Every office has employees with low productivity. Some employees are easily distracted by their phones or their social media accounts that they end up wasting precious time when they could be working. Fortunately, there are ways to steer them back onto the straight path and be more productive again.
Know your people
The first thing you should do is to get to know your employees. Their lack of motivation to do their tasks right away could stem from a personal issue that has been bothering them. So, even if the urge to order them to go back to work is strong, it would be better to check first what’s distracting them from taking care of their tasks. Some of them may just be looking for some guidance and you might have it in you to help them get out of their rut.
Cultivate a culture of being organised
Another reason some people are easily distracted at work is that they are not very organised. For instance, if your desk is cluttered with snacks, files, and knickknacks, you might get distracted every time an item on your table catches your eye.
What you can do is to implement a rule in your London office that all employees should minimise the number of items on their desks. They should only keep things that they need for their tasks. Other stuff should then be kept in pigeon hole storage units. This is effective in helping employees declutter their desks.
Remind them that they are important
Some employees lack the urge to take care of their tasks right away because they no longer feel that what they are doing is important to the company. Of course, they know that if they do not do their jobs, they will be penalised for that. But, instilling fear in people is not the right kind of motivation to make your employees keep their focus.
Instead, remind your employees about their contribution to the company. Tell each department (if you cannot talk to every employee) that without their contributions, the business would never succeed. Your employees need to know that they are essential to the growth of the company in order to motivate themselves to work harder because they will think that their efforts will directly impact the success of the business.
Remind them that promotion is for everyone
Another way to motivate your employees to stop slacking off and focus on their daily tasks as soon as they sit on their chairs is to let them know that you are always on the lookout to promote deserving ones. If they know that they can go further in the company, they will push themselves to work harder in order to get noticed.
Companies will always have daydreaming employees. It is a given because employees are not robots capable of working on a particular task without taking a break. But, as long as you take these steps, you can motivate everyone in your team to focus on their work and minimise distractions.
