How do I know they are working?

How do I know they are working?  This is such a loaded question.  My initial response is how did you know they are working when they were in the office?  Just because you can see them doesn’t mean they performing at an optimal level.  

In an office environment, we experienced staff members who would spend time on Facebook, surfing the web or even online gambling.  This was a quick lesson in establishing controls over activity and ensuring we had a clearly communicated policy on acceptable technology use (a must have for any company).

The bigger lesson here was developing an effective process to communication and manage productivity.  This is important regardless of the work environment though it can be more critical in a remote setting.

Does the person know what is expected of them?  Do you even know what the optimum level of productivity is for that position?  Do you have a method to track that productivity? This comes down to understanding what outcomes are expected for the position and how it is tracked.

When I embarked on this journey, there was a lot of analysis around what it takes to service our clients and how each role contributes to that service.  The first step was understanding our clients’ needs and defining the service package for each level of client service.  We looked at client profitability, service expectations and pricing to create client segments that helped move us toward defining the actual servicing needs.  

From there, we looked at our organization chart to determined which role worked with each segment and the deliverable for that segment. Then, we broke down the specific functions each role contributed to that deliverable.

Once we had this framework laid out, we analyzed the average time to produce that work.  This gave us the beginning framework for the volume that role could produce based on the expected client work hours.  These work hours aren’t as simple as 40 hours per week.  It was based on the average number of hours an employee is to spend on client work.  This is determined by deducting PTO, meeting time, training and development time, etc. from the full-time annual base hours of 2080. This number can be adjusted based on how your organization approaches the work day and expectation of work hours.

Now, we knew what it took to service each client and how many clients each role could support in a given time period.  This was the basis for our productivity measurement.  We also analyzed our job descriptions and created 3-4 experience levels for each position.  The productivity expectation was further weighted by the level of experience in the role (i.e., more junior staff did not have the same level of expectation as the more senior staff).

This gave us the basis for assigning work, managing outcomes and determining capacity and hiring needs along with another piece of the puzzle in our strategy discussion.  We leverage this information to develop cross training opportunities and career path outlines to help staff grow in their roles.

Over time, we were able to move away from managing hours to focusing on outcomes. Staff no longer had to track their time (it was a professional services environment) as there work was defined through their client assignments.

So, how do I know they are working?  I know because there is a system that supports successful outcomes and everyone has a clear understanding of expectations for their role.