In only one in five companies is collaboration anywhere near where it was before the Corona crisis/Lack of collaboration is already causing efficiency, cost and quality problems – Study

Köngen, 06 May 2021 – Corona continues to test companies and their employees. According to the current study “Collaboration as the key to success,” only 22 percent of companies currently manage to maintain collaboration at pre-crisis levels. This stressful situation directly impacts companies’ key performance indicators. For example, poor collaboration noticeably reduces efficiency in 72 percent of companies. For the study, business consultancy Staufen, together with the Shop Floor Management experts from Staufen.ValueStreamer surveyed more than 300 companies in Germany.

“The pandemic has become a stress test for communication between managers and employees, but also between employees themselves,” says Wilhelm Goschy, CEO of Staufen AG. “As our study shows, despite video conferencing and other forms of communication, around 80 percent of companies remain well below pre-Corona levels when it comes to collaboration.”

Cafeterias and kitchens lacking as communication hubs

Above all, the lack of informal exchange is a massive burden. If the lack of casual exchanges was a problem for 16 percent of companies before Corona, it continues to hinder good collaboration for more than half during the pandemic. “Cafeterias and kitchens are currently not available as important communication hubs due to hygiene measures,” Goschy said. “Closing this gap, or at least mitigating it using digital leadership and management tools, has so far only been partially successful for companies and their leaders.”

Even before the crisis there was not enough communication, and not with everyone

According to the Staufen study, there is a simple reason why official communication cannot replace the lack of informal exchange in many places: Even before the crisis, too little was said and, above all, not with everyone – the keyword being silo thinking. “These omissions are now falling on the feet of the companies,” observed Dr. Andreas Romberg, Managing Director of Staufen.ValueStreamer GmbH. “The crisis acts like a magnifying glass here. After all, even before the pandemic, megatrends such as digitalization, flexibilization and internationalization, as well as increased cost pressure, have significantly changed the requirements for collaboration in companies.”

Poor collaboration directly impacts costs

As the study results show, these supposedly soft factors are already leaving their mark on hard metrics. “In three out of four companies, efficiency already suffers from the effects of poor collaboration,” says collaboration expert Romberg. “And in one in two companies, poor collaboration has a direct impact on costs.” It is no wonder, then, that the majority of study participants are convinced that collaboration must become a top priority in the future.

Download the study “Collaboration as the key to success” here.

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About Staufen AG – www.staufen.ag

Inside every company there is an even better one. With this conviction, Staufen AG has been advising and qualifying companies and employees for more than 25 years. Markets are on the move – the competitive pressure is enormous. Staufen helps to quickly bring about the right changes, increase productivity, improve quality and increase innovative strength. With the appropriate strategies and methods, the international transformation consultancy ensures rapid and measurable success. In order to leverage the potential available in every company, Staufen consultants establish a lively and sustainable culture of change together with executives and employees. The Academy of Staufen AG also offers certified, practice-oriented training courses. From the international locations, more than 320 employees serve customers all over the world. In 2021, Staufen AG was recognized by “brand eins” as “Best Consultants” for the seventh year in a row. According to the renowned industry study “Hidden Champions 2020,” the consulting firm is Germany’s best Lean Management consultancy and was honored several times with the “Best of Consulting” award by the “Wirtschaftswoche” journal.

About Staufen.ValueStreamer GmbH -www.valuestreamer.de

Real collaboration in global value creation networks. This guiding principle is implemented by Staufen.ValueStreamer GmbH through its consultants, all of whom have many years of experience in the fields of lean, collaboration and leadership, as well as an interdisciplinary software development team. The spin-off of Staufen AG pioneered the need for digital performance management and virtual collaboration support back in 2014 and implemented it in the first ValueStreamer® generation for pilot customers. The software solution ValueStreamer® is a logical step towards meeting the digitization requirements of companies regarding management tasks, control and collaboration. All of the Staufen Group’s digital Shop Floor Management (dSFM) activities are bundled in the Staufen.ValueStreamer GmbH. This enables global collaboration in virtual teams – also in the context of the range of Industry 4.0 approaches. Around the world. In real time. Agile.