What is work efficiency?

Time: Five o'clock in the afternoon. Location: Office.

Because it's fast enough, you've finished your day's work and want to go home. However, your colleagues have not gone, so you have to stay in the office for one or two hours, on the internet, or reread the mail or something. So ... Nobody's going to be a slacker.

This is a typical unfortunate fact: in today's major companies, pay attention to efficiency has not been the promotion and encouragement. I always had this experience when I was working at a law firm in Washington. Because I have some previous experience, so usually can quickly answer a customer's question, this can actually save us both time. But, like many law firms, our firm also pays by the hour, so my efficiency makes me suffer.

From the law firm's point of view, hourly pay is reasonable: because once my work has taken longer than expected, they can also transfer this risk to their customers. But, from a customer's point of view, this is not good for them. Because it would encourage lawyers to put too much effort into a case and investigate over it. For myself, it's not fair to pay by the hour. Because I'm always quick to answer questions, so I don't have to pay a lot of time, which means I'm taking the risk of not earning enough.

However, companies that value working hours more than the results of their work actually do a lot. In a 2010 survey, the researchers interviewed 39 company managers and asked about their views on the company's employees. As a result, the managers believed that those who stayed in the office during working hours were "highly reliable" and "very dependable", while those who came to work overtime on weekends or stayed late in the office on weekdays were considered "dedicated to the job".

One of the managers said, "There is an employee who will attend every meeting." He was punctual, though many times he was silent, and everyone would notice. This person is definitely considered to be a hard-working and trustworthy employee. Another manager said: "Working overtime on weekends can make a good impression." Because you are conveying the message that you are contributing to the team and are paying extra effort to do it. ”

In fact, the managers ' reactions are understandable, as the experience of the industrial age has been judged by the time when workers ' work in the assembly line was completely standardized (in which case time represented Labour). However, for knowledge workers, a system based on work hours can be said to have no meaning. Because they make a contribution through their value, that is, they use their ideas and experience to create how much value, this assessment.

Many organizations have taken the industrial-era mindset to the workplace in the 21st century, and they are doing just that to discourage employees from improving their efficiency. If employees need to stay late after work to please their boss, how can they possibly have the power to finish what they should do during the normal working hours during the day? After all, how can they spend the time they have to "show up", whether they are analyzing customer data or just surfing the internet. In this case, it is not surprising that many professionals suffer from procrastination, but it is difficult to concentrate on one task.

The solution is also obvious: evaluate yourself by the results you create, rather than calculate your working hours there. Think about whether you've got to deal with squeezed customer orders, have you come up with a new idea to solve a tricky problem, and have written a first draft for a deadline next week. Obviously, these achievements, not the time you wander off, will ultimately determine the success of the Organization as a whole.

The development of this result-oriented strategy should be handled in detail based on your work and the specific circumstances of the company. There are, however, a number of ways in which the industry can be more efficient:

Limit meetings. Internal meetings can be a waste of time. A short meeting might help to discuss a controversial issue, but long meetings-I mean those that have more than 60-90 minutes-are usually low in output. In meetings, bosses of many companies spend a lot of time reciting introductory information, and the participants end up losing their focus.

If you have a hunch that a meeting will be long and the output is low, you must try to avoid such a meeting. If possible, you can point out to your colleagues the deadline of work to push off the meeting. If you can't do that, say it to them, you can only listen to the first 60 minutes, and then you have to go ahead and do something more urgent. Also, you have to be careful when organizing meetings, because most of the problems you can get through email or a quick call.

If you are involved in the planning and organization of a conference, remember to make sure that the meeting will produce enough. Make an organized meeting agenda and make sure that each process is not dilatory. Then, at least one day in advance, the agenda of the meeting and any relevant information are sent to others. In addition, at every meeting you must designate a "devil's Advocate" to designate such a person to ensure that the potential downside of a topic has been discussed.

At the end of each meeting, you will also make sure that everyone has no objections to the next strategy, and that each responsibility has been assigned to a participant and contains specific deadlines.

