You’ve turned every financial document upside down, but things just don’t add up. For some mystical reason, your company is not making the money it’s supposed to. Well, the reason may not be secretly hidden somewhere in Middle-earth with the elves and hobbits. You don’t even have to search far and wide to know why you’re losing money. Perhaps, the problem lies within the workforce and how projects and tasks are handled.
Naturally, you would want to learn how to save money when starting a business. The best way to get the most out of your budget is by ensuring that employees work in a healthy environment. You must help them reach their full potential, increase their productivity, and work more efficiently. If you’re managing a remote team, then discovering the advantages of using time tracking software is your best bet.
No matter what type or size of business you run, you’re losing money when your employees don’t handle their tasks efficiently. So, in this post, we are going to show you the reasons why time tracking is saving your money.
You Don’t Know Who’s Procrastinating
There is no such thing as a ‘professional procrastinator’! There are just people with no initiative to handle tasks efficiently. You might not be aware that some of your employees are consciously avoiding what they should be doing. Unfortunately, they are not the worst form of procrastinators. In some cases, people do not even know that they are putting off critical tasks.
You can arrange a surprise video call with your remote employee and confront them about procrastinating. However, they might simply shake their head and insist that they are not lazy. Don’t worry—you’re not imagining things. Some people genuinely are unaware that they’ve been setting aside important work. They just don’t know which tasks to prioritize.
Employees Do Not Know That They’re Procrastinating
If you’re a prolific manager, you know a trick on how to get things done right away. You’ll reach into your pocket and draw the ‘urgent’ card for your employees. What you don’t know is that there are consequences to using this card too often. People will delay the most important tasks for the day and shift their attention to less significant yet more urgent activities.
You must understand that this type of procrastination has nothing to do with being apathetic, lazy, or disengaged. So, it doesn’t count as a valid reason for you to throw binders around on a temper tantrum and lash out at your employee. This type of procrastination has more to do with the person being in a constant state of interruption.
Reality Slap: It May Be Partly Your Fault
In this scenario, your remote workers find themselves in a never-ending influx of tasks that prevent them from focusing on high-value work. They are veered away from the direction that moves your company closer towards its financial goals. There are ceaseless emergencies that leave them with no choice but to sacrifice their sacred to-do lists.
“Everything is happening so fast and there is so much to do.”
You’re free to believe and accept that this is the reality in your business. No matter how you keep it buried at the back of your mind, dilute priorities in the workplace are a result of breakdowns in your business. Your employees are procrastinating because of poor workflow management. Because there’s no proper preparation, there are always last-minute emergency meetings. You may think that you’ll receive the ‘most productive’ manager award by the end of the year. In reality, frantically sending out so many emails and over-scheduling are just losing you money.
What Are the Results of Poor Workflow Management?
You won’t notice it right away, but over time, low-performing employees can affect the business. As we’ve mentioned, it is not always your staff members’ fault that they are not productive. In some cases, it has something to do with workflow management. In most cases, when there is no efficient task administration system in place, the consequences include:
1. Lower Quantity and Quality
When your remote employees get easily distracted, they won’t complete essential tasks. What’s more, the constant ‘urgent’ activities may cause them to produce half-baked results.
“Eureka! I can get away with mediocre work!”
Once your remote employees have said this, they won’t find an incentive to do their best.
2. Some Employees will Stuck with Too Much Work
Just because people hate working in groups, it doesn’t mean that they are not team players. Hey, don’t be too quick to judge! Has it occurred to you that they’ve spent hours in therapy just to get over the fact that they always end up carrying other people’s load? Anyone can get frustrated when they are working harder than others.
Natural leaders often end up picking up the slack of low-performing employees. Of course, all workers have limited time. So, high-performing employees will have more work to do than the time they have in their hands. Eventually, they won’t be able to do their job efficiently because they’re juggling too many tasks.
3. Lower Employee Morale
When you allocate certain tasks to the wrong people, they often produce results that have to be redone. They may be genuinely doing their best, but they cannot meet deadlines. This can leave other employees feeling frustrated. Workers will find it challenging to be satisfied with their job when they’re constantly picking up the slack for other people. It is never a delight to work with a sourpuss!
Low performers are not necessarily lazy procrastinators. Some of them truly want to work and produce quality results. However, they are not suitable for the job they are doing. They’re possibly intelligent and efficient workers, but they cannot use their skills in the position they are in. In this case, it is vital for you to figure out why these employees are struggling, and this is where the benefits of using time trackers come into play. We’ll discuss more on this later.
4. Your Business Wastes Time and Money
If your employee is not usually underperforming, then perhaps, they just need a break. Talk to them and tell them, “Hey, take a chill pill!” If operations can handle the load, let them take a week-long vacation for a much-needed system reboot.
On the other hand, you need to check if some employees are consistently low performers. You must identify people who do not try to delegate specific work or take the initiative to improve their skills. Otherwise, they will cost your company money. When you do not spot these weak links, you’ll end up paying someone who’s doing much less work. When they do not accomplish enough work or they’re producing poor quality results, they may harm your business.
Ignoring this problem also means that you’re taking money away from employees who deserve a raise or promotion. You’re also wasting money on projects that need to be redone or fixed. Once you start wondering why your business is not earning as much as it is supposed to, you’ll start to contemplate the benefits of tracking employees’ time.
How Time Trackers Can Save You Money
Of course, money is important to keep your business running. So, if there isn’t enough to sustain your operations, then you might want to consider using a task tracker. Here are some ways a time tracking software can help you save money:
1. Higher Profit
When you track time, you can easily see what you’re putting your money into. You can monitor the budgets you allocate for certain projects. When you notice that some tasks are not paying off the way you planned, then you can place them at a lower position in the hierarchy.
2. Accurate Billing
Perhaps, you’re losing money because you’re paying people more than the work they accomplish is worth. Time trackers allow you to discover what tasks your freelancers have completed within a certain period. In this way, you can generate accurate bills and get your money’s worth.
3. Attainable Goals
Let’s face it. It’s harder to manage remote teams than the ones you see every day! On the other hand, you can make things easier when you use a time tracker. You can let everyone set clear goals when they are tracking the time they spend on a project. Consequently, you are removing the confusion around what each employee should be doing.
4. Better Productivity
Using task monitoring software like Traqq allows your remote team to focus on important and urgent projects. You will also discover the daily hiccups in your operations. Using the data you’ve collected, you can form strategies that will help your freelancers enjoy improved productivity.
5. Efficient Workflow Management
Monitoring tasks will give you an insight into how long it takes your freelancers to get projects done. Consequently, you can efficiently prioritize projects and foresee employee capacity.
6. Transparent Results
Time tracking apps like Traqq allow remote workers to log hours automatically, giving transparency into their job. Consequently, you can keep them accountable for the projects you assign to them.
7. Monitored Progress
Letting your office employees or freelancers track time will allow you to know if they are hitting deadlines within the work hours. The trouble with too much work to do is that employees end up completing their tasks during their free time. Of course, this cannot be healthy for them, which may cause them to produce low-quality results. So, monitoring their tasks will help you set limitations and discover whether your team can be more productive with an extra pair of hands.
Most types of businesses can enjoy the advantages of using time tracking software. Whether you’re running a startup company or a well-established business, you can increase your team’s efficiency with such a tool. With a task monitoring app like Traqq, you can watch the profits soar!
