Insights

​We’re just measuring the wrong things

Productivity figures only tell part of the story. Set your business up to achieve extraordinary things by focusing on culture and flexibility - and hiring the right people.

We’ve been hearing a lot lately about Australia’s productivity problem. The Productivity Commission’s annual productivity bulletin 2024 shows a 3.7% decline in labour productivity over 2022-2023 while other reports suggest we’re losing ground to the US.

It certainly sounds alarming, but I don’t believe we have a productivity issue. The real problem is what we’re measuring and why.​

Why measuring output doesn’t work

We’re still measuring productivity on output, which made sense when the economy was driven by goods, mining and resources. But it’s changed over the past two decades. Our economy is now much more driven by services – and productivity can’t be measured in the same way.

Take aged care, community care and disability. When I talk to managers and caregivers, they’re working incredibly hard. Often, they’re doing it unpaid because they genuinely care about what they do. They have a huge impact on the lives of others, but that’s not measured in the productivity reports or shared in the news.

Disability services provider Nadrasca is one example. It provides meaningful employment for hundreds of people with disabilities, fostering an empowering culture for those who may be excluded or treated differently in other areas of their life. It’s life-changing for the people they work with.

And that’s the other limitation of measuring productivity by output. It doesn’t differentiate between being busy doing busywork, or being busy doing work that changes lives, has meaningful impact, and creates success for others. ​

Instead of output, let’s achieve impact

If we stop worrying about how many hours people are working, and instead focus on setting our people up to excel, we can create something truly extraordinary.

Once you get a group of individuals working as a team, the sum can become greater than the individual parts. In terms of productivity, that means one plus one equals ten.

So how do we do that?

1.Create the right culture

What’s the ideal culture? It’s one where ordinary people work together to achieve extraordinary impact. To create this type of culture we need to focus on behaviours and attitudes.

When you promote certain attitudes towards others, and ways of approaching challenges, you change how people treat each other and set them up to excel as a team. Think Google, and how its 20% time rule – where staff were free to work on ideas outside of their primary job responsibilities – led to the creation of Gmail and Google Maps.

With the freedom to think, be themselves, and be flexible, people will look forward to going to work – and be motivated to give their best when they’re there.

2. Focus on flexibility

With return to work mandates in the news, there seems to be a growing flexible work policy backlash. However, the reality is there is no single way of working that fits everyone.

Instead of following the herd, look at what works for your organisation, your customers, and your people. We’ve seen how work from home and hybrid arrangements have significantly improved workforce participation for women, as well as people living with disabilities. Consider the consequences of an enforced full-time-in-the-office mandate on the diversity of your teams. You may end up losing people who were bringing immense value to the table.

However, the needs of the individual still need to be balanced with the need for face-to-face team collaboration or customer-facing work. Both sides may need to compromise and work together to find the best solution. Start with an open and honest conversation when someone joins your business to find the right balance for everyone.

3. Hire for trust and teamwork

Psychometric testing has added science to the human instinct of recruitment decisions. But, despite making things more complex, it rarely reveals how a person will perform in their role.

Let’s be frank: the fundamentals of employee engagement have not changed in the last 50 years. You still need three things – trust, alignment of values, and teamwork.

Trust is vital to making flexibility work. Employers need to trust their people will spend the majority of their time focusing on and delivering outcomes when they’re working from home. That starts with thorough due diligence during the recruitment process: check they’ve delivered what they say they have, and are not claiming sole credit for the work of a team.

In a culture where your people are set up to succeed, skin colour, sexuality, gender or age shouldn’t matter. Instead, focus on finding people who are team players, who use ‘we’ language instead of ‘I’ language, and who are prepared to go the extra mile to serve your customers. ​

Treat people like humans and they will excel

However you choose to measure productivity and impact, creating an environment that brings people together and sets them up to excel doesn’t have to be complicated. By humanising the way you work with your people and creating a culture where they feel supported and valued, you can set everyone up to do incredible things. ​

For help finding people with the skills and attributes to create extraordinary impact for your organisation, please get in touch with the team at BWS Recruitment. ​