For companies that are looking for new and innovative ways to make their output more efficient, there are many options out there. For companies that are also looking to achieve this goal while not spending more money, there is one excellent way to do this: Electronic timekeeping systems are effective ways to monitor your employee’s time to make their work output more efficient. While standard electronic timekeeping systems typically only include clock in and punch out options, to really make a difference in your workplace, look for a Time Allocation System (TAS) as well.
What are Electronic Timekeeping Systems with Time Allocation?
The point of a Time Allocation System (TAS) is to enable electronic timekeeping systems to take their automation one step further into your employee’s workday. Instead of just automating the start and finish of their workday, a TAS automatically allocates each hour of the work day for specific tasks, jobs and events. Typically, this will involve assigning X amount of hours to one project, Y amount to another job, Z amount to cost centers, and so on and so forth.
This keeps your employees focused on time-centric tasks, ensuring that they aren’t spending too little or too much time on any one aspect of their job. Through the reporting function of your electronic timekeeping systems, you’ll be able to tell which employees are succeeding and which are slacking, or notice that certain tasks need more or less time allocated to them if the entire department is showing the same time management trends on a specific task.
How Does an Electronic Timekeeping System with TAS Work?
There are many ways that you (or you can even allow your employees to assign their own time each day) can set the specific task times at the beginning of each work day, week or month. Here are some of the most popular options:
1. Punch Clock Terminal.
Depending on permission levels, managers and/or employees can allot their hours right from the punch clock terminal at the beginning of their day. They can also return to the punch clock throughout the day to reassign hours, giving them a real time way to check in and managers a real time method of monitoring progress on tasks throughout the day. The employee punches in a sequence off key strokes and then when they punch into a new task, the hours from the previous task automatically clock out, giving managers a precise look at how their employees spend their time at work.
2. Employee Clockcard Modification.
Supervisors and managers can view any employee’s worked hours via their clockcard, breaking down the various tasks of the day through categories such as job codes, projects, cost centers, departments, etc. This gives you an excellent way to see exactly where time is being wasted across a number of categorical variances.
3. Employee Self Service.
Employees self monitor their jobs and tasks by clocking onto the next one when they complete their current task. They can also clock into categories such as “NOTASK,” “NOCLIENT” and “DEFAULT” if your company sets these options up. This allows some more freedom to the electronic timekeeping system for companies that might not have the most traditional setup (e.g. tech startups, online consultants, etc.).
4. iPhone or Android Applications.
You can also set up your electronic timekeeping systems to be controlled through individual iPhones or Androids. These can be company issued or personal phones of the employees that are granted access to the system through a user-created account. Your employees can then use this free app provided by the electronic timekeeping system to either automatically sync into your time management server or input their hours manually.
If you choose to automatically sync, the supervisors and managers can assign a list of tasks, projects, clients and other types of categories which will pick up the nearest employee that is available for the task and automatically sync them into the task they are to move onto next. This works very well for versatile departments and employees who might wear more than one or two hats at work, or for projects that are waiting for a specific employee to become free, such as an engineer or electrician.
5. Employee Timesheets.
The timesheets your employees keep throughout the week can be physically entered into a computer and at the end of each week; they are submitted to a manager or supervisor for approval. Once approved, the timesheets are put through to be collected for meta data analysis through a report generation system, giving you a better way to keep track of your employees’ work hours.landline clocking systems work on the 1-800 number through reverse billing, there is no equipment to setup and no additional costs to your employees—all they have to do is use any landline phone and call in to clock in or out.
