Nu12 #8 By NU 12- Marta Fretheim Goal setting clarity; communications

NU 8

What pisses you off in the office?

Communication barriers

Our office is a bit spread out., some work from Sweden, some Norway, and some Portugal and now I am in the Philippines. The thing that bothers me the most is by far our communication problems. There are several both verbal and non verbal. Its starts by the formulations of our goals, I honestly don't think anyone knows what our goal is except increase profits. Secondly our responsibilities are also unclear, people are working but no one really knows who is in charge of what. E-mail might get sent around in a circle before it actually gets answered.

I think there should be spent more time defining the company goals, and breaking them down in milestones. Clearer goals makes sure people are working with the right things at the right time, it would improve the efficiency at work. As all the employees in La Point is fairly individual and in charge of themselves this is extremely important. I would suggest a special program made for business activities, this program would be accessible online so that everyone can use it where ever and when ever they want. The program would in short:

-       List all activities both planned, finished and under work activities

-       Participants of each activity,

-       A list/overview of all employees and their responsibilities

-       Due date for the activities

-       If the activity is done in time or not

-       If the activity is done within its budget

There would be a "dashboard" showing the short-term goals, timeframes and responsibilities. The dashboard will be in both verbal and non-verbal forms. For instance there would be if a task is completed within its time limits or budget it will be showing a green light, if some activities are late according to the initial time limit but can still make the final due to date for the project then there would be a yellow indicator and if it is not feasible, cancelled or exceeds the final time limit there will be a red Indication. This way everyone can easily see what tasks have been done, what tasks are under work, what tasks are on time and which are not, who is working with what and what tasks are planned to be done. I think this would give a better overview and improve coordination among the employees as well as ease possible frustrations and misunderstandings at the work place.  3

By Marta Fretheim