Do you find it challenging to track where your employees are spending most of their office hours?
Businesses need robust time tracking software that allows employees to log in the time spent on every task. A modern timesheet can certainly give you visibility into their schedule so that you can take the necessary steps and redirect most of their time to billable work.
In addition, it is a constructive way to analyze employee utilization, productivity, and actual time spent against the forecast. This helps to generate accurate invoices and process payrolls.
This blog highlights the benefits of using an employee timesheet and the limitations managers face when choosing a traditional one. Let’s begin:
- What are the limitations of a traditional timesheet?
Traditional employee timesheets have limited functionalities and are error-prone. In addition, they demand constant surveillance and reviewing several times by the HR and accounting departments before using it for payroll, which is extensively time-consuming.
Here is a rundown of the limitations of a traditional timesheet:
- These timesheets cannot provide an accurate record of employees’ working hours. It lacks visibility into the actual time taken for billable and non-billable work.
- It cannot provide insights into employee utilization and productivity reports.
- Since they are manual, they can welcome biased treatment from the HR department and management.
- Every department has a different timesheet template which can contribute to silos due to a lack of standardization across the organization.
- Manually created invoices are prone to human error, which may lead to revenue leakage or hamper relationships with a client due to a lack of transparency.
- Lastly, manual timesheets lack compliance and may lead to unethical practices like time theft, etc.
2. Benefits of using a timesheet solution
Modern timesheets provide multiple benefits like tracking time on a project, analyzing employee performance, preventing manual errors, and saving time. Below is a run-down of the benefits offered by time-tracking software.
2.1 Captures log in/out time with real-time tracking of individual tasks
A modern timesheet can record the date and time of employees logging in and logging out and the total number of hours they worked. Thus, it cannot alter such details after the timings are clocked in, preventing time theft.
The timesheet tool allows managers to track the time resources spent on individual tasks and the progress achieved in real-time. Further, it helps them analyze the actual versus forecast, which can additionally be used to bill clients and make accurate estimates for future projects.
2.2 Provides real-time insights into resource utilization
A modern time-tracking software comes as an add-on with another software or can be purchased as a standalone tool. Thus, it can be easily integrated with any tool and offers real-time reports for employee utilization.
Using the tool’s business intelligence feature, managers can get comprehensive visibility into color-coded heatmaps. It showcases the employee utilization levels by using the data in the timesheet. It helps managers quickly identify areas that require immediate attention, such as over/ underutilized resources, and take corrective actions accordingly.
2.3 Automates timely invoicing and payroll processing
Using a robust timesheet, managers can quickly view the data filled in by the employees. It gives them transparency into the billable and non-billable hours an employee puts in. Accordingly, they can send it for invoicing after they have been approved. Thus, it reduces human error and ensures accurate payment with no loss of time.
Further, managers can get complete visibility of leaves, schedule adjustments, accruals, and work hours and track employees’ productivity in the office. This way, it streamlines and standardizes payroll processing and reduces any chances of human error or biases.
2.4 Provides accurate forecasts vs. actual
Forecast versus actual reports assist managers in understanding if the progress of the project is in sync with their estimated plan. In addition, it helps to understand the variance between the planned and the actual values using these reports.
Accordingly, managers can find the reason and course correct to meet the deadline, improve the project lifecycle and prevent revenue leakage. Furthermore, if employees take more than the estimated time to complete a task, they can investigate and adjust the estimates, improving the overall project plan.
2.5 Minimizes overhead costs
Traditional timesheets consume a lot of time for admin work like payroll regulation, generating invoices, and approving timesheets regularly. However, a modern timesheet has automated and streamlined the entire process, thereby reducing the need to hire people for admin work.
In addition, organizations can relieve employees of daily mundane tasks of manually entering data and redirect their focus on billable work. This way, it increases employee productivity and efficiency. Furthermore, it speeds up the reporting and approval steps when the process is streamlined. This is how modern timesheets minimize overhead costs for businesses.
2.6 Assist in performance tracking and recognition
When employees can meet their deadlines on time, it showcases their efficiency and performance. Managers can get the same visibility through the data fed in the employee timesheet.
In addition, performance tracking through timesheets offers another way of accurately determining an employee’s progress and acknowledging them appropriately.
2.7 Ensure time compliance and enhance the organization’s productivity
A timesheet ensures uniformity across all employees at different levels in the organization. Since the software is fed with the same rules and regulations regarding entry and exit times, working hours, leaves, and breaks, employees have no option but to adhere to the organization’s policies.
Therefore, it ensures that every employee is treated fairly and there is no bias during payroll processing. Timesheets also ensure ethical practices and prevent time theft. In addition, timesheets help employees reduce distraction and focus on the tasks allocated to them.
3. How to effectively utilize a timesheet within resource management software?
Timesheet is an integral component of Saviom’s resource management software. It offers an in-built timesheet feature that helps analyze the time spent by resources on specific tasks. Further, it allows employees to log in their work alongside each project with its duration against their capacity.
The software provides resource utilization reports, forecasts versus actuals, and heatmaps that offer insights into resource utilization levels and retrieve instant insights on billable utilization. Thus, it is an efficient tool for monitoring a project’s progress and resource productivity.
4. Conclusion
Traditional timesheets have existed for the last few decades, but they can only provide information on employees’ clock in/out data. Today, timesheets have evolved into a modern solution that gives data about employee hours and provides centralized information on resource utilization, productivity, etc. Thus, it can be an excellent addition to organizations.
