The importance of training and investing in productivity for companies

There are few things that generate greater consensus than the need to increase productivity. Business organisations, the media, politicians… we all compulsively chant the same mantra. But do we truly believe that the productivity of our people will be raised simply if we repeat it often enough? Who teaches us to be productive?

Personal productivity is just one more skill. It can be learnt and can be developed. If today so many organisations have overlooked training in personal productivity, this has to a great extent been the fault of existing training programmes. Programmes which addressed only the definition and characteristics of time, the need to prioritise, the time killers… and which offered very limited practical application.

In order for a Time Management and/or Personal Productivity training programme to be effective, then it must fulfil three fundamental conditions:

• Offer specific tools and techniques, working processes and systems which can be applied in real life.
• Allow these techniques to be put into practice while offering feedback and recommendations.
• Provide sufficient time for practice and experimentation to become a habit.

These are the three cornerstones on which we focused at Gamelearn when we set up Triskelion, the first serious game focused on improving productivity and time management, which has given us highly positive results at dozens of multinational companies on all five continents.

Organisations have an urgent and major need to commit to serious games and gamification as a tool to increase productivity through tools-based productivity training. In doing so we are not dependent on the global economy, on political decisions or external factors. It is a solution which is in our hands, is swift and inexpensive. And as an investment it offers one of the greatest direct impacts on the bottom line.

What about you? Have you ever been taught productivity techniques? What were they? Have you ever wished someone would teach you to be more productive? Do you feel that more could be done for the productivity of your company? We are waiting to hear from you.