Gray work eliminates the ability to effectively collaborate, as data and processes are stuck in disconnected, separate systems. It also causes risks for an organization, with data held in systems that may not be secure. Lastly, with different teams having different sets of data, it can cause duplicate work or mismatched data, ultimately leading to project delays, budget overages, and lost revenue.
According to McKinsey, organizations are leaving $900 billion in productivity on the table due to miscommunications and time spent gathering information.
Manual systems or systems that are disconnected are the biggest culprits for gray work. Offline spreadsheets in Excel or spreadsheets in personal folders can be a major challenge when people don’t have the centralized tools they need to get work done. People may also customize tools in a way that makes it inaccessible to others in the organization, again removing any chance for connection.
More than anything, continued frustration with tools and processes is your biggest tell that gray work is a challenge.
Giving people the tools and capabilities they need to accomplish their most complex projects will remove the need for gray work. Using a platform purpose-built for dynamic work, like Quickbase, will remove gray work from people’s processes and give your organization the connectivity and control it needs to become a dynamic enterprise.
