During transition and adjustment periods, task management and workflow issues often surface. Meeting deadlines, seeing tasks through to completion, and maintaining a healthy workflow is especially difficult. We’re hearing business owners and executives say “things just keep slipping through the cracks” and “I don’t know why but our managers just can’t seem to get that done.” 

To help management and supervisory teams with task management and workflow issues, our Exodus HR Specialists have compiled four tips to assist in ensuring your business’s workload gets completed efficiently and on time:

1. Implement activity reporting that includes clear and measurable goals.

Activity reports are simple summaries of your team’s activities and performance that can easily be set up in your CRM, whether that be Salesforce or another software. You can designate certain periods for activity reports to span (1 week, 2 weeks, etc.). It’s also important to specify clear expectations and measurable goals for your employees to include in each activity report. When your team members have goal numbers for things like customer calls, demonstrations performed, and more, they can compare their numbers with their quotas and deadlines. This can make it easier for them to succeed.

2. Communicate which tasks to prioritize and why with employees.

Oftentimes, tasks slip through the cracks, and deadlines aren’t met because employees aren’t sure what to prioritize. Especially when they have large workloads, it can be difficult for them to meet all task deadlines. If your employees don’t know why specific tasks are most important and what larger role they play in project completion, they will likely be less motivated to put in the work to complete things on time. By clearly communicating which tasks to prioritize and why they are of greater importance, your employees will know what to direct their limited energy towards.

3. Help managers understand the importance of leading and holding their team accountable.

Managers who successfully lead and hold their teams accountable generate significant output and climb the ranks at most companies. By educating your management on the importance of accountability, you are developing them into better leaders and likely improving your bottom line. When your team is encouraged, motivated, and strive to be accountable, their effort and energy are appropriately directed toward juggling their workload and completing their tasks as instructed. An accountable team also breeds transparency and this can create a culture of trust in the workplace.

4. Create both incentives and consequences for all staff.

Incentives and consequences can drive performance, and they are proven to help motivate your employees to perform their best. A little friendly competition may be great for inspiring your employees to hunker down and organize their tasks to efficiently complete their workloads, and you can do that with meaningful incentives. Take the time to consider what would be meaningful to your team as both incentives and consequences. It’s important to have some non-financial incentives in place, as well. Not everyone is equally motivated by financial gain! You may want to ask your team what motivates them to determine what incentives best fit your company culture.

Here at Exodus HR Group, we are dedicated to helping you focus on business growth and strategies by providing customized human resource solutions for you to support your executives, management, and staff. We know that alleviating distractions and investing in your employees is key for you to sustain success and stay on top of task management. Contact us at (855) 931-3865 to learn more about how we can help you support and maintain a healthy workflow, and enjoy business success.