Hybrid Work Productivity: 5 Metrics You Should Track

Our ways of working have significantly changed over the last few decades, more so in the last 18 months or so. Many companies were forced to allow their staff to work from home. Now things seem to have calmed down, many companies have decided that working from home some of the time is manageable. That is leading to an increasingly hybrid workplace.

The hybrid model is very popular with remote workers. Flexibility seems to be one of the primary reasons people like hybrid work: flexibility to work from anywhere, flexibility to work at selected times, flexibility to not go to the office.

While the hybrid work model has shown some positives, it raises issues for employers. One of the biggest challenges is measuring the productivity of the staff when working remotely.

Employers want to know their staff is as productive in a hybrid work environment as they would be in an office setup. That’s where productivity metrics come in.

This article will look at some metrics to help employers track the productivity of their staff. Measuring hybrid productivity metrics will help employers evaluate staff performance. Based on findings, companies can craft a tailored hybrid work model that works for everyone. That will lead to business growth and happy employees.

5 Metrics to Track Hybrid Work Productivity

1. Feedback from All Sides

Communication is integral to the success of hybrid work models, and employee engagement is just one of many touchpoints. Employers should prioritize speaking with staff to learn about their needs. Feedback is also essential as employers strive to help remote workers balance their work responsibilities, home responsibilities, and personal time.

Listening to team members is critical if an organization’s hybrid work model is to be a success. Team leaders should keep open lines of communication with all employees.

Many organizations are still adapting to the changes, and clear communication reduces employee doubt and anxiety. Silence can lead to low hybrid work productivity. 

Managers can collect feedback through techniques such as questionnaires and interviews. Once they have collected this feedback, employers can analyze the results. This stage will help companies better to understand the demand for hybrid work within the organization. 

Employers can also further create flexible working arrangements that appeal to individual remote employees or teams. Participation of employees is a crucial step towards creating a successful hybrid work model.

You should collect feedback regularly to ensure that employees and employers are on the same page. Now more than ever, it’s essential to create a positive employee experience in a workplace that increases hybrid work productivity. 

2. Goal-Oriented Management

Goal-oriented management measures objectives and looks at how employee productivity and overall output contribute to hitting company goals. To track this metric, companies need to have organizational and departmental SMART goals in place.

SMART goals will provide the needed guidance for what you hope to achieve. Team leaders should set up meetings with each team member to discuss any goals before performance reviews become crucial.

To achieve these SMART goals:

• Organizations should provide tools and processes that allow for collaboration equity among employees. 
• Every employee should have the proper equipment to contribute to their fullest potential regardless of location, experience level, and role.

Achieving set goals also means organizations must take note of the work styles that exist within teams, reconsider and redefine what collaboration should be like within their companies.

Collaboration equity ensures that every team member can achieve set targets. Managers can monitor each employee to check if they are hitting minimum productivity metrics by tracking this metric. If an employee doesn’t achieve targets, managers will have sufficient information to identify underlying problems and provide appropriate solutions.

Knowing how to gauge employee productivity in a hybrid work environment is vital to keeping the operational integrity of any business. From an organizational viewpoint, goal-oriented management can increase employee productivity and decrease onboarding and hiring costs.

Companies should be mindful of organizational culture to take advantage of collaboration within the hybrid work model fully. This aspect is usually overlooked, but it has enormous impacts on employee productivity. The hybrid work model presents a chance for managers to “think outside the box” and create an inclusive office or online community. 

3. The Ratio of Planned to Complete Work

Managers can measure how much of the assigned work employees finish with the planned to done work metric. To calculate the planned to complete work ratio, just divide the number of tasks supposed to have been completed against what was done. After that, turn the figure into a percentage.

Productivity is critical, especially when your team members are not together to motivate each other. One key factor that sticks out when it comes to productivity is adaptability.

Agile organizations will be more productive if they easily and quickly adapt to prevailing conditions. They will find it easier to increase their hybrid work productivity. Managers should aim to empower their teams to perform at an optimum level by using platforms designed to match the needs of the team members. They should also be prepared to adapt as those needs change.

Business agility also means having capable and effective technological tools. These tools, such as e-signature, should provide employees with a seamless work experience from the office or anywhere else. 

By using the planned to done work metric, employers can assess employee performance individually, critical to hybrid work productivity.

For example, if one team member has a 60% planned to done ratio and all other team members in the department have over 80%, this is a clear indicator of an underlying problem with that particular team member.

Managers can then use these insights to help employees who might be having trouble with their performance levels. Tracking productivity over time is also critical; managers can measure employee efficiency with this data and find ways to extend this efficiency to all team members.

4. Time Management Productivity

Time management productivity entails assessing what people do with their time. Therefore, time management is essential, be it in a hybrid, remote, or office setup. Using time tracking software is helpful to assess time management productivity. The process of tracking time management productivity is straightforward.

To fully utilize this metric, there needs to be some historical data to compare against. Before managers start calculating value and employee productivity from any selected tool, you need a baseline to compare against.

Tracking can happen daily, every week, monthly, or at any chosen interval. Results might not be 100% accurate, but the tracking should give a more accurate picture of how employees manage their time during office hours.

Time management and tracking how time is used can be a sticky issue within any organization. Managers should be transparent with all team members if they have any plans to introduce time tracking tools. You should address any employee concerns regarding privacy to avoid any anxiety or unhappiness, leading to decreased productivity.

5. Profit as a Measure of Productivity

The productivity by profit metric measures how much income is generated by the various tasks for the business. This metric can be helpful for businesses looking to grow their revenue base in the short term.

By focusing on tasks that bring in revenue, managers can use the extra cash for expanding operations. The ultimate goal of any business is to make a profit; therefore, it’s hard to ignore such a metric that focuses on the business’s bottom line. Profit margins will heavily determine how a business streamlines its operations to minimize losses.

Certainly, profit as a measure of productivity is a valuable metric for marketing or sales-related tasks. After all, you want to align the work you do with the returns you generate.

Despite the importance of measuring profits, managers should not lose sight of other factors that contribute to worker productivity.

And they should also embrace the automation tools to cut down the manual workload. Profits will only grow if the team doing the work is motivated and operating at an optimum level. Managers should also take note to consider any other revenue streams that are not linked to sales.

Why You Should Track Hybrid Work Productivity

The hybrid working model is becoming the new normal, and companies should strive towards maintaining high employee efficiency. That is only possible through a collaborative effort from both employees and employers.

You learned some hybrid work productivity metrics from this article. Make sure you track these metrics so you can ensure your team is productive.  The discussed metrics are not the only ones to track, but they should provide any business owner or manager with a solid starting point. You can also tweak these metrics to meet business needs.

Collaboration will ultimately lead to positive company culture, despite the distance between employees.

About the author:

Baidhurya Mani is the founder of SellCoursesOnline.com. He regularly shares tips, tools, and strategies to help creators and entrepreneurs build a successful online course business.