Don’t we all want to be super efficient and productive at the office?
‘19 Ways to Improve Productivity in Your Office’, ‘7 Tips to Increase Productivity at Work’, ‘Boost Your Office Productivity: 10 (Easy) Tips’ – good advice is never in short supply.
A quick Google search will quickly yield a range of tips, from afternoon naps to meditation sessions and placing fresh herbs on your desk.
A cultural approach to productivity
However, despite the frequent citations from studies, these tips aren’t always entirely credible. Many studies have been conducted abroad, in work cultures that are quite different from ours.
In Japan, researchers found that looking at cute ‘kawaii’ images made people more productive (kawaii, or cuteness culture, is a prominent aspect of Japanese culture), and in America, it was found that having daylight in your workspace helps productivity (which apparently isn’t so obvious there).
Two tips that don’t quite seem to fit in a Belgian context.
But 3 universal factors
So, is there anything generally applicable to office productivity? After all, how productive people are is ultimately what makes companies run and grow.
Some time ago, the Center for Evidence-Based Management conducted a study bringing together the results of no less than 35 meta-analyses. In the studies they reviewed, they found 3 factors that seemed most linked to productivity at the office:
· Social cohesion
· Support from leadership
· Information sharing
In other words, the core of our productivity at work lies in our relationships with colleagues and how we share knowledge with them.
