How to Track Employee Time Without Insulting Them

There comes a day when you, as a small business owner, find that you need to start tracking your employees' time. Thoughts of employee rebellion and havoc in the office fill your mind. How is my team going to react?  Are they going to hate me? Will they think I don't trust them? They just might, unless you follow these four simple steps.

Step 1 - Buy Your Employees Some Pizzas

Schedule a company-wide lunch meeting by letting everyone know that it’s going to be a free lunch. People love pizza, and I suggest ordering several variations, so every team member gets what they like. Also, let it be known that you'd like to discuss something with the team after lunch. This allows them to prepare accordingly.

Step 2 - Explain Why Implementing an Employee Time Clock was a Difficult Decision

Explain that this was a decision you pondered for a long time. Be honest and let your employees know that you were worried how they would react about punching a clock. Go ahead and get a little emotional here -- no crying, please. The idea here is to let them know that you really care and that this was not just a way to crack down and control your employees.

Step 3 - Explain How a Time Clock Benefits Employees

Many employees view tracking time as a negative thing, but there are many upsides for your team. Here are a few examples you can use to show that moving to a time clock system will be in employees' best interest.

• More Accurate -- Few things are more irritating than getting shorted on your paycheck. Using a modern punch clock eliminates these errors.
• It’s Easy & Cool - Using an online time clock is easy for you and your employees. They can log on, see their timecards, message you, and even request PTO.
• Keeps Thing Fair - Explain that you trust your employees, and give a scenario where a new hire is constantly late or leaves early. Then, ask how would the team feel about this? Help employees look at the situation from a different perspective. 
• Accountability - Time tracking systems add a layer of protection for the employees. The employer cannot fudge hours in Excel or on paper. An online time clock keeps everything stored digitally with a change log or audit trail.

Step 4 - Explain How an Online Time Clock Benefits Your Company

Start off by reminding your employees that you are all a team and that if it benefits the company it will benefit employees. Time tracking benefits the company, as it saves time and money for producing timecards for payroll. Time and money are saved in many ways, here are a few big ones:

• Faster Employee Hours Collection - No more handwritten hours, emails, or I-thought-I-told-you-this-many-hours conversations.
• Eliminates Manual Timecard Calculations - According to the American Payroll Association, up to an 8% error rate can occur when calculating time by hand. Using an automated system will minimize these mistakes.
• PTO Tracking - Modern time clocks offer integrated paid time off (PTO). Employees can request PTO, and managers can approve or deny it. Allotments and accruals can be easily customized as well.
• Access Anywhere - An online time clock can be accessed anytime, any place. Adjust, approve, and send timecards to payroll from work, home, or on vacation.

If you follow these steps when implementing a punch in/out software, you will find that most employees are actually a bit excited for the change. It’s really about how you frame this transition and if you frame it correctly, your employees will accept the new system without a problem. After a few weeks, your employees will love tracking time and won’t want to work without it

OnTheClock has a system just for you, please check us out or give us a try today.