Timesheet Best Practices: Driving down the cost and increasing the efficiency of time capture

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Timesheet Best PracticesDriving down the cost
and increasing the efficiency of time capture
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Automating timesheets

• Challenges of automating timesheets
• Best practices solutions
• The payoff
• Return on investment

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The Timesheets Business Challenge
Addressing multiple business needs with one
solution
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Challenges of Timesheet Collection

• Lengthy Turn-around Times and Procedures
• Time and costs of tracking down late or missing
  time sheets
• Manual, paper-based approval process
• Drains on employee and project manager
  productivity
• Errors and Inefficiencies
• Time reporting errors due to inaccurate project
  codes and time data
• Re-key often required in Payroll or Billing
• Delayed billing cycles slow turn-around on
  receivables
• Lack of Real-Time Data
• Inability to capture real-time billing and
  revenue data
• Difficulty tracking project status and cost
• Lead times in obtaining employee utilization
  information

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The path of the timesheet today
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Typical problems with the process
Late
Incorrect Approver
Illegible Signature
Missing Info
Paper Lost!
Re-key
Old Codes
Invalid Codes
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Best Practice Solutions for timesheets
Streamline and automateVisibility Increase
accountabilityPerformance improvement
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Streamlined and Automated timesheets

• Automated time capture increases efficiency and
  reduces the cost of
• Managing projects and activities that utilize
  cross-departmental teams
• Project resource allocation and utilization
• Internal cost allocation and/or charge-backs
• Time and attendance tracking

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Why automate time reporting?
Provides real time visibility into time recorded
Eliminates paper forms and manual processing

• Reduces time collection and accounting costs

Improves management of project costs
Increases reporting accuracy
Increases employee productivity
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Process improvements
2. Employee complete electronic timesheet
Clockware timesheets
5. System sends approved timesheet to
appropriate back office system
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Improvement points
Eliminate Delays
Eliminate Paper
Clockware timesheets
Automated Workflow
Valid Codes
No Re-keying
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Timesheets to Manage Projects
Project managers should be able to answer the
following questions
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To manage internal costs
Empowers managers throughout the organization to
answer the following questions
timesheets is a great complement to ABC or ABM
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Core System Features
Billing/ Payroll
Employee
Manager
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Process Improvements Benefits

• Increased productivity
• Any time, anywhere access
• Project and tasks code default based on employee
• Easy access to valid and active project codes

Employee

• Streamlines and automates timesheet collection
  and reminder process
• Timesheet data is validated on entry
• System ensures that proper approvals are obtained

Timesheet Admin
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Process Improvements Benefits

• Real-time visibility to time recorded
• Timely billing and revenue recognition
• Improved management of project resources
• Increased focus on strategic activities

Manager

• Elimination of re-key activities
• Accelerated billing cycles and cash flow
• Timely and accurate payroll processing

Billing Payroll
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Case Study Atex Media Solutions
Provides content and information management
solutions for publishers. Over 300 employees in
20 locations world-wide, many of whom are
telecommuters.
Project Objectives
Results

• Extremely easy to deploy
• Very user-intuitive minimal training required
• Easy fit with SQL database
• Managers able to view data in many different ways

• Replace paper-based timesheets process
• Improve effectiveness of management reporting
  tools

Core Requirements

• Fully web-based solution due to high number of
  remote employees
• Ease-of-use and ease-of-deployment
• Compatibility with the companys existing SQL
  database
• Flexibility and ability to customize

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Case Study Volvo IT North America
Formerly the IT division within Volvo, became an
independent subsidiary in 1998. As a result, the
2500 employees in this centralized service
organization needed the ability to track and bill
time.
Project Objectives
Results

• 100 deployed in 60 days
• Able to collect real-time performance and
  employee utilization data
• Automated payroll data collection
• Helps organization prioritize time
• Employees bill time more effectively

• Implement centralized timesheets solution
• Establish billing procedures to bill other Volvo
  organizations for products services

Core Requirements

• System must be easy to install and manage
• Easy to deploy
• Easily accessible to all employees

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What is your organizational readiness for
automated timesheets? Questions for internal
discussion
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Key questions for internal discussion

• Do we require employees/contractors to track time
  on paper or Excel timesheets?
• Are managers responsible for authorizing
  timesheets before they are routed to the
  appropriate back office system for processing?
• Do we have administrative employees who manage
  the timesheet process?
• Do we need to be able to track time so that we
  can understand how much it costs us to develop
  and deliver products or services?
• Would an automated timesheets solution would help
  us execute our Activity Based Costing/Management
  strategy more effectively?

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Key questions for internal discussion

• 6. Which employees are required to record
  attendance data on a daily or weekly basis?
• 7. Do project managers frequently manage
  resources who do not report to them?
• 8. Is timesheet data is manually entered into the
  appropriate back office system by staff in our
  accounting, finance, payroll and/or billing
  departments?
• 9. Is time incurred by overhead departments is
  charged back to the departments for whom the work
  was performed?
• 10. Do we charge third parties for work performed
  by our employees/contractors?

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Costs of business as usual (BAU)

• What are the costs of our current timesheets
  process?
• What are our true costs for timesheet data
  collection and approval process? That is
  employee, managers, accounting/payroll, billing
• Do we have double data entry costs?
• Are we losing money from
• selling unprofitable products (not knowing our
  true costs)
• being over budget on fixed-bid contracts (not
  knowing our project costs from one phase to the
  next)
• Opportunity cost of
• project budget over-runs
• poor resource allocation

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Timesheets system savings

• Quick hit savings challenges
• Timesheet data entry, submissions and approvals
  take an average of 2 hours per employee per
  month. Can you reducing these costs by 50?
• Timesheet data entry errors and double key entry
  can cost 40,000 per year for every 100
  employees. Can you reduce these costs by 80?
• Timesheet lateness and change edits can slow
  billings or charge-backs. How much are we losing
  from late timesheets?
• A certain percentage of projects run over-budget
  because of poor visibility into project progress
  and costs. What percentage of our projects can
  be better managed from real-time project
  information?
• A certain percentage of projects miss deadlines
  because of inadequate resource allocation. What
  percentage of our projects would benefit from
  easier project monitoring and resource management?