What is productivity? And, why does it matter?Learn Management Articles on management-info.biz. What is productivity? And, why does it matter? article will help answer your questions on Management Articles.We at management-info.biz specialize in Management Articles. Management Articles at management-info.biz provides the most up to date news and articles. If you have questions please do not hesitate to contact us.
By: Robert F. Abbott When Phil hires a new helper for one of his construction projects, he first watches to see whether or not the newcomer has the right attitudes and habits to keep him as an employee. And, if the newcomer meets expectations,' Phil introduces him to his philosophy about work by telling him the woodcutters story. Two woodcutters who are working together for the first time, set off in the morning to cut down trees. One woodcutter works very hard, and aside from a couple of breaks, works steadily all day. The other woodcutter, though, seems to take many more breaks, at least one every hour. So the first woodcutter expects he'll have cut down many more trees by the end of the day. But, when they quit for the day, the first woodcutter finds, to his surprise, that the second woodcutter has done more, despite taking all those breaks. And, in his frustration, the first woodcutter wonders out loud how the second woodcutter did it. The second woodcutter couldn't help but hear the first woodcutter's question, and replies, 'Yes, I take many more breaks, but every time I take one, I sharpen my axe.' Phil uses this story of the woodcutters to explain his ideas about productivity, and he doesn't relate it to the productivity which economists refer to in their statistics. Phil thinks of productivity in a very immediate way: how many nails you can drive in one hour, for example. The economists are talking about the same thing, only they're talking about it as the sum of many millions of businesses and organizations, so they're talking about productivity in an abstract way. Whatever the case, productivity simply refers to the amount of value you can get from labor, land, or capital (invested money). As we'll see in the next section, Phil's income goes up when he (and his helper’s) productivity goes up. Increasing productivity across a whole nation is also good news. It means everyone in society becomes more prosperous, that everyone (or almost everyone) will have more money to spend or save. Increased productivity can also mean lower prices. For example, if carpenters and home building companies increase their productivity, then house prices will go down. Generally speaking, though, consumers, owners of businesses, and workers in those businesses all share productivity gains. And what about people without job? Well they often gain, too, because when businesses owners and workers make more, they pay more in taxes. In turn, that makes more money available to governments for social programs. Having heard all that, you may be skeptical, thinking your prosperity hasn't gone up much, if at all. But you'd be wrong. Productivity has gone up, and gone up a lot over the past two hundred years, and especially over the past 50 years. It may be invisible to most of us, but productivity is one of the silver bullets that have given us our prosperity and so many of our choices.
|
More Articles:1. Check Your Communication Skills By Steve Kaye Use this check list to assess your communication skills.Focus* Do you pay complete attention to others when they are speaking? (A wandering focus discourages open communication.)* Do you manage your thoughts during a conversation, focusing them on understanding what the other person is saying? (Effective listening requires more concentration than any other form of communication. If you are thinking about anything other than what the person is saying, you are defeating your ability to unde… 2. Motivating Employees - Ten Ways to Start You Off By Martin Haworth Yet there is a place for those external 'raft-build's', 'away days' and 'paintballing'! Just get them in context; there is work to do up front to leverage those experiences and get the best value from them. Just build great relationships in your business or organisation, one-to-one - then have the fun day out and grow even more!"Motivation is like food for the brain. You cannot get enough in one sitting. It needs continual and regular top ups."Peter DaviesSo a 'people-focused' way of being in… 3. Can You Fully Grasp The 3 Ranges of Time Management? As you carefully read this article you will find that it goes to the very heart of mature Time Management. It covers things that absolutely anyone can do and takes no time at all to learn because you can already do it easily. Can you think of anyone around you that needs this? But before I reveal to you the most overlooked and most vital recommendation for time management, consider this.. There are three categories for Time Management. Below are three excellent and highly recommended techniques… 4. Enhancing the Motivational Climate of Your Workplace By Etienne Gibbs It has been well documented that employees' productivity and job quality increase when we are made to feel welcome at work. In other words, when the motivational climate is enhanced to meet their needs they produce quality work at the 100% rate.The source that caused them to produce at such high standards came from their employer's attempts at enhancing the motivational climate. As a result, they came to work, not because they had to, but because they wanted to.By listening to your employees,… |
||||
