Tag: Freelancer

10 Ways Time Tracking Helps You Make The Most Of Your Freelance Employees

Time Tracking for freelancers is quickly gaining popularity in the remote work industry. As more and more companies go virtual with respect to their teams and work practices.

Many companies are functioning with distributed teams that are spread out globally. The issue, most of them face, is regarding fully utilizing the freelancers they hire for different tasks.

Most are not able to do so and are generally overpaying in return for the output they’re receiving. Here are 10 ways in which you can make the most of your freelance employees and save the company’s resources using a time tracking solution.

10. Track Time for Increased Productivity

You can carry our time tracking using time tracking solutions. Many are available in the market and have multiple features and prices.

Integrate time tracking solution with your company’s platform and track your freelance employees’ productivity using that.

When working remotely, the freelancer can start the timer for a certain task they are about to work on, pause it when they take a break and end it when they are done with the task.

9. Remote Monitoring to Ensure Correct Work Track

Monitor your remote employees using a time tracking solution that supports real-time screen sharing and takes screenshots of the freelancers’ computer screen every minute.

Those screenshots can then be combined as separate frames and used to create a complete workday playback video. That way you can know exactly what your employees are working on and how their progress is going.

This will also make sure that you and your freelance team are on the same page when it comes to how tasks are attempted and what direction a project is supposed to take.

8. Implement a Schedule via Time Tracking Solution

Design a schedule for your employees and make sure that it is being followed. Considering they are freelancers and will have other tasks, the schedule must be a personalized one for each employee, fitting to their personal chores and tasks as well.

Furthermore, it must align with the work hours of the company so remote employees are available for coordination, discussions or meetings with in-house employees, whenever needed.

Productivity heat-maps for each individual must be an important consideration while creating the schedule.

7. Task-wise Billing Using A Time Tracking Software

The payment structure for freelancers is best when done task-wise or hour wise. For this, you can integrate an invoicing solution with your time tracking solution. So the billing can be done according to tasks completed and the hours worked.

The time tracking solution will have a complete record (with proofs) of the work completed by the employee. That way you can be sure that you’re not overpaying the freelancers.

6. Intelligent Report to Get Value for Money

Many leading time tracking solutions in the market offer the option of advanced reporting. Some remote employee monitoring software offers intelligent employee reports. Where the day’s screenshots are automatically categorized according to the active windows in those images, clearly telling the employer what the freelancers spent most of their time working on.

This increases transparency and if there are any wasted minutes, the employers can get to know about those within a matter of a few clicks.  

People sitting around a clock

5. Task Logging to Estimate Work Done Through Time Tracking

Make sure that your freelance employees log each and every task they perform. Whether it is a task already assigned to them or a task they performed.

When a task is logged, a record is maintained that lets the employers know how much work was actually achieved by the freelancer. Whether they are putting the best of their efforts into the work or not.

4. Clarify and Align Company’s Goals with Freelancers

In order to be sure that the employees work the same way that you expect them to, it is essential to make it clear to them what they are working for, what is the end result supposed to look like and what are you trying to achieve.

Once the goals of the company are aligned with the freelancers’ goals, then the workflows will be regulated on their own. Productivity will increase and the employees will put their best foot forth.

When the employees know how their work is going to impact the common end-goal. They will have a clear idea of the value of their work and their value as an employee to the company.

This is essential for boosting the morale of employees and pushing them to work harder.

3. Rule of Thumb: Work Smart, Not Hard

Taking up this rule will make tasks easier for you and your employees, both. Working smart saves time, energy, resources, gets things done much faster and makes searching for information much easier.

Automate timesheets instead of manually maintaining logs for each hour or each task. It is much easier to start and stop the timer with a single click, rather than manually making each entry to a timesheet.

Furthermore, it makes the job simple when all work done during the activity time is recorded and gets divided into separate categories, creating automated timesheets.

This way, your freelancers spend the majority of their time working on the actual tasks instead of logging entries manually.

2. Improve Communication via Audio Clips

Team communication impacts employee productivity and plays a major role in how your employees perform. Merely assigning them tasks using a project management tool or a time tracking software isn’t enough.

