By Lilia Guan

 

Interviews with 700 Australian corporate leaders and government decision makers showed that a large majority rated productivity improvement a top priority, the highest since surveys began, while there is optimism that productivity can improve business outcomes even though economic times are tough, stated Telstra's latest Productivity Indicator report.

That optimism is especially apparent in so-called productivity leaders in organisations that measure and achieve a significant improvement in productivity.

This year’s report also finds; productivity is a top business priority for 80 per cent of Australia’s private sector and 66 per cent of government organisations; overall, there has been a 25 per cent drop in organisations that have achieved significant productivity gains between 2011 and 2012 (32 per cent versus 24 per cent); having achieved productivity improvement over the last 12 months, Productivity Leaders are significantly more optimistic than followers (52 per cent versus 29 per cent) about achieving further productivity improvements in the future, regardless of the global or domestic economic uncertainty.

According to the report government sector leaders are more optimistic than followers they will be able to better manage risk (43 per cent versus 17 per cent) and achieve key organisational objectives (39 per cent versus 16 per cent).

The report, analysing Leaders’ traits, the research indicates Leaders place an emphasis on people and collaboration, investment in ICT and a focus on innovation to deliver business outcomes. The advantages these bring enable them to grow, develop new revenue streams and win market share.
 

Telstra’s executive director for government and not-for profit, Chris Pearce, told Government News this year’s results have seen almost half of productivity leaders rate an integrated ICT roadmap, including investment in video conferencing, cloud computing, mobile devices and fast broadband data networks, as being a leading factor that has helped them achieve increased productivity.
 

“Flexibility through remote monitoring and cloud computer help people move around,” he says.
 

“The trend will see government employers offering and investing in flexible workplace solutions, which contributes to productivity increase.”
 

Director of strategy in Telstra customer sales and services, Anthony De Jong says by offering workers more tools in the field allows public sector workers to give constituents better services.
 

According to Mr Pearce (former Aston Liberal Member of Parliament) said the government sector proved to be leading in making productivity gains, because it has recognised that constituents have become customers.
 

“Key findings in the report for the sector show that customer satisfaction is important and that’s a quiet a shift from the past couple of years,” he said.
 

“Everything they are doing around productivity is aimed at facilitating that [customer satisfaction.”
 

According to Telstra the main between those who are leaders and those who lead is the ability to stay committed to the tract – through data building and improving organisation drives.
 

“Productivity is not just about having more output than input, it would be incomplete to look at productivity in this way,” Mr De Jong said.
 

“Strong employment engagement can also attribute to increasing productivity.”
 

The report also states that industries and sectors expecting to see significant increases in productivity in the year ahead include the agricultural, forestry and fishing, mining and utilities sectors followed by the transport, logistics and construction industries.

 

However only 66 per cent of the public sector  respondent Productivity improvement saw productivity as a priority over the next 12 months.