New Year’s resolutions 2021

Looking back at all that we learned in 2020, we have many opportunities to make 2021 a year of success. It is clear that the acceleration of digitalization, specifically in the first half of the year, will continue in all branches and across all company activities. But how can we exercise our risk-averse muscles to help us avoid trouble while tapping new pockets of growth?

Table of content

• Teams

• Managers

• Business & Marketing

• Extra Steps

• Summary

Teams

What began during the crisis may become the norm. #WFH forever? How do you integrate new resources into your team?

1. Read the signs – Although teams were happy to have more flexibility, they might be feeling lonely now that time has passed. When the second wave of lockdowns hit, people had to go back to working at their kitchen tables. Still, a general feeling of benefiting from the situation is emerging: less stress and more focus combined with stable productivity. Skilled workers and introverts appear to be benefiting the most. As a company, it is important to survey the feelings and needs of your team members in order to be able to create an effective post-Covid work environment.
2. Encourage diversity and belonging – Integration means more than just hitting the figures. Taking steps to guarantee equality and mutual respect also means taking differences into account by considering everything from refraining from setting up meetings at dinner time to celebrating all religious events and being considerate of time differences by rotating regular meeting times. There are many ways to show people respect. The basics include empathy and understanding without judging aspects of life that do not impact efficiency at work.
3. Create inclusive training practices – New context, new needs: You can improve efficiency by training people towards the new normal. Doing this may mean establishing a completely new set of training practices, edging away from teleconference etiquette and turning toward collaborative tool usage as well as structuring projects and standard operations. The objective is to provide comfort in times of uncertainty by enabling your team to build the skill set that will help them feel capable while #WFH.

Managers

From managing uncertainty to managing digitally?

1. Build structure into remote teamwork – Office space is organized to provide good working conditions for all employees. Country regulations see to that by requiring good quality office materials, lighting and air. At home, employees are not always equipped to maintain these standards. This may be fine for a couple of weeks but not for the long term. Reducing your office space does not mean that your employees should have to bear the burden of providing equipment, access and training. Going the extra mile can even include encouraging health practices like regular gym time options.
2. Create feedback spaces – One significant hurdle that comes with remote working is the lack of management contacts and informal feedback opportunities. Although both senior and mid-level employees are used to some autonomy, engagement is correlated to management relations. Digital managers need to build up their feedback arsenal so that they do not lose their teams.
3. Limit repetition and misunderstandings – Teams that are basically living at their workplace need to be clear on tasks, processes and updates. It is extremely tiring to attend stand-up and update meetings where you hear the same news but are not always given clear next steps and responsibilities. Avoid multiple update loops by centralizing history logs within workflow platforms and chat tools and instill in your team the advantages of using collaborative documents and flows in order to limit friction over individual to-do lists.

Business & Marketing

How to perform in the “new normal” and creating value from headwinds? 

1. Break team silos by centralizing data infrastructure – Offering an infrastructure where teams have access to the data they need without duplication makes it possible to combine their data in order to gain transparency. It also reduces the amount of necessary reporting and prevents duplication, which saves time and reduces errors for teams, giving them more time for exchange and thinking.
2. Generate margins by increasing the productivity of each team member – Every team member has an idea of how to improve their own productivity, even if not every idea can be applied on a large scale. Asking your team for solutions bottom-up reveals the approach you need to take toward work improvement => everyone can contribute their tips and tricks for boosting productivity.
3. Use data to build your performance assessment – Giving your team access to automated dashboards and data knowledge can open doors to better performance. By instilling healthy KPI-setting processes, each team is able to clearly visualize expectations and results without extra work. 

Extra Steps

How to strengthen your advertising?

1. Improve your advertising process pipeline – You can take advantage of tremendous opportunities when it comes to saving time and resources, from in-housing part or all of your media to managing vendor relationships and yearly commitments. Data can be used to identify room for improvement.
2. Leverage your “everyday experts” channels – Influencers have gained traction in this digital age. The end consumer is attracted to audio and video formats for practical reasons, which opens up an enormous opportunity for new content development. Be the authority in your field
3. Loyalty and advocacy are even more central – Acquisition is at the heart of many advertising strategies. However, customer retention is an important money-saving opportunity that can increase your bottom line. The full funnel for customer experience brings with it opportunities to expand your clientele.

Summary

Data can be an enormous help when it comes to building and monitoring a “new normal” structure. At MMT, we provide the support you need to design and build the relevant workflow, dashboards and data pipelines to increase your advertising productivity and help you build your new normal. Get in touch. How to perform in the “new normal” and creating value from headwinds?