Do Business Well

How often do you …

• Dawdle before work, causing frequent lateness?
• Forget things?
• Fidget around losing productive work time?
• Misunderstand instructions?
• Take extended coffee breaks?
• Get major assignments and projects in late?
• Feel at odds with your boss?
• Feel alienated from your workmates?
• Take sick leave when you are feeling ‘just a bit off’?
• Daydream about being elsewhere than at work?

The items above suggest a common picture—the non-productive worker. Of course, we all have bad days and even the occasional disastrous period, but if non-productive events crop up regularly in your day-to-day work, then you should do something about them. If you don’t, your boss might.

Being productive is what most jobs are all about. Productivity means that you are doing what is expected—getting the job done. Aside from fulfilling the expectations of your employer, being productive is also one of the major elements in job satisfaction. By working hard and accomplishing your set goals, you feel more fulfilled at the end of the day.

This will discuss several important aspects of productivity ranging from personal issues such as understanding and satisfying your personal needs in your work life to various ways of boosting your productivity. Having discussed these issues, the will end with a productivity problem clinic focusing upon the problems of job burn out, absenteeism, boredom at work, and problems with your boss.

Understanding your work needs

One of the most common reasons for low productivity is that workers’ needs are not being met on the job. Non^-productive workers will often claim they are frustrated in or alienated by their jobs. Let’s look briefly at several examples.

Paul, a friend who loved the piano, was pushed into studying medicine by his family because there was no future or security in playing the piano. After graduating from medical school, Paul persisted with medicine because he was too old at that stage to go back and pursue a career as a concert pianist. Even though the financial rewards in medicine were encouraging, Paul was not really satisfied in his work. Basically, he just was not interested in working with sick people. His heart was really with music and the piano. He solved his problem by working only part-time as an industrial medicine consultant and devoting the remainder of the working week to music. He was fortunate to have the finance and time to pursue his true love.

Betty, a secretary in a large organisation, disliked the impersonal feeling of being a five-digit number in a multi-national computer company. She far preferred working amongst people who were ‘on the same wavelength’. After three years, she left her secretarial work and started her own business as an interior designer. With this fairly radical change, she found new satisfactions and far more interest in her new work.

Bill, a factory foreman, was becoming increasingly dissatisfied at work. More and more pressure was being placed upon him due to a recent takeover of the company. He found himself in conflict between his work team and the new high pressure management. In order to cope more effectively with the new situation, he asked for special leave to attend an external course on assertiveness training and supervisory skills. One returning to work, he found that his new approach to management instilled vigour and vitality to his work life.

These brief sketches show how personal issues can limit your work productivity. The sketches also point out the necessity to take strong and deliberate action to sort out low productivity problems. If you are not working productively in your job, you may either improve your situation, leave and do something else, or continue in your existing rut.

Before you consider making any major changes, take time to appraise your personal qualities so you have a better understanding of how your needs might be more satisfactorily met either in your present job or in another line of work. You may well benefit from speaking with a professional psychologist about your work needs. Career counselling can be a most helpful experience if your productivity is marginal or lapsing. The counselling process could well involve some psychological testing of your aptitudes and vocational skills. You can get a brief overview of some of the relevant issues from the questions below.

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