What makes your employees productive? What differentiates them from each other and their ability to get work done on time? These questions often arise when managing a remote or a large team. Employee productivity is not a mystery, and businesses can gain valuable insights using time tracking software solutions. Aside from helping leaders understand their teams’ core strengths and abilities, this tool can also be used for various other tasks.
The data collected can be used for payroll, attendance timesheets, client billing, reporting, productivity analysis, and more. The extent of data tracked depends on the parameters your business needs to track to gauge employee productivity and performance. The good thing about the currently available range of best employee time tracking apps is the numerous features and benefits they offer for a business to leverage.
What is an Employee Time Tracking Software
Time tracking refers to logging hours an employee has worked during their shift or over a defined period. The data on time spent on tasks or projects is then considered to compensate employees fairly. These tools also ensure your organization is legally compliant.
These tools also allow a business to maintain transparency regarding the workload assigned to employees or their productivity. With remote and hybrid working becoming the norm, these tools ensure team members can join from anywhere and collaborate to achieve common goals.
Time tracking tools like Toggl allow companies to stay completely remote while smashing productivity goals without missing deadlines or stressing their employees.
What are the Benefits of Using Time Tracking Software
Its benefits include the following from standardizing payroll policy throughout the departments to seamless collaboration.
-
Enhanced Productivity
Employees can clock in and out independently, giving them control over their time. Due to this, they are more likely to manage their time efficiently. Using productivity tools also helps understand how the task progressed in detail and recognize time-consuming projects. So if a team member needs more resources, they know where in the project they need it.
-
Transparency Throughout
Time tracking software offers detailed insights into how work is being done and the productivity rate of individual employees and identifies any roadblocks consuming more time than anticipated. Knowing the accurate timeline it takes for your team to get work done ensures realistic time estimates are sent to customers when deciding the scope of work and timeline for deliverables.
-
Billing and Operational Efficiency
For any organization, billing productive hours ensures fair invoices and payrolls are issued. For instance, time tracking software like Toggl can generate billable utilization reports highlighting the work the team has done and their productivity levels (individual and combined). With this, businesses can ensure no discrepancies in invoices, and your customers know exactly the range of services they’re paying for.
-
Understanding Budget Spending Better
Project budgets exceeding the initial estimate are stressful situations for organizations and their clients. Such events also raise a suspension in clients’ minds, who want to gauge where their investments are being spent and potential reasons for project budget extension.
Thankfully, as time tracking tools keep every team member on track with progress and every milestone is backed with data like time and resources spent, it becomes easier for businesses to deliver top-notch results while staying within budget. This aspect maintains brand credibility and reassures customers that they are not being overcharged.
-
Increased Accountability
With a time tracking system, every employee knows the clock is ticking and must be productive while at work. As a result, employees tend to be mindful of the tasks they are engaging in.
It also encourages them to develop time management skills to get the most out of their work hours. When an employee knows how much time needs to be spent on a task, they are more likely to disengage from distractions and focus on completing their tasks on time.
Key Features to Look For in Your Time Tracking Software
Time tracking tools are undoubtedly an effective way to make your team work at their best productivity. But it is equally important that the tool you’re using aligns with your organization’s objectives. Some features to look for include:
- It is feasible to track time both online and offline.
- Availability of desktop and mobile apps
- Single-click time tracking eliminates the need to go through multiple steps before time tracking starts.
- Shared time entry features allow team members to add time when working on the same project.
- An easy-to-use interface, so people with any technical knowledge can use the tool without hassles.
- Auto-track activities on apps being used.
- Ability to publish custom reports from a personalized dashboard.
- Wide range of integration options to bring all teams together on one platform.
Bottomline
Time tracking allows organizations to track time, generate authentic reports, and engage in fair payroll actions without hassles. With technology advancing daily, time tracking tools like Toggl are making it easier for organizations to get more done, even with limited resources. To maximize your efficiency, productivity, and employee satisfaction, use a tool that aligns with your goals.
