There’s never a wrong time to try and better yourself as an employee and improve efficiency at work. Enhancing your efficiency, both in terms of your own routine and the way you use the available resources, is sure to win you some brownie points with your boss and will help you feel more organised each day. With that being said, here are 4 ways to improve efficiency at work.
#1: Determine Your Priorities
Consider how you start work each morning. Do you put together a list of priorities so that you can tackle the most important tasks first or does your day have limited structure? Do you break up large, challenging tasks into more manageable chunks or just battle through? Think about some of the ways in which you can change the way you operate to make things less stressful for yourself as the day goes on.
#2: Take Regular Breaks
Be sure to take regular breaks from your desk to stretch your muscles and give your eyes a rest. If you don’t get up and walk around at frequent intervals throughout the day, you may start to suffer with eye strain, headaches and even some more serious conditions like repetitive strain injury. Time out can also help to reduce stress and anxiety throughout the day. Regular breaks will furthermore give you a chance to catch-up with some of your colleagues so that they don’t distract you whilst you are trying to focus.
#3: Use Resources Efficiently
As mentioned above, efficiency isn’t just about your performance, it’s also about how you use the resources available to you. For example, it is common sense to use available resources such as drum trucks and trolleys to move heavy drums safely and efficiently in a factory setting. However, in an office, it is not efficient or cost-effective to print copious amounts of letters to co-workers, using up unnecessary ink and paper, when a simple email to all would suffice.
People tend to be more wasteful at work as they are not they ones paying the bills. However, wasting your employer’s money will have a knock on effect on the company as a whole, as there will be less in the pot for things like bonuses, pay rises, and other benefits.
#4: Switch Off Overnight
Do you shut down your computer properly at the end of each day or leave it in stand-by mode overnight? The latter is a waste of electricity, which is not only bad for the environment, but will boost the bills unnecessarily. You should also think about how you use the company’s printer. Could you perhaps send digital copies of documents via email rather than printing them off? If the answer is no, then perhaps you could reduce the font size so it requires less paper and ink, or print double sided.
As you can see, there are lots of ways to improve efficiency at work. Be sure to talk to you employer about your plan as they may be able to encourage the rest of the staff to get on board as well. As a result, company profits will likely rise, as your employer will be getting more for their money, with less effort required on your part.
One Response
Yes I do prioritise. I work from home and also am a hands on Nanna, so have to be organised. Regualr breaks? Needed, must organise this. Switch off overnight – a work in progress