Team Efficiency vs. Team Effectiveness

Something Worth Knowing....

  Team efficiency is very important for running a business properly and making sure that it is going to be profitable. But what many people don't realize is that a business can be efficient and still not be effective. Here are some tips to help you understand the difference between team efficiency and team effectiveness and to determine how to reach both.

Having a great team can really mean a lot for your business and is very important to your success. Having a team that performs poorly can cause a great deal of stress for the business and also for you personally. But being productive isn't only driven by how well a team is managed, but also by how well they manage themselves. Creating an environment where team members can develop themselves and their talents will also help the whole team improve their performance.

A team can be efficient and still be ineffective. Efficiency is defined as being able to accomplish all of the necessary tasks for a job in the appropriate amount of time and with the right tools available. No matter how well your team does the tasks assigned, if they are doing the wrong things or for the wrong reasons, then they will still be ineffective.

Team effectiveness is much more important that team efficiency and also implies that efficiency will be part of the equation. Effectiveness is the degree o which the business runs as a business should. There are plenty of efficient businesses that don't run effectively and that won't last for very long.

               

When you are building your business team and deciding what things are most important to you, it is a good idea to distinguish between efficiency and effectiveness. A focus on efficiency will certainly help you get more things done with less money and less effort. But this can often lead to too broad of a goal and accomplishment of the goal may or may not actually lead to success for the business.

Keeping your focus on effectiveness and the underlying principle of efficiency will help you to maintain a good balance in the business which will lead to greater profits and more long term success. When you are forming your team and establishing goals, take the time to explain the difference and to give examples of how members could be efficient but not effective and how this could actually harm the business in the long run. When everyone is focused on getting things done right instead of just getting them done cheaply and quickly, then the work environment will be much better for everyone and the business will thrive.

So, whats your view on this...