9 Tips to Improve Productivity, and How PMO View Can Help

June 30, 2016

9 Tips to Improve Productivity, and How PMO View Can Help

By: Sean Buckley

It’s tough to meet the challenges of an increasingly competitive economy without the proper insight and direction. By combining the principles outlined below with the increased visibility of PMO View Analytics, your organization stands to dramatically improve productivity and profitability!

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1. Begin Now

Good news! You’re already well on your way to learning this first principle. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step and a willingness to press forward precedes any substantive progress. Over 20% of people self-identify as chronic procrastinators according to Dr. Joseph Ferrari, associate professor of psychology at De Paul University. He warns that procrastinators tell lies to themselves like “I’ll feel more like doing this tomorrow,” or “I work best under pressure.” However, the reality is that procrastination is proven to compromise immune systems, increase stomach problems and insomnia, and invariably shifts blame to other people, destroying workplace camaraderie and private relationships.

Start looking for ways to improve your organization today with custom scorecards, status reports, and financial forecasts in PMO View. We guarantee you’ll find room to improve and a renewed sense of capability with actionable information so readily available. (Ready to get started now? Start your FREE trial of PMO View today!)

2. Encourage Sharing

Good communication is the crux of all teamwork. When management fails to clearly delineate personal responsibilities it breeds unnecessary competition and double-work. Those issues are only exacerbated when team members cannot effectively communicate between themselves.

Simple PMO View export options let you keep your partners and employees apprised of project health with the click of a button, helping to align objectives and increase efficiency. You’re no longer bound by seat-based licensing and access to the same proprietary software. PMO View updates can be sent to anyone in your professional network.

3. Set Ambitious, Yet Realistic Goals

We all want to accomplish as much as possible, but discerning the subtle difference between being pragmatic and overly ambitious can be a difficult task without the proper measurement tools in place. Les Brown, a motivational speaker and radio DJ, once said “Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.” So what moon are we shooting for? And when do we want to reach that moon?

Start by establishing ambitious goals with sequential deadlines. Record and measure the results, soliciting feedback along the way. Whether you’re balancing your checkbook or preparing a quarterly report, the same process will help you improve productivity in your schedule.

Fortunately PMO View has the same functionality built into it’s project roadmaps, allowing you to easily forecast project success. Access key indicators like project deadlines, percentage complete, overall health, and status reports all from the same simple interface. Now that we’re keeping your whole team accountable to one another, the only thing left to do is decide what moon you’re shooting for!

4. Put a Premium on Innovation

Bill Campbell, a top executive coach for such luminaries as Steve Jobs, Eric Schmidt, and Jeff Bezos was notorious for always wanting to increase R&D budgets. He personally pioneered a policy allocating 4 hours of unstructured time a week for Intuit Engineers. This renewed focus on innovation won new products for Intuit, and can similarly help you combat competition and market volatility.

Free up resources to elaborate high-level strategy and invest in the future of your business with PMO View. Our centralized platform will improve enterprise reporting and insights, enabling far-thinking initiatives not possible otherwise.

5. Be Proactive, Not Reactive

Don’t let your competitors decide where the industry is headed. Find prescriptive solutions and get out ahead of any long term problems with improved visibility into project health and resource utilization. You wouldn’t allow phone calls and emails to dictate how you spend your day, so don’t allow passing fads and temporary distractions to obstruct your ultimate business goals.

With custom scorecards that highlight company successes on a quarterly basis, you can see the long-term progress you’re making and pursue corrective action. Empower your team with information on key deliverables and valuable data on the successes and failures of existing projects.

6. Team Work

The collective experiences of your coworkers can create a flashpoint of creative energy and enthusiasm. Embrace diverse opinions and viewpoints to create robust products with wide marketability, and improve trust and company culture at the same time. With open communication you can resolve conflicts and promote a wider sense of project ownership. The free exchange of information in PMO View can increase team ownership by providing a centralized platform for updates and collaboration. When coworkers see the progress their team is making they’ll naturally endeavor to match that pace, fostering a spirit of mutual success.

7. Learn to Say No

We all have the same 7 days each week to accomplish our goals, so how can we account for the wide disparity in personal achievement? Often its the allocation of your time that makes all the difference, and when bombarded with tasks and opportunities, you have to be particularly perceptive. A fierce dedication to your priorities sometimes means saying “no.” Remember, when declining new commitments you’re simply electing to honor existing obligations, ensuring your full focus and creative energy on what matters most to you.

Ensure that your employees focus on what matters most to the company with careful and considerate resource management available in PMO View. Identify bottlenecks in production and reallocate your team to the areas that need the most help. Dynamic analytics on capacity, utilization, and demand help you know when to embrace new projects, and when to just say “no” to legacy time-wasters.

8. Don’t Let Email Take Over Your Day

Checking your email seems so harmless, even efficient, in the small bursts of your daily routine. However, too much of a good thing can quickly become a problem. Bob Pozen, former vice chairman of Fidelity Investments and a senior lecturer at MIT teaches executives to use the acronym OHIO, or “Only Handle It Once. If it’s important, respond to it right then and there.” Delaying correspondence or otherwise procrastinating work only makes the process less efficient as you switch from unrelated tasks and search for pertinent information multiple times. Pozen also advocates staying away from your inbox entirely if you can, “Do not look at your email every two minutes or five minutes. Try to retrain yourself to look at your email every hour or two.” Lastly, say goodbye to reply all. “Organizations should train people not to copy a bunch of people on an email. Really confine the email to the people who need to know. Reply All just leads to huge amount of email.”

With PMO View, you can stay informed of your team’s progress without daily perfunctory messages. See project updates online from a centralized platform that everyone can refer to and keep personal exchanges to a minimum while you improve productivity.

9. Give Yourself Something Nice to Look At

It may sound unlikely, but some research shows outfitting an office with aesthetically pleasing elements–like plants–can increase productivity by up to 15 percent. A beautiful office feels all the more inviting, fostering an emotional connection with industrious employees and visiting clients. That positive flow of energy will help boost employee retention and make those who stick around more appreciative of their jobs.

We all know how important aesthetics can be in our software. The drab, uninspiring confines of an excel spreadsheet do little to inspire those that see it. It’s only when beautiful charts and graphs are added that the data truly comes to life. The advanced, finely crafted data visualizations within PMO View similarly inform and inspire those that see them with simple to understand color coding and project analysis.

So go ahead and give yourself something nice to look at. Get the best view with PMO View from ResultsPositive. More details are available at pmoview.com.