Productivity is about getting more from your business with existing or fewer resources.

Productivity issues that people pay attention to vary. For example, an operations manager will speak with people, attend meetings, and receive emails about many issues the business faces. But, they would focus most of their attention on the issues they are responsible for, i.e. not missing promised release dates and customer deadlines. Conversely, a sales manager would focus on issues affecting their ability to gain customers and upsell features to existing customers.

Frequently, managers of different areas have heated debates with each other, trying to cause changes that will result in improvements in their area.

Productivity challenges exist at many levels in an organisation, such as:

• Individual performance (‘getting the most from the resources you have’)
• Team collective performance (‘we are a team, let’s coordinate and help each other’)
• Cross-team operational flow (‘facilitating more timely handovers between functional areas’)