Analytics to measure Productivity

PS

On the galley slaves topic, in an engineering design environment, I well recall lighthearted discussions with workplace union reps when they’d start accusing me of being harsh or callous or dictatorial towards their colleagues, when I’d say something like ‘just wait until after Christmas when the Management are going to buy me a bigger and better whip to use on you all......’

But of course we all knew that everything was in reality far far more complicated than that fantasy...........

I agree David - but as we bill clients per hour, we do have to be able to justify what those hours were used for, so its hard for people to "hide" their idle time with in a project without getting called up on it! Having said that, we do get a fair amount of time booked to "internal meetings" :-)

As you've said, its about being on the floor and talking to people, as well as managers reviewing the actual outputs - reports can only tell us so much!

Sure it varies massively on a spectrum, Polly, depending on how easy or difficult or feasible or whatever it is to audit bookings of time to jobs.

Hi Natasha

epmetrics.com which helped my organization to enhance productivity. maybe it will help you to increase your productivity stats

We are a consultancy company and billable work is the measure of productivity/utilisation. There is split for billable and non billable work as you've expressed here.

However, I'm not equipped with the tools to measure engagement and this is the focus of my role for the upcoming year. Currently, our HRM has been equating engagement with productivity. We need to separate productivity and engagement and create a better strategy for enhancing engagement levels. Many of you have expressed my thoughts on this more articulately than I did in our last meeting. Any ideas on this are very welcome.

Hi Natasha

I'd start by asking the question of what they [your manager/senior manager] are hoping to achieve? Is there a problem they're trying to solve (i.e. staff are not productive enough? High turnover?) or are they just trying to establish a measurement of where you are now, so that you can measure progress?

You may already have some data from exit interviews which you could examine?

You could as others have suggested use a survey or external provider for an assessment. Or run a focus group/employee forum with representatives or a specific group if there is a particular group where problems have been identified. It depends on your available budget and the culture of the organisation.

There are lots of ways forward but unless you know what you're trying to measure or achieve, it could be a fairly meaningless exercise!

Lots of organisations out there can help you build an engagement survey......

Hi Natasha
It sounds to me that this is learning more towards an employee value proposition which should include metrics on understanding how engaged your employees are feeling. This is usually done in a number of ways including engagement surveys, monitoring changes in employee behaviours including sickness/leavers etc. Happy to chat if helpful.

Thanks Benjamin, We decided to carry out he Great Place to Work survey again from which I have previously developed the EVP. I also wondered whether I should look at any other factors or metrics which could contribute to high levels of absenteeism in a particular division of the business.

We're using great place to work again for the engagement piece. What I think I'm hearing from everyone is that productivity and engagement are separate pieces and should be measured differently.