Nothing can beat the power and impact of face-to-face communication. If you cannot communicate with them in-person due to geographical boundaries, then feel free to conduct a Skype Business Call, or use a platform that helps.

You can assign tasks in the form of voice clips and allows the freelancers to respond back using voice clips as well. In case they have any query and wish to clear it prior to attempting a task.

Clear and quick communication is always verbal and enables workflow-streamlining when the teams are on one page.

1. Trust your Employee to Get the Job Done

If you’ve hired a freelancer, trust that they can get the job done as well. There is no point in hiring them otherwise.

If you try to micromanage your employees, directing their every move and telling them how to go about a task, even when they might be suggesting better ways to do it, they will simply be exhausted and irritated.

Build a certain trust level with your employees, and believe in them. Have a solution that monitors their work activity by giving you an idea of their sincerity and dedication to their work.

If they work hard, waste no time and have the required level of productivity, then let them be, sit back and let them deliver the assigned work to you, on schedule.

How Time Tracking makes Work from Home easier?

Work from Home was previously unthinkable. But today, it has been made possible because of the many amazing tools that we have available today. These tools help us connect with colleagues and bosses.

They help us organize our data on cloud computing platforms. They let us collaborate with our team members so that we can work on projects collectively while in the comfort of our homes!

All these types of tools have helped us grow the new trend of Telecommuting. And they deserve an undivided discussion. So in this post, we will discuss how time tracking software has made Work from Home easy for telecommuters and freelancers.

How Time Tracking makes Work from Home easier?

It makes employees more Organized

We all are guilty of wasting time. And we all accept that if we become a tad bit diligent about our time and become a little organized about the way we get things done, we can increase our efficiency level to a great extent.

People who use Time monitoring tools and techniques while working claim that they get a lot more out of one day as compared to the time when they did not use it.

These tools let you know how much time you spend on getting a task done and how often you get distracted during your work routine.

This information can help an efficient person get more organized as he would be able to work without being distracted.

It builds trust

One of the major reasons why employers were previously skeptical about hiring remote workers was that they didn’t trust the faraway professionals.

They felt that they cannot truly rely on them for delivering the desired quality work on time. This was a major hurdle for freelancers and the freelance world.

Time Tracking Software is a bridge between the employer and employee no matter how far apart they are. It helps tremendously in trust-building.

It makes the payment system fair

Paying the employee fairly is something that is really tricky in the world of distributed teams. Most remote workers charge by the hour and this is exactly where it gets tricky.

Did my employees actually work during those hours? Is the padding the hours or it actually took this long to get the task done? Is the person I hired really behind all the work or is he getting it done from someone else?

All these questions loom in the mind of an employer, especially when he is looking at the invoices and making payments to the remote employees.

The software delivers correct statistics related to the work done. Some smart software even goes as far as remote employee monitoring and lets the employer capture the screen activity of the employees.

This way the evidence of work done is acquired and the payments are made accordingly. Therefore, transparency is maintained.

RECOMMENDED FOR YOU: INFOGRAPHIC: GUILTY OF WASTING TIME AT WORK? WE ALL ARE!

It keeps the employers informed

When the employee is not right in front of the employer, it becomes hard to be well informed about all the aspects of the project.

This is where Time Tracking Software comes in handy. Most software has elaborate reports that shed the light on how the time was spent and how much work has been done.

The breakdown of time and activities delivers useful insights to the employers and the managers about the progress on the project so When people are empowered with the right kind of information, they can make strong and useful decisions to forward their business.

And when the businessmen and employers are satisfied with the performance and input of the employee, it ensures a smooth flow of work for the people who work from home.

It helps the employees stay focused

Time Tracking Software is brutally honest. They let the user know how they have been spending their time. The detailed breakdown of activities shows how much time we have spent on work and how much of it was wasted.

The total time taken to get a task done tells the user if he has been managing time properly or if he is getting distracted time and again.

Clever users have been able to weed out activities and distractions that slow down the work process. People who work from home have especially found it very useful.

