Business productivity across the board is seeing all-time highs. This means businesses are getting more bang for their buck, and yes, the trend’s continued in 2026. If you wish you were seeing those numbers rise, but struggle with complicated workflows and an unmotivated workforce, you may not see the same gains.
That’s all set to change, because you found this guide. To help boost your business’ productivity, all you need to get started is to follow these top tips.
First, Identify What Productivity Means for your Business
Globally, productivity is calculated by GDP per hour worked. In the UK, for example, productivity has increased an average of 2% per year, only seeing a hit after the 2008 financial crisis and briefly just after the pandemic (before it soared to its highest amount in 2021). In the US, productivity is around 20% higher.
GDP per hour worked ultimately doesn’t mean much to a business’ day-to-day operations, which is why you need to first identify what productivity means for your business. Is it:
- Reduced costs?
- Faster workflows?
- Improved sales?
To best reach your goals, set clear targets. Rather than a general objective to reduce operating costs, outline by how much. Ensure you use goalposts to keep your targets achievable and reasonable.
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Audit Current Workflows
You’ll also want to audit your workflows to help you understand where bottlenecks exist. Always have the teams themselves do this, as they’ll know first-hand which steps feel redundant, or what sort of solution they’ll need to do their work faster and better.
Use Automated Systems That Can Triage Alerts
There are many automated systems that can happily work in the background until they come across a problem, at which point your staff will be alerted. Security systems are a prime example of this. A robust security solution can monitor activity 24/7 and work with other systems to help establish a baseline of behavior to detect anomalous activity.
The problem comes with those alerts. If your security team needs to deal with every alert like it’s a data leak or security breach, they will burn out. Burnout leads to lower productivity and can even mean they’re less ready to handle a real threat.
That’s why your automated solutions need a built-in triage system. A managed detection and response solution, or MDR, for example, can monitor your system, send alerts, and automatically sort them by priority so that your staff can address issues more effectively without burning out.
Use AI and Automation Strategically
Automation is still your best friend, even with its advanced LLM-based AI cousin on the field.
For example, a smart automation program that automatically manages your inventory, sends alerts when you’re low, or tracks lifetime sales to help you understand buying habits is all traditional automation. You don’t need an AI agent to do this, and you will likely struggle with the system’s penchant for hallucination and varied responses.
Where that LLM-based AI works best is either as a direct assistant (where it can be monitored) or in language-based tasks, like an advanced chatbot.