You don't have to read anything. You don't have to read all the materials that come across your job, even if it comes from your boss. While reading a page may make you more productive, you may actually be able to make better use of your time. It is quite possible that only a very small portion of the information is important to your work. So what you need to remember is that big, main meaning, not all the details. Or maybe you just need to find one or two examples of a larger point of view. Every time you start reading the text, remember to actively search for the important information, and the less relevant parts to skip.

Of course, some information does require you to master all the details. If you are reading an article about the company's latest blockbuster product, it is appropriate to read it from cover to cover. However, you don't need to be so meticulous about tasks that aren't very important.

Then, you should also avoid reading emails repeatedly. I have a very strong belief in one principle: a clean treatment at a time. When you read an e-mail, you decide whether or not to reply to it. If you need a reply, then you have to answer it. I found that 80% of the emails, both internal and external, did not need to be answered.

Write faster. Even if you want to make a project A +, you don't have to be perfect in the first place. A lot of people in writing articles, all have to write the preceding sentence flawless, will continue to write the following sentence. They want to complete a writing process at once. This is actually the hardest job. According to my own experience, this writing is very inefficient.

A better way is to think about a few major steps first. First prepare an outline for what you want to express and think about the order of the parts. Then write a draft, and you should be clear that the draft cannot be without flaws. After these processes, you can repeat the draft and revise the changes. This is the time when you should really perfect your sentences.

Generally speaking, if a job is a B +, you do not need to do a +. You can put extra time on projects that really need to be a +.

When you try the above and other kinds of results-oriented methods, you find that you spend less time in the office-which may make some bosses uneasy. After all, the traditional methods of assessing employee's value to the company in terms of their "face" time are simpler for managers, since simple calculations are much less time-consuming than real evaluation results. But that's why you need to build a new relationship with your boss.

You have to convince your boss that you can get the job done in less time. One way to do this is to think about your organization and learn to watch your boss. Ask yourself: What is the most important goal of your unit? What kind of pressure does your boss face--global expansion, introduction of new products, cost reduction, and other pressures? What effect does the boss's personality and management style have on such problems?

But just thinking and observing is not enough, you must also learn to communicate, and need to communicate frequently. Every week, you need to write a list of tasks assigned to you, whether it's a short-term task or a long-term task, and order them from your point of view, in terms of importance. Then you need to show the list to your boss and let him weigh the list.

Next, you should agree with your boss on each project target you are involved in. If your boss doesn't give you any indication, you need to hint at it yourself. These indicators can include both quantitative and qualitative results. They provide an objective measure of how the final results are measured--and let your boss no longer rely solely on "show time" to judge your job performance. In addition, the whole process of establishing the entire index can also let you and the boss see clearly, how to do the best to complete a project.

Once your boss is convinced that you know what to do and how to do it, you need to prove to him that you can always bring satisfying results for those high-priority projects. There is no specific secret: do your best to achieve the goal you set. Also remember that most of the projects in the implementation process will encounter potholes and even roadblocks, so you have to timely feedback to the boss questions and provide some possible solutions, even ... Revise the project indicators themselves.

I know that from focusing on working hours to focusing on results is a big challenge for some organizations. However, if you can politely ask your boss about efficiency and tell him that you are willing to take responsibility for the results of your work, rather than working hours, your boss is likely to accept that. In addition, this means that you may be able to do more work at home if that is what you want.

However, even if you are in a results-oriented team culture, sometimes you have to work in an office, and some jobs do require employees to be in the company. In almost every workplace, co-workers need to get together and brainstorm ideas, solve problems, or build team ties. However, there is absolutely no reason for such interaction to occupy a large part of your time.

In my own case, by emphasizing results rather than working hours, I can almost get home at 7 o'clock in the evening-except for some emergencies. This has greatly improved the quality of my family life and has given me another benefit: a fruitful rest. When I was at home 10 o'clock at night, I solved some of the toughest problems in my job-when I chatted with my wife and children for hours and again.

It can be said that focusing on results rather than working hours allows you to do more at work while leaving more time for other things. Talk to your boss about these questions, don't be afraid. Quoting Peter Drucker, a management guru, though you don't necessarily like your boss, you have to be able to keep him/her in order so that you can have a successful career.

Robert C. Pozen, the author of this article, is a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School, a veteran researcher at the Brookings Institution, who has "extreme productivity: Improving your results, reducing your time"