Every team has productivity ups and downs, some days it just feels like they’re not motivated enough to handle the work they’re supposed to. This is perfectly normal, as long as it doesn’t turn into a habit. If it does, you must look for the cause of such behavior and help your team overcome the issue.
One way to do it is with a work time tracker. This tool can help you out in multiple different scenarios, and we’ll show you how.
Poor Communication
Poor communication is the cause of most issues within a team. In the case of poor time management, bad communication includes not informing the team properly about the project requirements, deadlines, and schedule. Additionally, team members must maintain proper communication levels amongst themselves in order to complete the project.
If you’re looking to put an end to this, lead by example. Each time you start a new project, gather everyone who’s involved and explain the project in detail. Start by laying out the client’s requirements, then follow with delegation, timeline, and deadlines. Follow up this meeting with an email which will include everything you’ve discussed.
To prevent any further communication issues regarding the project, create a group chat or a channel on your app of choice which will be used solely for the project updates and queries.
Who’s in Charge?
If you’re running a large team on multiple projects, it can be hard to keep up with who’s doing what. Not if you’re using a work time tracker. The most usual use case of such software is to track time on projects and tasks, meaning there’s an admin dashboard you can use to create these projects and tasks and assign them to different employees.
With so much work on their plate, it’s normal employees sometimes forget they were supposed to finish that task and not their colleague. But with a tracker, they always have an overview of the tasks they’re handling.
Also, next time you have an urgent matter someone should handle, just open up your dashboard and check how busy everyone is. Additionally, if an employee is suddenly absent, you can easily find who’ll cover for them in this same way.
Also, this feature is quite handy if you’re looking to check who was in charge of a task that wasn’t properly handled, or of those that exceeded clients’ expectations.
Deadlines and Timelines
When we don’t have a set deadline for a certain task, or if the deadline is far in the future, we tend to procrastinate, thinking “I have time to do this.” On the other hand, when the deadlines are tight we feel like we’re under constant pressure, and that we’ll burn out soon.
Neither of these options is good for improving time management. Luckily, if you’re using your work time tracker regularly, you can see how long on average it takes for every task, and set deadlines and timelines according to those numbers. The data will show you how long it really takes to finish something while considering procrastination, social media browsing, chatting with colleagues, and everything else in between.
Having a clear deadline will help your employees organize their time at work in a much better way, so make sure you set up due dates, and urgency levels to every task you assign to your employees through the time tracker.
Wrap Up
These are the three most common causes of poor time management at work. Some others include too much control, not enough time for breaks or jokes in between the tasks, etc.
It’s important you keep an open door policy and listen to your team when they have complaints or suggestions on how to improve the workflow. The workflow updates also help improve time management, so there’s no reason not to try something your team members suggested.
In any case, a work time tracker is set to help you out improve everyone’s productivity by improving their time management, so we suggest you give it a try.
