listening to my colleague Tor Dahl who used to suggest that productivity initiatives release energy and innovation (they unfreeze the organisation); quality initiatives standardise systems and processes to 'lock in' quality (and they freeze the organisation).  Another way of putting it is that quality initiatives help cement the gains realised by a productivity initiative.

So, we do need them both - but not necessarily at the same time.  There seems to be a natural sequence of productivity-quality-productivity-quality.