Preparation is everything
Preparing the rollout of a time tracking system can be a decisive factor in getting your employees on board. But how do you prepare yourself and your team properly? Here are 3 steps you can take in advance:
1. Find the right tool for you and your team
The first step could also be seen as step 0. When it comes to introducing a time tracking system, thinking about your team right at the decision stage will definitely make your life as an employer easier.
What exactly does that mean? A solution that is ideal for you is not necessarily ideal for your employees. Time tracking has two sides: the admin side and the user side. On the admin side you see your employees' clocked hours, the timesheets, the vacation requests, employee data and so on. What you may come into contact with far less is time tracking itself. With digital time tracking, that means the app, its features and its design. These two sides can look very different.
Our tip is to involve employees in the decision-making process who can take a look at the user side. They may have requirements for the system that you were not aware of. Try to find a solution together that works for both sides.
2. Manage the rollout deliberately
When introducing the new time tracking system, we recommend starting with small groups. Pick a handful of employees in your business to run a first test phase with you. Once you have settled on a solution, these employees are already experts on the system. They can support you throughout the rest of the rollout - whether that means answering questions, running small training sessions or simply being a source of support for colleagues in everyday work.
3. Communicate your plan
Communication is an important point. If you want the new tool to be well received in your business, there is no way around having an open conversation with your employees.
Alongside a basic explanation of how the system works and why you are introducing it, you should also explain the benefits for your employees in this conversation. Time tracking still comes with prejudices in some people's minds. You can give those space and address them in this conversation too, because there is one thing you should communicate clearly: time tracking is there to protect employees, nothing else!
Simple arguments for time tracking
As mentioned earlier, it can also help to communicate the benefits of a digital time tracking system in order to get your employees on board with the tool. The following arguments might help:
1. Relief and efficient working through digitalization
Digitalization automates processes, so tedious bureaucracy drops to a minimum. That gives your employees more time for what they really love about their work. In other words: instead of losing time and nerves over slips of paper, a digital time tracking system lets your employees focus better on what matters.
Coordination, scheduling discussions and document exchange also happen far faster digitally. At the same time this lowers the stress level in your business and raises your employees' motivation. But it does not mean that personal conversations, meetings and coffee breaks are scrapped.
2. Flexibility thanks to mobile time tracking
Working from anywhere at any time - digital time tracking makes that possible. Using the app, your employees can clock in and out from anywhere and record their activities.
3. Strong transparency in the business
Digital time tracking does not only mean automated processes and efficient working. It also means that hours are recorded correctly and that time worked can be billed correctly. For your employees it can also mean that overtime gets automated processes and no working hours fall through the cracks any more.
4. Occupational safety is ensured & promoted
Because of the obligation to record working time recently established by the Federal Labour Court (Bundesarbeitsgericht), recording working hours is mandatory for all businesses in Germany. This obligation is based on the German Occupational Safety Act (Arbeitsschutzgesetz). Under it, employers must ensure that legal requirements such as break times and rest periods are observed in the business. Introducing a time tracking system ensures this.
5. Modern work processes
Today, using digital tools has become an integral part of many people's lives. Businesses that carry on processing data by hand and organising slips of paper will run into problems with their competitiveness in the future, and with recruiting new employees too. You can read more about the changing labour market here.
Handling time tracking the right way
You have introduced a time tracking system in your business - now what? Does it all run by itself from here? Well, a look at reality shows that this is not always the case. But don't worry, we won't leave you on your own here either. We want to answer a few questions that may come up in your business during use and that you may not have thought about in advance:
How do I make sure my employees don't feel stalked?
Time tracking is aimed above all at employees. As set out in the working time recording obligation of the Federal Constitutional Court (Bundesverfassungsgericht), its purpose is to ensure that the requirements of the German Working Hours Act (Arbeitszeitgesetz, ArbZG) are met. Those are primarily break times and rest periods, maximum working hours and the ban on working on Sundays and public holidays. All of these requirements serve to protect your employees' mental and physical health.
To stop your employees from feeling uncomfortable with working time tracking, you should communicate these points clearly. Working time tracking has the great side effect of generating automatic timesheets and taking a lot of work off your hands, but it is not intended for monitoring employees.
My employees don't clock in regularly - what can I do?
"Not clocking in properly" can mean two things: do they forget to clock in, or are they perhaps clocking in incorrectly on purpose? Forgetting to clock in or out can happen to any of us. In this case digital time tracking systems offer the option of correcting entries afterwards. In just a few clicks they can either adjust their hours themselves or send a request to the administrator (that is, you or your HR department) to change the hours. With all of these changes, the originally clocked hours are always preserved.
If this process becomes an everyday occurrence, though, you should take other measures. If your employees generally start at the same time every morning, for example, you can set that up in the system. Your employees are then clocked in automatically every morning and can clock out again either themselves or, likewise, automatically at the end of shift. If your employees' start times are somewhat more flexible, you can also have notifications sent to the relevant device to remind your employees to clock in.
There are creative ways to remind your employees to clock in, too. In some businesses it can help to turn clocking in into a game or to reward it. Sometimes it is enough to leave post-its on desks as a reminder, or to place the time tracking device where people cannot miss it as they come in.
But what if I suspect that my employees are deliberately not clocking in correctly? In that case it is working time fraud. You can find more on this topic here.
How do I handle smoking breaks and coffee breaks under time tracking?
Smoking breaks are a hotly debated topic even without time tracking. The big question is: are smoking breaks, or coffee breaks for that matter, active breaks that should really be clocked? We cannot give you a definitive answer to that question. In the end it is an individual decision that you either have to make for your business or make together with your team. This article may help you with it.
The right time tracking for your business
Still looking for the right tool for your team? With clockin you tackle not just time tracking - but your whole administrative day: vacation requests, sick leave notifications, project hours, documentation and team communication all come together in one app. The lean design makes the rollout easy - for you and for your employees.
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