Time Is Money – Ben Franklin
Whether you’re asking “Does anybody really know what time it is?” or wondering if you can turn back time, there’s no doubt that keeping track of it is vital for your business. Obviously having a way employees can clock in and clock out prevents you from underpaying or overpaying them, but setting a clock while employees work on projects can be just as important.
It doesn’t matter what size your business is, your time is your most precious resource. Whether you are working on a project, driving to an appointment, or talking on the phone, when you own a business, you must put a value on every minute. Ignoring or downplaying time’s importance can lead to decreased productivity, a weaker bottom line, and employee burnout…all of which are things you want to avoid!
Time Is the Wisest Counselor of All – Pericles
If you’ve been in the same business for years, doing the same types of projects all that time, and your business isn’t one that needs to change with the times all that much…then and only then would I say that you have a great handle on exactly how much time it takes to do your job.
If, on the other hand, your business is one that needs to take advantage of modern technology and changes in business environment to change and evolve on a monthly or annual basis, the new processes may totally skew how much time you end up spending…which makes it impossible to know how much you need to estimate to do the job next time.
Using a time-tracking app today will help you to quote those projects better tomorrow!
And if you are a company that bills strictly by the hour, you can end up cheating your client or yourself—and who’s to say which is worse!—if you aren’t keeping an accurate record.
The Key Is In Not Spending time, But In Investing It – Stephen R. Covey
How much time are your employees spending on specific projects for clients? Even more specifically, how much time is each individual employee spending on discreet tasks within those projects? If you can’t answer those questions, there’s a pretty good chance that you don’t know if your employees are making the best use of their time.
With proper time tracking, you will be able to see all the tasks that go into a project and see that “Employee A” is spending 6 hours on the project doing 8 specific tasks, while “Employee B” is only spending 3 hours to do 12 tasks. Examine these tasks and you may find out that “B” is better at certain things, so she can complete them more efficiently than “A.” Maybe “A” needs to have different tasks within the project…but how will you tell if there’s not a good measuring stick?
The key is to find ways to make all the members on your team their most efficient, so the company as a whole spends less money to perform a project…and free up time for the team to tackle more projects! It also ends up giving each member a better sense of accomplishment, which keeps morale high and works against burnout.
Time Is The Most Valuable Thing A Man Can Spend – Theophrastus
If you spend a little time tracking what is going on within your company, you will likely end up getting even more time back in the end. When you deploy your employees to perform the tasks they are most efficient at, you can shave minutes off each tasks, possibly netting hours every day when you add up all the minutes each employee saves. As I stated before, that means more projects for the company, which means more billable hours for other clients.
Never forget that no matter what you are doing, your time is worth whatever value you ascribe to it. If you continue to think about each hour wasted as an hour that can’t be billed, you will find ways to increase your efficiency, streamline your processes, and create less waste.