Yesterday, I talked about a core value of my company—accountability. Today, I'm sharing one more— continuous improvement. The establishment of an ongoing, organization-wide productivity improvement program requires the right company culture, a continuous improvement mindset, innovative thinkers and the active support of senior management— but this is not enough. To be successful, it must also have a defined set of processes, the ability to measure and communicate your results and a clear understanding of how each productivity enhancement provides value to the organization.

Today and tomorrow, Promotional Consultant Today discusses the processes your organization can establish to drive improvement. Known as the Productivity Pyramid, this approach can help you create a company environment where more is done in less time.

Goal Alignment: The alignment of individual, project, department and corporate goals is a mainstay of the strategic planning process. This is also true for your productivity goals. As a result, as you define your productivity-related activities, you must also prioritize them based on the answers to these two questions:

  1. Does this productivity project free up corporate resources that can be redeployed to achieve current corporate objectives?

  2. Will the productivity project, by its nature, assist in the potential success, efficiency or cost effectiveness of any currently funded corporate projects?

If one or more answers to the above questions are "yes," then your proposed productivity project is a candidate for funding. Therefore, like all potentially funded projects, it should be prioritized based on its short-term and long-term return on investment (ROI).

Holistic Mindset: Organizational productivity must be looked at holistically. All too often, individuals and organizations attempt to enhance their productivity through the improvement of one or two key business activities. It could be improved delegation practices, time management training and the implementation of email-oriented best practices or other key internal processes. Improvements in each of these areas individually have the potential to provide substantial productivity gains.

By their nature, however, productivity improvements in one area can cause productivity losses in other areas. For example, an effort to reduce meetings may have the adverse effect of increasing emails. Reducing the number of people copied on emails may cause process inefficiencies. Improved time management prioritization techniques may help facilitate individual productivity improvements, but if team member priorities are not properly synchronized, project deadlines can be missed—and as a result—organizational infighting can counteract all previous productivity gains.

Supportive Culture: As people have personalities, organizations have cultures. Some people are open to change and some are not. Some organizations embrace change as a catalyst for future growth and profitability and some do not. Increasing productivity requires change. If your organization views the ability to change as an important business attribute, then ongoing productivity improvement can be the status quo. If your company is set in its ways, refuses to streamline its processes and shuns innovation, then your productivity initiatives are unlikely to gain traction.

Want to know more about the Productivity Pyramid? Read PCT again tomorrow.

Eric P. Bloom is the president and founder of Manager Mechanics LLC, a nationally recognized speaker and author of the forthcoming book Productivity Driven Success: Hidden Secrets of Organizational Efficiency. He is also a nationally syndicated columnist, certified executive coach, and an adjunct research advisor for IDC. He is also a past president of National Speakers Association New England.