There are a lot of distractions at home like family and personal activities. But the software that tracks time has the power of making people more focused towards work!

Conclusion

Among all the wonderful tools that have made remote work reality of the modern corporate world, Time monitoring Software wins the race as it helps the employers and the employees on a deeper level. It builds trust between the two and trust is the most important component of a relationship!

Read More: How Artificial Intelligence is changing the World

How Time Tracking Software makes Freelancing easier?

Freelancing and telecommuting are on an all-time high. Thanks to the wonderful technological advancements in the areas of Communication and Networking. Freelancing has become a choice among tech professionals as it does not hinder their careers and gives them a chance to work from the comfort of their homes.

Many freelancers are able to save time spent while commuting to the workplace. Many employers save money by not having to pay for the office premises and supplies. In short, it is a win-win situation. However, the freelancing does come with many pitfalls.

It is not always a smooth ride and the problems can have many professional and financial repercussions. To solve these issues, freelance time tracking can help a great deal.

Let’s look at some of the downsides of Freelancing and see how effective Time tracking practices can assist us!

How Freelance Time Tracking Helps

Getting distracted

While freelancers are saved from the distractions of water cooler gossips and office grapevines, they are certainly prone to different versions of distractions that are equally or sometimes even more harmful.

The freelancers who primarily work is the software business report being distracted by Social Media a lot. A small trip to Facebook might seem trivial but too many of them can amount to a few hours.

However, worry not freelancers! This problem could be easily resolved by using a good quality employee monitoring software. Today, there are many Softwares out there that could track time correct to the second.

This way, employers and employees could get a better idea of how the work hours are spent. Identifying distractions is the first step of getting over the problem.

Inaccurate billing

Many freelancers bill by the hour. They fill up spreadsheets that later translate into billable invoices. However, the practice of exaggerated billing is very common in freelancing.

Tracking time manually is often inaccurate and can cost employers more than what they really owe. Alternatively, inaccurate billing could also mean that the freelancers get paid less simply because they couldn’t keep track of the time they actually spent in getting a job done.

Automated Time tracking can actually protect everyone from a loss. Accurate employee time tracking, which provides insights into how the time is actually spent, will lead to correct billing. And neither the employee nor the employer will be in a loss.

Loss of productivity

Many freelancers face the problem of procrastination. With no-one to boss around, freelancers are at the liberty of spending the day however they like.

But this liberty can come at a cost. Many times, procrastination causes loss of productivity. Similarly, many times multitasking also causes a decline in productivity. According to a report by the American Psychological Association, multitasking causes a 40 percent drop in productivity.

Complete Employee Monitoring Software and the many innovative features keep a watchful eye over the progress of a freelancer and do not let him get off the track while working towards a goal.

Loss of quality of work

As more and more people from the 3rd world countries have started pouring into the Software business, finding good quality freelancers have become hard.

More often than not, the work delivered by freelancers isn’t of the same quality as promised by their portfolio. This discrepancy later revealed that many freelancers outsource their work on lower pricing and essentially act as a middleman.

There are a few time tracking software that provides an elegant solution to this conundrum. Some apps have the feature of real-time employee monitoring. They give the employer the option of viewing the activities and progress of the remote employee in real-time. Hence, the employer can ensure the quality of work.

Low levels of Remote Monitoring

It is a natural human trait to feel relaxed about work when nobody is looking. That is why many employers still prefer that employees join them in standard office premises every day so that the work is done. Low levels of employee monitoring can prompt employees to slow down during work, procrastinate more and in general harbor more distractions.

Many software equips employers with sophisticated tools for remote monitoring. They provide access to employees so that they can keep a hawk-eye not only on the progress made but also on the activity of the employees. Such features can greatly reduce the pains of freelancing.

While there are many time tracking software out there, the best ones are highly automated. They work behind the scenes and generate precise reports that are indeed flawless. Applications like these have greatly enhanced the confidence for telecommuting and remote working in the eyes of the employers as they get the power of vigilance and rely on the Software for correct management practices.

Keeping this in mind, we are quite positive that more and more people will opt for freelancing in the future!