Many of us frequently feel that we don’t waste time at all during office hours or at the workplace. In general, we come across a lot of people who say the same phrase “I was too busy.” But the fact is that we never ever actually count the number of working hours that we spent on those specific tasks.
The reason why I am saying this again and again is because, if we knew how much time we are actually spending on stuff is much less than the time we always thought we spent on those tasks, and there is a hell of a lot of scope for increasing our work productivity in a day to accomplish our targets in a faster and improvised way.
As someone once rightly said, “The first step toward change is awareness.”
If really you are aware how much time you spend on each of your daily duties or tasks, you can strive hard to increase your efficiency and productivity. Calculating tasks such as how much time you spend on completing a specific job or assignment will add up quickly. You need consciously be thinking how you will do this? Well, it’s simple. By deploying some kind of time management software or time tracking.
Time Management Software
Keeping a tab on time spent on the each and every job you did in a day is not building a satellite. All that you need is a good, efficient time tracking application that perfectly calculates the time you spend on each job. If you have a business that based on employees’ working productivity then a time tracker system not only assists you in increasing productivity but also gives the encouragement to finish the given assignment within the stipulated timeframe.
This software will give you a good effect on your overall work productivity in a day. It keeps well-performing employees encouraged all the time so that they can keep themselves as good performing employees all the time.
In addition, it brings not-so-well performing employees to the organization’s attention. Management can then keep a track on them too. For instance, one of the team members may be finding difficultly with a particular job. You can help train them sufficiently so that they can perform their work better. If self-employed, you can introduce the training and professionalism to yourself to evolve into a developed business.
Track What’s is Essential
There’s no such thing that you cannot track by using this tracking application but also it is important to keep in mind that whether it is worth to track or not. Right from your resting time to your workout, you can track every little thing that you do in a day.
However, what you need to think about is whether tracking such things will help you in increasing your productivity or not? Personally, I am not a bit interested in knowing how much time I spend on some tasks or assignment at my office. So check what’s essential and track those things.
Transparency Matters
If you are a freelance professional and usually your work depends on per hour basis, then clients certainly would want to see how effectively you spend on each assignment or job. This is one of the hard things to not only explain to clients, but also trust issues come in the relationship if you are not utilizing a time tracking app.
Freelancers very frequently don’t get full credit may be because of their working style and sometimes it could be because clients think that they don’t spend enough time working on a particular project. So by deploying a time tracking software, you can send it as proof for how many hours you spent on each of their tasks and assignments.
Here are some of the essential things that may happen if you maintain this level of transparency.
-- You don’t have to defend yourself. Your tracking software will speak for you. You shouldn't have to do this, but you will have the information if you do have to prove it. Many companies have no idea how long some tasks should take. They assume it's easy because they are not doing it and don't know.
Maybe you just want to push yourself and you can use time tracking to motivate yourself to be your best self, be faster---and make more money. And you'll be able to see it.
-- They may offer more business as you are making things easier on them.
-- They may likely recommend your services to other businesses because they know how you work.
It Will Let You Grow Globally
Right from the day of inception of your business, you need to keep maintaining strong business processes such as time tracking invoice practices, etc. This is not just productivity wise, but the your entire business enhances efficiency and productivity more than you think. Whether your business is a freelancing type work or a business (Small or medium). In addition, you can utilize your data to make smart steps in your business and your systems to decrease the minimal errors that frequently take place in an administrative work.
Simplifies Your Client Billing Processes
No matter what kind of services you offer, whether it is web design or accountancy services, the number of working hours you generally spend on your clients’ work should actually let you generate revenue for your company.
You may be memorizing or copying the time spent on each assignment from your random notes. This will only make a loss for your business in some or the other way, but it takes copious amounts of time. Because most of the times, you either would be over calculating or under calculating the hours spent -- and sometimes you lose the note you wrote on and then you can't charge your client. A couple of those unfortunate events and you can lose a lot.
See the Change for Yourself
Once you figure out after several months of time tracking, you can sit and analyze thoroughly those hours and see what can be changed. When I first tracked time of my tasks it was a complete unknown what the results would be. But once I knew what was going wrong, where I could improve and where I was spending more time -- I was immediately able to change this for my own personal benefit.
Tracking time is as important as tracking your money. You will know the time all of your activities take. You will get a helpful data that gives you insights on various aspects and whether you really want to spend you valuable time in the ways you have been.
You will immediately see if you are making profit or loss. Find out the toughest projects that are giving you hard time so that you can know how much time ideally you should spend to get the desired results and what kind of niche you should interact with frequently.
I personally believe that the main hurdle that is stopping all of us from achieving a certain goal or dream can be solved in the finding of the correct amount of time to pursue them. As far as tracking time is concerned, it is an effective way to find out where your time is going and in which direction.
Let us know what methods you have used to help yourself in improving your work efficiency. Leave in the comment section below. We would love to hear from you.