At a degree when companies are so technology-driven, guide timesheet strategies sound like a factor of the previous. It brings to thoughts your first job at a grocery retailer 20 years in the past while you needed to punch out and in on one in every of these unhealthy boys.
However imagine it or not, 38% of U.S. workers nonetheless use paper timesheets and punch playing cards. The consequence? Losses in productiveness, revenue, and your treasured time.
Immediately we’re masking a number of the downsides related to guide timesheet strategies. Whether or not you’re a one-person operation or a enterprise with dozens of workers, it’s time to think about your different choices.
The 411 on guide timesheet strategies
Guide timesheets require workers to trace the time they labored by hand. Conventional strategies embrace paper-based kinds reminiscent of bodily punchcards or weekly timesheets. Some companies have transitioned to a digital method, utilizing Excel or Google Sheets to trace hours. Nevertheless, this nonetheless requires workers to enter this system and manually document their work all through the day.
Greater than two-thirds of US workers submit a timesheet on a day by day or weekly foundation, however 22% submit one twice a month. That’s quite a lot of work to account for in a single fell swoop.
It’s 2025—why accomplish that many people nonetheless use guide timesheets?
Whereas we haven’t fairly reached a Jetsons-level reliance on expertise, it’s important to admit that the world we reside in is a digital one. Our love for (or dependence on?) tech is apparent in the necessity to always have the newest devices or in the way in which so many roles require the usage of expertise.
So, with tech utilization solely turning into extra prevalent, why do greater than a 3rd of US companies nonetheless use guide time sheet strategies?
I’d argue it’s for a number of causes—
First, the price of these guide time monitoring strategies is subsequent to nothing. Paper and pencil timesheets run you just a few cents. Google Sheets—particularly for companies who’re utilizing the Google Suite merchandise—is mainly free. These low costs might preserve companies from even contemplating another. Plenty of time monitoring software program choices require a month-to-month subscription that firms are unwilling to pay, particularly in the event that they’re supplying a complete crew with the software program.
It’s additionally an indisputable fact that some enterprise house owners and executives merely don’t wish to strive one thing new. The “If it ain’t broke, don’t repair it” mentality retains them on a well-recognized path, unwilling to swap out guide timesheets for a digital method.
Lastly, some enterprise house owners merely might not see (or have) a necessity for something apart from guide time monitoring. This might simply be the case in industries the place workers hardly ever use expertise to finish their jobs. Individuals with a commerce—like hairstylists, plumbers, or woodworkers—may not want a digital device to trace their work after they spend all day working with their palms.
Not everybody wants to maneuver away from the normal guide timesheet strategies. Nevertheless, for companies that might profit from using a digital system, there are some unintended penalties from sustaining the established order.
The results of guide timesheets on freelancers & entrepreneurs
For those who’re working solo as a freelancer or entrepreneur, monitoring your time can appear a bit of pointless. Positive, you have to log the time you’re employed in your hourly contracts, however what’s the purpose outdoors of that? You began your personal enterprise to be your personal boss. You shouldn’t must reply to the person, even when that man is your self!
As a small enterprise proprietor, you might also be working with a small finances. Guide timesheet strategies are low-cost (learn– FREE) and a sexy resolution while you’re juggling different software program for your small business.
The hesitation in utilizing a digital time monitoring device isn’t a brand new idea– we talked about it simply two weeks in the past. You’ll have determined to discover a center floor by manually recording your work all through the day. That’s completely a superb place to begin—nevertheless it’s not essentially a perfect long-term resolution.
Right here’s why—
Inefficiency
Proudly owning a enterprise means juggling two sorts of labor: work in your shoppers and work in your personal enterprise. Each are invaluable, however just one instantly generates revenue.
Guide time monitoring takes up time you possibly can be utilizing to ship proposals, full consumer work, or enhance your promoting efforts. While you streamline tedious administrative work like logging your hours, you unencumber billable hours that may add to your backside line.
And talking of billable hours…
Lacking out on billable hours
Guide time-tracking strategies usually fail to seize all client-related work. Chances are you’ll not at all times account for the ten minutes you spent replying to a Slack message earlier than mattress or the half-hour you spent researching your consumer’s opponents. This prices you the cash you rightfully earned however failed to assert.
Inaccurate monitoring additionally opens the door for scope creep. For those who’re contracted for 10 hours of labor every week, you wish to restrict your self to these 10 hours. While you fail to precisely document the entire time you spend on a consumer’s challenge, you could not even discover as your workload grows outdoors of your contractual settlement till it snowballs into one thing that’s impacting the remainder of your work and feels uncomfortable to handle.
Impacts in your skilled picture and consumer relationships
Imposter syndrome could be very actual, and it could actually deprive you of feeling like an expert though you might be one.
