Although we spend approximately 60% of our communication time listening, we only retain 35% of what we hear. Actually, two months after a conversation, we only remember around 25% of what was said. That’s no surprise considering our average eight-second attention span, which makes listening concentration so hard to achieve.
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Productivity and being productive. It’s a modern issue. Ideas come and go. They’re a dime a dozen. Having the idea is only 1 percent of the issue. Putting the work in, that’s an entirely different matter. Getting your team to be maximally productive, even more so. It’s tougher than ever to get everything done
Musk: Space X, Tesla Inc, SolarCity, and the list goes on. Just look up Neuralink, you’ll use it to download your mind, two decades from now. All eyes are on Elon Musk. After all, he figured out a cost-effective way to manufacture his own rockets. Alongside individual accomplishments come team achievements that might seem even more incredible.
Former employees and collaborators tell stories that paint a very vivid picture of life under the leadership of Elon Musk. Add to this the Hyperloop, Neuralink, and making plans for several decades at once. There clearly must be something about team management that Elon Musk does well. How else would you have the guts to sport a “Before and After” poster on your wall?
By Daein Ballard [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons
Staying focused is tough. Studies show that even experienced meditators find it hard to maintain focus. And many of them meditate thinking of nothing. Imagine how tough it is to focus at work. Jokes aside, focus is a serious issue that equates into billions in lost productivity every year. And this is simple to understand.
Executive communications are leadership informational exchange. It’s what happens when key people from the executive team have something to say. A key person may be the CEO, or any departmental head or a representative. Which means that executive communications are very important.
After all, when an executive team member has something to say, people pay attention. And departmental teams also pay a lot of attention. Also, whoever does not pay attention, stands to lose. From employees to investment bankers, everyone has an eye on executive communications.
Remote work may have been on the rise for the past years, but most people still prefer to do their job in the office. At least that’s what a recent report released by BambooHR says. More precisely, “in 2016, 79% of employees felt they accomplished their best work at the office, yet only 27% favored it.”
Meanwhile, we are witnessing a (r)evolution of the workspace. To fuel idea generation inside the office, an ever growing number of businesses that rely on the intellectual output of their employees are focusing on reshaping the concept. And they seem to have found a means in workplace architecture.
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Meetings are about to die. Particularly since collaborative work has become the staple of modern office life, they are about to die. And after they die, they will move somewhere better, virtual. Somewhere in the cloud, or in a special bundle of apps. But don’t get your hopes up high yet.
After all, there have been attempts to put new life into meetings. Some preach against inherent inefficacies. “Make meetings purposeful”, they say. Others are deluding themselves that theater methods will do. So “treat your meetings like an improv session”, they say. Seems like everyone thinks that “The Office” is a documentary. That we should all turn Michael Scott and do some improv.
Team collaboration is what makes a team. Without it, you don’t have a team. Instead, you have a bunch of people working at the same time. However, true teams do more. They use collaboration to synergize.
Be that as it may, collaboration is not an intrinsic human need or priority. In fact, we learn to collaborate. And it’s a difficult process. This process has helped us achieve a lot. Most modern achievements are the result of collaboration.
Sure, you can cultivate greatness without collaboration. While writing poetry as a team might be fun, this is a one-person job. Also, a lot of other activities are not team activities. And that’s fine.
Team collaboration can be a metric on which you benchmark productivity. Yet, we should not confuse regular productivity with synergized productivity. In synergized productivity, the overall result is greater than the sum of inputs. Work has a final result of a value superior to the elements of work. For example, a Tesla S is greater than the sum of its parts. Yet, people could be very productive producing the parts. In this case, there is no added value, no synergy.
Onboarding done right. Surprise, it’s a challenge! In fact, a quick peek at employer review websites can tell you a lot about the value of onboarding. Dating is similar. First impressions matter. But that’s the interview. The love affair starts with onboarding.
Onboarding done right leaks when measuring quality of hire. If you’re not HR, quality of hire is a trendy metric to track. While tough to calculate, it does provide valuable insight. It is also a gateway into building a system of metrics on which to plan improvement goals. Quality of hire factors in various items. Indicators such as job performance, ramp-up time, enthusiasm, cultural fit and more. Fear not, we won’t attempt to do a math model of quality of hire.
Goals, productivity, and teams. What could be the secret ingredient that binds these three? We admire those that inspire. And nothing inspires us more than the pursuit of greatness. Tenacity. Resilience. The ability to keep going, no matter what. And it is people like these that we want to lead us. It’s no surprise that we tend to follow those who persevere.
