How to promote the rapid adoption and productive use of a Time Tracking tool by your employees? Honestly, the question is worth asking since most people spontaneously have a negative or suspicious attitude when they hear about time tracking. It is therefore important to be imaginative and inventive when introducing your new timesheet tool to facilitate a smooth transition.
Introducing time tracking to your employees can sometimes be difficult. Many people are reluctant to track their time, either because they don’t see the need or because they’ve had a bad experience in the past.
How you present time tracking to your staff can make a big difference in their effective use. Likewise, you should also explain why time tracking is important to the company. The better employees understand the impact their time tracking has on the success of the business, the more likely they will adopt the timesheet tool.
Communicate the value of time tracking
Most people get frustrated when they feel like they are being forced to do something for no reason. If your employees must spend time on a new task, they want to know why. In other words, the first and most important step to getting buy-in from your employees is: be upfront about why they need to clock in their time and what you’re going to do with the data.
Be transparent about why time tracking is important
Most employees sincerely want their business to succeed. They are willing to go the extra mile to achieve it. Make it clear to them why time tracking is key to the company’s success. You can even show them examples of reports you will create from their timesheet data.
Here are some common reasons why companies track time that you can share with your employees:
– Track billable hours: if you bill by the hour, show your employees how tracked hours will be incorporated into invoices and how the company’s revenue depends on tracking hours.
– Keep projects on track: if you use time tracking to make sure projects are on budget, show employees the reports you’ll create to track project progress.
– Make better estimates: show employees how time tracking will allow you to create a library of past projects and how this information will improve your estimates and profits.
– If your organization makes research and development requests, the documentation of that request is heavily dependent on notes and descriptions taken on a daily basis.
Be honest about what time tracking is not for
There are a lot of fears about time tracking. Many people think it means the company is going to monitor everything they do. Reassure employees (and encourage them to clock in and out) by being clear about what’s not going to happen.
Let employees know that you will not use time tracking to spy on them. Make it clear that the Timesheet does not do any monitoring.
Also emphasize that accuracy is the most important thing, not the number of hours they work each week. Let them know there is no penalty if they work less than forty hours in a given week. Otherwise, your employees may “make up” what they think you want.
When timesheets are well filled out, the method of compensation can even be modified to benefit those who are a little more committed to deliverables and meeting deadlines.
Conclusion
It’s critical that your employees develop good timesheet habits to keep your data accurate and complete. If you don’t get their buy-in to clocking their time consistently, timesheet data will be incomplete and/or inaccurate; this will limit your view of the status of projects and mortgage your ability to make informed decisions.
In short, when it comes to your timesheet tool, employee buy-in is essential.