I’m not saying that you just’re not an actual enterprise proprietor when you don’t make the most of one million sorts of expertise, however utilizing just a few key items of software program could make you are feeling extra like an expert and provide you with confidence in navigating your consumer relationships.
Time monitoring software program that integrates together with your invoicing system makes it simpler to ship skilled invoices. For those who expertise any hourly billing disputes, you’d most likely want to reference your time monitoring software program information as an alternative of sending an image of a paper the place you wrote down your hours for the week.
Missed alternatives for data-driven selections
Guide time monitoring—if it’s correct—provides you a broad overview of the way you spend your time. You possibly can see that at 9:00 you labored on Venture A and at 10:30 you switched to Venture B. You will have a basic concept of what number of hours you labored that week and the way a lot time you spent on numerous duties.
However time monitoring software program is wealthy with information about your work habits.
Take this snapshot of my work patterns for the month of December—
My working hours sometimes span 9 am-3 pm. From taking a look at this report, I can inform that my productiveness peaks about halfway by way of the day. This helps me know when to schedule my writing work and when to schedule administrative and communication-related duties as bookends to my day when my focus isn’t as sturdy.
A Google sheet itemizing what I did that day isn’t going to provide me the identical sorts of insights.
The results of guide timesheets on a enterprise
I do know that the majority of you might be freelancers and entrepreneurs—small enterprise house owners trying to optimize their processes and improve their income.
However many giant firms are nonetheless caught within the early 2000s, asking workers to manually account for his or her hours whereas spearheading million-dollar tasks. I used to show in one of many largest college districts in my state, with a working annual finances close to $30 million, and categorized employees submitted their timesheets on a chunk of paper that was popped into their worker mailbox every week.
In a current weblog publish, our CEO, Brian Ficoa, shared that RescueTime ceaselessly fields requests from firms who’re searching for a solution to monitor their workers’ work. I wish to converse to these readers as nicely, outlining the pitfalls of guide time monitoring and suggesting a center floor to assist observe time labored with out appearing like Large Brother.
Guide timesheet strategies are financially inefficient over time
On the floor, guide timesheets sound reasonably priced. They don’t require firms to put money into time monitoring software program or the related prices—further licenses, coaching, and so forth.
Nevertheless, the time inefficiency of guide time monitoring additionally has a value, by way of each cash and productiveness. The time that workers spend monitoring and coming into their time every week is taken away from hours they might be finishing precise firm work. However the associated fee doesn’t cease there. Managers or payroll workers then must take all of that data and switch it into the payroll software program. As a substitute of mentoring workers or overseeing tasks, managers are spending their time ensuring individuals are paid accurately.
We’re liable to human error
Guide timesheets are extra liable to being mistaken than being proper. Analysis exhibits that US employers must right errors on 80% of timesheets submitted by workers. Most frequently it’s as a result of workers can’t keep in mind their actual hours or they neglect to clock in or out.
Compliance points
Workers wish to be paid for each minute they work—and rightfully so!
Lawsuits associated to the Truthful Labor Requirements Act have risen by 417% since 1997. Whereas nearly all of these lawsuits relate to eating places, lodges, healthcare suppliers, and building firms, they are often filed towards any firm not following the laws outlined by the FLSA.
For instance, the FLSA requires that timesheets must be stored for two years. Nevertheless, solely 16% of enterprise house owners are conscious of this legislation, and solely 36% know that they should preserve payroll data for at the least 3 years. There are quite a lot of companies on the market that haven’t maintained the suitable data as a result of who needs to carry onto submitting cupboards filled with timesheets?
Worker dissatisfaction
A pal of mine was not too long ago coming into her time for the week on the digital platform that her firm makes use of for timekeeping. As she vented concerning the complexities of this system, she snarkily famous, “However they provide a category on the way to enter your time if I wish to attend that!”
Few workers benefit from the guide means of coming into their time. It takes away from time they might be spending on extra significant work. Ensuring each second is precisely accounted for can even lead to stress and nervousness.
It’s time to shift to automated time monitoring options
For small companies, groups working remotely, and freelancers, RescueTime created a brand new product to automate time monitoring and supply perception into the place their time went every day.
RescueTime Timesheets simplifies timesheet era, reduces guide entry time, and enhances crew productiveness by automating monitoring and job assignments. Our automated timesheets remove the fear you could have about logging your hours accurately or lacking out on billable hours you by no means recorded. It consists of easy monitoring instruments so that you’re at all times updated together with your challenge standing—and subsequently on observe to fulfill your deadlines.
Timesheets additionally integrates with GitHub, Asana, and Trello that will help you observe the work you full for every of your shoppers. Calendar integrations with Google and Outlook can help you see conferences in your day by day timeline.
While you strive RescueTime, you get Timesheets without spending a dime. What are you ready for?
