Johannesburg, 03 Aug 2015
When an employee signs up a contract of employment with an employer to render services either on a contractual or full-time basis, in reality employees are trading their skills and time in return for income, which the employer must provide for services rendered to it, so it can also generate its own income. Like they say: "Time is money."
This precious exchange can be easily abused. The employer will more likely keep his end of the deal by paying the promised remuneration for services rendered and time spent in their employ. However, some employees are not always diligent in keeping their end of the deal. This happens in the main because employers do not always have time and/or ability to ensure optimum, meaningful and proper usage of time.
Some employees do not have the necessary time management skills. There are those employees who will work the required number of hours, but still be unproductive, while others will work fewer hours and be very productive, bringing the necessary revenue. Break-time is one important time in an employee's day. One employee might be taking long and/or frequent breaks, while others might not be taking sufficient or any breaks. Any of these employees may either significantly bring about increase or decrease in revenue depending on their time management abilities. Some employees might not efficiently execute their tasks or they might forget some of their tasks. Employees must be taught how to use time effectively in order to add value to the company and bring the much needed revenue. Research on better task execution and continuous coaching and learning are extremely critical when it comes to time management.
The employers need to have a good time management plan in place for employees to utilise. This can range from a clear definition of what each employee's daily tasks and duties are. It would help to have some well researched and good averages for how long each task normally takes to accomplish according to the employee's level of skills, knowledge and experience, bearing in mind there might be variations and/or adjustments every now and then. There is also a need to keep employees' levels of concentration at the right level throughout the day. Some companies might have defined 'coffee breaks', while others have flexible 'coffee times'. A precise to-do list is at the centre of this approach with clear and set deadlines in terms of deliverables.
Even more important is having a good old time management tool or system where employees can be required to capture their time daily. A good tool or system is one that will allow employees to capture start time, end time in respect of each task, and also capture the total duration of each break or breaks, whichever is applicable, and a brief description of what the employee was doing each and every day while on duty. In cases where there is a time-driven project then a project number and assigned tasks and any other necessary detail would be necessary to include in the time management system. This will enable the employer to have a good insight and view of what the employees are expected to do and what they have been doing on a daily basis.
A good time management system must also have a capability to allow for reports to be generated out of it at a touch of a button. The reports will assist the employer to get an overview of the trends and draw the necessary conclusions. Some of these systems will have both real-time capturing capacity and leave of absence capturing. It would be easy to see the trends, including whether or not such trends have a negative or positive influence on other employees. For instance, it would be easy to identify if some employees achieve more in a day when a certain employee is present or absent given the shift in work load where necessary. This behaviour can then be addressed accordingly by taking the necessary measures to plan ahead in instances of leave of absence, for example.
With the usage of some good time management strategies in conjunction with an IT time management system, like the one provided by iMbasa IT, one is able to manage time more effectively and proactively, taking the necessary precautionary steps to promote effective time management and avoid losses and prevent time wastage. The great thing about this system is that it is easy to use, and capturing of time does not erode the employee's billable and valuable time. The fact that it can also be accessed using a mobile phone is an added advantage. The employees just have to make sure they capture their time on a daily basis, while the assigned and performed tasks are still fresh in their minds. Employers are able to log into the system and check on all their employees' activities as captured in the timesheets. Employers are able to draw very informative reports out of the time management system.
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