Time is arguably your most valuable resource in business. As long as you have enough time, you can be sure that you are going to be doing things as you should. You can always gain more money and whatever other resource you might care to name, but once you have used up time it won’t reappear. That’s why it’s quite so important to make sure that you are using it in the right way. When it comes to your business, that means you need to encourage your employees to save time wherever possible.

Let’s take a look at how you might achieve that.

Get Them To Care

First up, you need to make sure that your employees actually really care about the business, and that they are keen to work hard to deliver for the company in whatever way might be necessary. If your employees do not care about the business, it is less likely that they are going to use their time wisely or considerately.

So how do you make sure that your employees care about the company and its goals?

One way is to ensure that you are hiring people who are likely to be passionate about whatever it is that your business does.

Those people are going to be more tuned in with the business’ goals, and that will really help things along. You can also do a range of other things to make this easier, such as making sure each individual knows their place in the whole and understands why where they are is so important. That and paying them well, and generally taking care of them well, is bound to really help.

The more they care, the more sensibly and effectively they use their time at work.

Set Measurable Goals

It’s always wise to make it clear what you expect from your employees. There are actually a number of advantages to doing this, and a major one is that having goals in place means that they are going to be working towards a specific thing. Those goals should be measurable, so that your employees know whether they are falling in line with them or not.

You will find that this simple change encourages people to work harder, and particularly to keep themselves utilising time as well as possible, so that they can ensure they are going to reach those goals you have set.

Encouraging them to set their own goals for the day, week or month could also be a powerful way to instil this. However you do it, having goals has often shown to be effective, and this is yet another example of how that is the case.

Outsource Time-Draining Tasks

There are some tasks that you have to do in the office which just take up much more time than they are worth. It is quite possible that you could benefit from outsourcing a number of these, in the hope that there is going to be much more of an opportunity to use time well in the office while still getting everything done.

You might already have a list in your mind of what kinds of tasks you might wish to outsource, and there are always going to be some prime examples here.

You can outsource powerpoint presentations, filing, marketing, social media management – you name it. Doing so could create more time for everyone, and help your employees to use their time in a much more useful way.

The Trouble With Remote Working

At the moment, a lot of people are working remotely. It looks as though this is not far off becoming the new norm, so it’s a good idea to make sure that you are aware of how to manage it. But when it comes to time management, remote working can pose a problem.

After all, how are you supposed to know whether your remote workers are actually making use of their time – or if they are slacking off?

There are many things you can do to help this along. You can set tasks that have specific, time-bound deadlines, to ensure that your employees have to use their time in a sensible and prudent manner.

• You can make it possible to view the team’s activity, whether by direct surveillance or just by asking people to report in frequently.
• You can track your employees’ internet usage – although you would need to be careful how you implement this if they are using their own devices, so as not to interfere with their privacy.
• Or you could simply supervise your employees remotely, and there are a lot of interesting solutions for doing this now. A certain modicum of trust is always going to be needed here, but as long as you have that, you should be able to keep an eye on your remote workers well enough to ensure they are not wasting time.

Various Kinds Of Monitoring

As you might imagine, it is important to have at least some kind of monitoring in place to ensure that you know what your employees are up to. If you do that, you should be able to make sure that they are not wasting time and that you are getting the most out of their work.

There are many kinds of monitoring, but one of the most common is to monitor their computer usage. Just knowing it is monitored will ensure that they work harder and smarter. You could also look into monitoring their phone usage and email account too, as these are reliable indicators of how busy they are.

However you do it, a little monitoring can be an effective way to keep your employees working hard.

With these in place, you should be able to ensure that your employees are all saving plenty of time at work, and in doing so you might be able to see a better future for your business, one in which you are much more likely to achieve what you want to achieve.

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