If you’ve ever managed a project you know it’s much harder than it sounds. You need to coordinate your team carefully, ensure everyone knows what they’re supposed to do, that they’re following the timelines, and that the client is happy with how everything is going.

What all projects have in common is their life cycle, and it consists out of four stages: initiation, planning, execution and closure. Work time track tool can help you improve all of these stages, so let’s see how.

Stage 1: Initiation

The first step of project management includes client negotiations. It all starts with the client sending you a request for a quote. This request usually includes basic project requirements, and you’re left to determine how long would it take you to complete that project, as well as how much would you charge for it. At the same time, this client reaches out to multiple other companies, asking them the same thing, so whether you get the project or not depends on your answer.

You don’t want to underestimate the project and give it a deadline and budget that are impossible to handle. On the other hand, you don’t want to overestimate it, charge too much or prolong the project, because you definitely won’t get it.

Basing your estimation solely on your memory and guessing won’t get you far, so you should look into the historical data of your work time track app and check how long it took you to complete similar projects in the past. The data includes everything – even the procrastination time – so you can rest assured you’re giving an informed and accurate project estimate to the client.

Stage 2: Planning

Now that you’ve won the project, you must plan it’s execution. Think about how many people you need, which people you want to work on the project, what are the smaller tasks that make it, and what’s the due date for each of them.

Once again, you can use the work time track dashboard to set up a project, assign employees, and create smaller tasks for each of them. Additionally, you can check how busy each of your workers is, and give the project to those who actually have the time to handle it.

Stage 3: Execution

During the execution phase, your team will be working on their tasks while you oversee them and keep updating the client on the project progress. Work time track app will help you see if anyone on your team is procrastinating, as well as if you’re approaching the project deadline and budget limit.

Additionally, the tool has a client login feature, which gives your clients gated access to their project’s data. This way, not only you’ll be giving your clients proof of work, you also won’t receive questions about project progress on a daily basis.

Stage 4: Closure

The final stage of the project is when you provide clients with the final product, and charge them for your work. Since you’ve been tracking all portions of the project with your time tracking tool, you’ll have an accurate number of hours, and minutes, your team has spent working on it. Therefore, you’ll be able to charge the client precisely for the number of hours worked.

You should also use this stage to analyze the data your work time track app gathered during the project. Check if there were any bottlenecks and see what caused them. Have a meeting with the team who worked on it, and give praise where it’s due, but also point out the areas for improvement.

Wrap Up

After you’ve tracked several projects with your time tracker, you’ll get a grip on which data should you be analyzing and measuring, and which should stay ignored. It’s impossible to track and analyze everything, so don’t overburden yourself with that. You already have enough work as it is.