The Importance of Full Team Visibility in 2021

The ideas of visibility and transparency in corporate settings have both become buzzwords. Frequently used and rarely understood, these notions have become the most popular buzzwords of 2020, and will likely persist with that popularity in 2021. However, companies today truly need to take a moment to understand and fully absorb the importance of visibility and transparency in their organizations. What are you doing, as a business leader, to turn these ideas into a reality?

By EMMA WORDEN

Does your corporate culture embody such values, to begin with? In 2021, with more remote teams sprouting everywhere, and people spending less time in gatherings and networking than ever before, it’s vital to leverage all the tools and solutions at your disposal to ensure visibility in your ranks.

In this sense, visibility refers to making sure every member of your company can clearly see what everyone else is doing, how they are contributing, and that they can understand their role in serving your overarching purpose. Here’s why it’s so essential to invest in visibility in this day and age when staying connected and communicating openly has become so challenging.

Ensure purpose-driven work

Today more than ever, people are eager to work for like-minded professionals and organizations whose values they understand and share. With that in mind, do your teams know why they come to work, even if they do so from home now? Do they understand what your purpose is?

Start implementing greater transparency by ensuring that your employees know what your purpose is. By giving them a sense of purpose, you also allow them to build your organization and contribute to something they find meaningful. If there is no visibility to being with, your turnover will likely grow, and more people will be eager to find brands they can relate to.

Improve time management 

Team visibility can enable your entire organization to prevent time-wasting tasks and processes and instead invest all of your resources on tasks that truly matter for your goals and success. Being in the dark in terms of knowing what portion of their work is pivotal, and what should be automated makes your teams less productive.

To elevate visibility, companies can use time and attendance systems that provide everyone with a clear overview of their workload, the time it takes to wrap up projects, and resource availability. You’ll be able to delegate more easily and assign the toughest tasks to the most successful people. You’ll also be able to allow everyone an insight into your organization’s schedule so that people know who they can turn to at what time, when team members are buys in a call, or when they have an opportunity to schedule a meeting.

Grow employee happiness

Transparency and visibility on their own don’t sound too relevant or impactful. However, by leading to all of the listed results, such as giving your teams a purpose and improving their productivity, visibility and transparency then contribute to happiness, as well. If you help your teams see what goals they are working towards, give them the resources to work effectively and efficiently, you also greatly contribute to their overall job satisfaction.

Build your unique corporate culture

By investing in transparency in your organization, you allow people to truly understand and embody all of your values. It helps you hire people who are not just qualified and educated for certain positions, but also the right people in terms of your values. That alone is a great way to help enhance your culture, because the simple truth is, your employees are the ones in charge of setting the tone for your culture, not just you.

So, if you leave them in the dark and they can only make wild guesses as to why you make certain decisions or you don’t keep them in the loop when you make changes, you can only expect disengaged employees who don’t care about contributing to your culture.

Facilitate cross-collaboration

Transparency in communication every single day, not just in presenting your overall goals and purpose, means that you are creating the perfect foundation for cross-departmental collaboration. If your marketers openly discuss their ideas and campaign goals with your sales and support team, you can improve all three strategies and align them better.

This helps with cross-departmental mentorship and learning, as well, which means that all of your team members will be able to contribute with unique ideas and help your business grow.

Simplify goal alignment 

Finally, sharing your overarching business goals with your employees means that they have the opportunity to structure their work in a meaningful, goal-driven way. If they merely come to the office and don’t think beyond their daily to-do list because they have no clue what your long-term vision is, they might inadvertently slow down your company’s growth.

Visibility among your teams helps clarify the roadmap to success for all individuals under your roof. Whether you use a PM tool so that everyone can see how everyone else is progressing, or you regularly share your goals in weekly meetings, you need to enable transparency in order to empower goal alignment.

Visibility in your business can mean a slew of different things, depending on what you do and how many people you have working across the world with your company. However, when you do invest in achieving greater transparency in your ranks, you’ll enable everyone to work while focusing on the same goals and purpose, and you’ll be able to notice growth opportunities that you’d otherwise miss. Make sure to make visibility one of your core goals for 2021, and your business will have an even better chance of success in the years to come.

Emma is a digital marketer and blogger from Sydney. After getting a marketing degree she started working with Australian startups on business and marketing development. Emma writes for many relevant, industry related online publications and does a job of an Executive Editor at Bizzmark blog and a guest lecturer at Melbourne University. Interested in marketing, startups and latest business trends. Follow Emma on Twitter @EmmaRWorden