7 Ways Tracking Projects Efficiently Can Help You Stay Profitable

Do you feel like internal initiatives and client projects tend to never get finished? Have you wondered why your good ideas never seem to pan out when you get a team to work on them? The problem may not be your employees or your idea. The issue could be that you aren't properly tracking projects.

According to a survey done by KPMG, 49% of organizations polled had a project fail in the last 12 months.

Curious about why project tracking is important? Read on to learn more.

Why Tracking Projects Matters

There’s a reason why businesses invest a lot of money into hiring project managers and account directors. Seeing a project through from its planning stages until it’s completed can take a lot of work.

Proper project tracking involves more than just making sure that employees are meeting set deadlines. Employee time tracking, cost/benefit analysis, and simply tracking money are all crucial for success.

A project that isn’t properly tracked could be costing your company money or valuable employee time. Improperly tracking projects could also mean that you aren’t catching internal problems that are holding the project up.

Reasons To Take Tracking Projects Seriously

Some people don’t see the value in carefully tracking projects because they can’t see how it benefits their business.

Investing in tracking software and a few talented project managers will be worth the money you spend. There are a lot of ways your business can financially benefit from proper tracking.

Ready to learn why project tracking is important for your business? After you read these reasons, you’ll wonder why you didn’t invest more time and money into project tracking.

1. Avoid Missed Billing Hours

How many times have you talked to an employee during a project wrap up meeting and found that they went over their hours on a project?

It’s a familiar scenario, but it’s more than just a minor annoyance. Employees that spend time doing work that isn’t billed are losing your company money.

When you track projects the right way, you’ll know exactly how much time employees spent doing work down to the minute. You won’t have to worry about losing money on projects anymore.

2. Identify Problem Areas

If you have employees going over their allotted hours, there could be a problem with the project. There may be a key deliverable that wasn’t properly defined, or they may not have the information needed to do their job.

When problem areas pop up in a project, they usually aren’t brought to people’s attention until the project is over. If you properly track time and money spent on a project you can stop problems before they get too out of hand.

When you’re properly tracking a project, you can easily see where employees are spending their time. If you notice that an employee is struggling with one task, it may be time to re-evaluate what they’re doing and why they’re doing it.

3. Improve Accountability

A successful project needs a team that works well together. If someone is consistently delivering late work, other people are bound to fall behind on what they have to do.

Project tracking makes holding people accountable and responsible for their own work easier.

Instead of waiting a few days to learn that a crucial part of your project hasn’t been completed, you’ll know as soon as the deadline is missed if you track work properly.

Proper project tracking also helps keep project managers accountable. It helps keep everyone on the same page and project timetable.

4. Determine Success

Some people manage the success of a project by reaching the end goal. To them, any project that’s completed is an instant success.

Simply completing a project isn’t enough to determine it “successful”. Things like cost and internal time invested in a project are the true KPIs you should be tracking.

Tracking projects can give you insight into employee’s and project team’s performance.

With the right tracking metrics, you’ll be able to see if you met deadlines, stayed under budget, or if you spent more money in areas you didn’t plan on.

5. Better Utilize Your Budget

Some people view project budgets as concrete plans. But almost every budget is going to need a little wiggle room after the project starts.

Making changes to a budget mid-project can be difficult if you aren’t prepared, but proper tracking can ensure that you’re ready for any money changes.

If you’re tracking projects diligently, you’ll be able to see where you have extra money in your budget. Some facets of the project may not need as big of a budget as you anticipated.

Once you see which parts of the project require the most time and money, you can take time and money away from project areas that don’t need as much attention.

6. Properly Utilize Resources

One of the main reasons why properly tracking projects is important is because it allows you to best utilize what you or your client has.

If you don’t track your projects, you may realize that you don’t have enough employees working on one section. You could see that your client is spending far more than they have to, or that they aren’t spending enough to get the results.

Successful projects depend on properly using the resources you have. The right tracking techniques can help ensure that you’re doing the best with what you have.

7. Manage Changes

Life can be unpredictable for businesses. Employees can get busy, work may require more time than anticipated, and client needs may change

When you track your projects, it’ll be much easier to roll with the punches.

Does an important employee have to miss a few days because of the flu? Your tracking methods show that they’re actually ahead of schedule, so you don’t have to scramble to find someone to fill their roll.

Did your client tell you that a crucial part of their project changed? No need to worry. Your tracking shows that they have extra funds they can pull from a different area of the project to fill in gaps.

Next Steps

Something as simple as tracking projects can save your business money, make projects more efficient, and help track employee performance.

Now that you see the power of tracking projects, it’s time to get started tracking the right way. Schedule your demo today so you can see how we can help your business.