Why Agency Time Tracking is Critical for Success

Most if not all creatives despise tracking their time, and as a manager, you constantly deal with the incessant groans and pushback. You've heard it all before, and we're here to reassure you with a list of useful advantages, that yes, the benefits of time tracking outweigh the annoyances and office naysayers. 

• "We do value-based pricing or fixed fee work - why should we bother tacking our hours?"
• "What is the real value of time tracking? What do you ultimately get out of it?"
• "My timesheet is kind of rushed, and honestly never really acurate... so why should we?"
• Conclusion

With Service Operations Automation, you can eliminate the manual pain from timesheets and make tracking time as easy as clicking a button. Still not sure? Let's address 3 common misconceptions about time tracking.

"We do value-based pricing or fixed fee work - why should we bother tacking our hours?"

There's a common misconception, that time tracking equates to billing (people tend to use lawyers as a prime example). So, the thinking goes, if you do either value based or fixed fee work, you don't need to track your hours, right? Wrong. As an agency, the main cost of your business is the talented people employed. If you don't track how you and your colleagues spend their time, there's no real way of knowing if the work you're doing is actually profitable. The only way to know for sure is to log time and gain better insight and understanding into what each employee has accomplished.

"What is the real value of time tracking? What do you ultimately get out of it?"

Tracking your time time can demonstrate just how hard you're working. When doing client-based work you're putting your success in their hands. How? How many times do you have to make revisions to appease your clients and their vision? You shouldn't be judged because they had trouble making up their minds and the outcome doesn't reflect your best work. After all you had to rush to meet their deadline. Tracking time showcase your tireless hours and effort. Think of it as your insurance policy. It backs you up in case someone blames you for something that you are not at fault for.

"My timesheet is kind of rushed, and honestly never really acurate... so why should we?"

Historically speaking, tracking time has been a very manual process. Instead of real-time tracking we rely on our memories and various scribbled down notes to recall what we did over the course of the week. It's easy to forget what we did a few hours ago, it's no surprise that our timesheets have been a result of our best guesstimates. But nowadays with modern systems, like ServOps, automatically sync with your email, calendar and smartphone, pre-populating your timesheet based on people you have emailed, meetings you have attended, even places you have been with the power of geolocation. No longer is your timesheet a mess of guesses, but you can accurately keep track and advocate for your work. 

Conclusion

As you can see, tracking time is critical to not only the business, but to every employee. It's a way for them to take pride in their work, empower the company they work for, and back them up in case they need it. So, the next time one of your employees dwell on having to track their hours, remind them that there's more positives and much more useful ways to spend this valuable time (that they can also add to their timesheet!) If you have yet to check out Accelo, sign up for a free trial today!