Time trackers, what's your take?

Companies that think they need this sort of software are on the way out. Big red flag & sign to stay far far away from these people.

🚩Big 🚩Red 🚩Flag 🚩

I worked for 18 months as a freelancer at a company that required me to track my time spent working, through an extension called TopTracker. I never liked the time tracking bit -- in the early days, I would question myself, don't they trust me?

Later on, I didn't mind it too much. Kind of got used to it I think. Also, it made invoicing and payments kind of smooth.

But honestly, the practice left a bad taste -- I never really connected deeply with their team as a result -- so I quit that job.

I'll never work for a company that requires time-tracking again. It optimizes for surface-level productivity and not results.

I wouldn't work for a company that used TimeDoctor or any sort of similar software.

Times have changed and the market has shifted. People don't work regular hours anymore, you work when you're at your most efficient . I often work mornings and then late in the evenings, and spend time with my son during the day, flexi-hours for the win!

Companies need to trust their employees, provide a working environment/culture that benefits everyone. It's easy to tell if your employees are working, just check that the work is done. Easy.

Like everyone else, I find this kind of behavior generally disgusting.

I'm particularly concerned because time tracking is an important part of the product we're working on and this form of tracking gives the process a bad reputation.

We're using a more general approach to time tracking to help everyone have a clear understanding of the state of a project and to, over time, become better at estimating project length. Without actual time tracking, this is a fool's errand (https://www.expectedbehavior.com/building-burndown/you-can-only-learn-from-your-mistakes-if-you-know-what-they-are/).

I deeply hate this type of practice, productivity should be measured using other systems. This is the method toxic companies use because it is the easiest metric to quantify.

Of course, I would never work for a company that uses these methods.

This is an interesting article dealing with this topic:

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/carolineodonovan/upwork-freelancers-work-diary-keystrokes-screenshot

I don't like to use it on a daily basis but is a great way to evaluate where you are spending your time. In the WBE Space we have a channel where people share their daily tasks and that is also helpful

As an independent developer, I’m a huge fan of WakaTime. It keeps track of my coding activity and gives me great report. I’ don’t share information with anyone, but it’s really useful to make sure I don’t spend too much time on something.

I find it ironic that the web page talks about trust as I see this as a complete betrayal of trust. I am fundamentally against any kind of digital panopticon and would refuse to work for a company that employs such measures.

I would never work for a company that uses that kind of software. How am I suppose to work on my project during the day?

I would also never use that kind of software for my company. Does it matter if someone works 60 hours or 10? The only thing that matter is results. (my 2 cents).