2097: Friends Indeed: Four Ways to Leverage Work Relationships to Boost Productivity by Laura Stack of The Productivity Pro

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[00:00:54] This is Optimal Work Daily. Indeed. Four ways to leverage work relationships to boost productivity. By Laura Stack of theproductivitypro.com. Quote, Your workforce is your most valuable asset. The knowledge and skills they have represent the fuel that drives the engine of the business, and you can leverage that knowledge. End quote. Harvey McKay, American businessman and author.

[00:01:23] Many savvy business people will tell you that the true secret of success is cultivating profitable relationships with anyone related to your work. Coworkers, colleagues, clients, prospects, even vendors. Sometimes the least expected person is the one who saves your bacon, like that quiet but hard-working teammate, or the networking associate you met at a conference last year. While relationships are, in fact, deeply important, it's how you use them that really matters.

[00:01:51] You're surely familiar with the principle of the lever, one of the world's simple machines. Using a fulcrum, you can maneuver a lever to manipulate an object you'd never be able to handle with your bare hands. Like using the claw of a hammer to pull a nail from a board, using the wood itself as the fulcrum. We also see this principle in action on the playground, with the seesaw, where children alternately use their weight and balance lever of the teeter-totter to lift another kid's weight.

[00:02:17] This illustration is particularly apt because the best kind of leverage helps everyone involved. That's the kind of leverage that moves mountains and makes your work much more productive. In many ways, all effective productivity is about leveraging relationships in one way or another, including with the following types of people. 1. Team Members or Co-workers Your work team is like your workplace family. You depend on each other for support in nearly all things.

[00:02:45] Whether you're a team leader or a team member, the quality of your relationships with your team members will determine how well you function, and, to some extent, your personal and team performance. Teams enjoying close relationships and or an excellent understanding of how their jobs interlink can leverage those relationships to not only boost their own productivity, but that of the entire team.

[00:03:06] You can leverage an exchange of favors, standard reciprocity, peer pressure, and even a person's desire not to let down the rest of the team to maximize performance and produce the desired or greater results. A team where everyone knows where they fit, where communications are consistent and polite, where members willingly lend each other a hand and pick up slack as necessary, is a highly tuned productivity machine. 2. Colleagues

[00:03:34] Though most of your work contacts will lie within your organization, wise workers maintain a network of external contacts within their field, outside the office. Professional organizations, conferences and workshops, meetings, and research associations can all help you create contacts you can then leverage whenever you need help.

[00:03:54] For example, when my archaeologist friend needs crew members for field work, he often contacts his colleagues at other private companies to ask if they have anyone to recommend, especially if someone was finishing a project there and needed more work. You can also leverage your networks to help you find non-human resources. Even jobs for friends or yourself should worst come to worst. I'm constantly reaching out to my colleagues and fellow members at the National Speakers Association for input or vendor recommendations.

[00:04:24] 3. Vendors You may not immediately think of vendors when it comes to leveraging relationships, but they shouldn't be forgotten. Especially important are vendors who specialize in supplying your specific industry. In cases where nothing else has worked, you might be able to leverage them to locate human resources because they often keep track of the current situations in organizations they supply.

[00:04:45] Of course, they're also the people you go to first when seeking specialty resources within their bailiwicks, or to see what other organizations like yours have done in certain situations or for other clients. And 4. Outsourcing This may represent the least personal way of leveraging relationships, but it does allow you to reach outside the organization to find people to do delegated work.

[00:05:09] Through the medium of an outsourcing company or platform like Upwork.com, you can find quality virtual workers to write, proof, edit, code, or design for you, as well as to virtually assist you for wages you can afford. Any size organization can use outsourcing, from solopreneurs to multinational corporations. And to an increasing extent, they do.

[00:05:32] In the last few months, I've used Upwork to find graphic artists, public relations specialists, researchers, and survey software experts. When it comes to productivity, your network of talented and hardworking people may prove to be your best resource. You can leverage these relationships for a performance boost. The more professional relationships you have, the better off you are, assuming they are good ones. So pay attention to and cultivate your gold stars.

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[00:06:59] Download the State Farm app or go online at statefarm.com. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. And a big thank you to Laura, who is one of our regular contributors here. She is an award-winning keynote speaker and best-selling author of eight books. So she's obviously known as the Productivity Pro for good reason. Her engaging personality, combined with over 25 years of experience helping organizations achieve results, have made her one of the most sought-after experts and keynote speakers in her field.

[00:07:27] Laura has been featured in the New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and Entrepreneur and Forbes magazines. And she's been a spokesperson for Microsoft, Danon, 3M, Office Depot, Xerox, and more. And if that wasn't enough, her client list includes top Fortune 500 companies, including Starbucks, Walmart, Bank of America, GM, Wells Fargo, and Time Warner, as well as government agencies such as the United States Air Force Academy,

[00:07:55] the Census Bureau, the U.S. Senate, and the IRS. So there is a lot to learn from her, and you can see a whole bunch of it at theproductivitypro.com. She's got all her videos, her books, store, newsletter, and blog all there on that site. Again, that's theproductivitypro.com. So with that, I wish you a great rest of your day and weekend if you're listening in real time. And I'll be back here tomorrow with the Monday edition. And that is where your optimal life awaits.