Whether you are starting a new business or have been in business for many years, time tracking is an effective way to keep track of your employees. Time tracking software can bring many benefits to your business, including increased productivity and revenue through accurate time billing. Gone are the days when companies were managing time with spreadsheets and paperwork.
In today’s market, efficiency requires that companies use computerized and automated systems to track and report on all aspects of their business. These elements are essential to business decision-makers, as the data must be easily accessible, up-to-date, reliable, and able to provide an “inside” story.
Benefits of Time Tracking Software for Your Startup Business
Time management software is a tool that helps you understand how much time you and your staff are spending on tasks. But it’s more than just time tracking.
Automated worksheets and billing
The lack of paperwork is the most significant, most straightforward and most direct benefit of time tracking apps. If employees can track their own billed time, they no longer need printed calendars or Excel spreadsheets.
Traditional spreadsheets are no longer adequate. You need a robust, automated time management solution that provides real-time access to employee time data and integrates with billing and project management tools.
The more frequently employees fill out timesheets, the more accurate they will be.
“Those who filled out the spreadsheet at least once a day were 66% accurate, compared to 47% of those who filled it out weekly and 35% of those who filled it out less than once a week.
Know where the most valuable resources you have invested
Time tracking software gives value and meaning to individual team members’ contributions. Avoid unnecessary paperwork and long, meaningless spreadsheets. If someone is inefficient, they will be found out.
But time tracking is not just about analyzing the mood of team members. Stop thinking of it as a way to catch criminals. Think of it as a cultural opportunity to improve your team’s time management skills. You can actually do a better job, identify imbalances and mismanagement, and eliminate those small gaps. Most programs are free, and you can try them out before starting.
Clear budgets and schedules
Everything seems to take more time and money than expected in the startup world, and this is normal and perfectly acceptable. But imagine if you could manage a budget and pay your bills on time.
By providing your customers with invoices and budgets, you can be one of the best businesses. This will help startups stay on budget, and time management software will also allow them to forecast costs and manage future projects. With these budgets, there are no unnecessary surprises for any client.
Tip: Use time tracking information and milestones from previous similar projects to track the progress of your next project. If you fall behind, you can make adjustments before it’s too late.
Investing time instead of wasting it
Many startups would agree. There will always be clients who demand far more work hours than they plan to invest. This comes at the expense of the company’s time and overall productivity, especially if it’s a small business. These projects can be even more detrimental if time tracking tools are not used.
When you start recording the time spent on each client, you may find that 25% of your time is spent on clients that are not generating enough revenue for their weight in your time. You can also cancel orders in the opposite direction!
Either way, you have been enlightened and empowered. So it’s best to choose software that can make you money and grow your business.
Increase employee productivity
Time tracking software allows employees to know exactly how much time they have spent on each task, effectively managing their workload and staying productive in completing tasks.
When employees are working on projects or tasks that are outside of their scope of work, they are often unaware of how much time they are spending. Time management helps optimize time use and accountability for different types of tasks.
Reduce non-billing
Managing unpaid time is just as crucial for startups as managing paid time. Growing and maintaining a business involves a lot of work, often unnoticed by many. EMS can help you track all of your activities to account for time spent on key “unpaid” activities such as networking, investor meetings, self-assessment, internal communications, accounting, and of course, working on new funding rounds. An innovative tagging system allows you to categorize all levels of activity quickly. You can even see how much time you spent on specific emails or Slack threads. This is important for determining the actual cost of unpaid work and maintaining a healthy balance.
Mobile Work Folders
EMS is designed for the busy startup lifestyle. It allows you to keep track of everything outside of the workplace, including meetings, workshops, conferences, off-site events, cell phone calls and travel. The EMS itself is also available online on desktops, tablets, smartphones, and smartwatches to manage your time on the go. Expect a full-featured native app on Android, iOS or Mac Windows.
To avoid miscalculations.
If you’re opening a creative agency, miscalculating your time can lead to financial losses. For example, a designer on your team estimates that a project will take 10 hours to complete. Three months later, you fill out a spreadsheet and calculate that it will take 11 hours instead of 10.
Without dedicated time tracking software, team members and freelancers record their time based on “guesses” that may not be entirely accurate. As a result, startups would lose out.
To Sum Up
The various metrics, especially the intrusive ones, are exciting. Once you know the expectations and level of achievement, you can determine the accuracy of each project. A good time tracking software provides all this and is, of course, easy to use. You don’t need any special technical knowledge to use this software.
Author Bio
Sarah Noah Liam is a 28-year-old Software Management person who enjoys programming, Free Employee Monitor, and screen recording. She has a post-graduate degree in Computer science. She was raised in a happy family home with two loving parents.