Kronlog installation experience at an 85-person company

Our consulting and software development company had grown over the years from four people to 85, yet we were still doing billings and keeping track of staff time using spreadsheets (each staff member at end of week would print or email their timekeeping XLS sheet to our billing department).

A bunch of things changed for the better, when we installed Kronlog.

Firstly, while doing the conversion from XLS to Kronlog data entry, we found out to our dismay, multiple missed billings to clients over the past year. It turned out that our Billing Department had missed some spreadsheets of staff time, and a day or a week of valid timekeeping data here and there had never ended up being billed. We estimate the total lost was over $20,000 in the last year alone! With Kronlog, this problem of missed data was totally eradicated:thank heavens.

Next, we found that we finally had a totally accurate HR record of staff illnesses, holidays taken, overtime owed, etc. As a bonus, the admin time taken to accumulate all of this information was dramatically reduced, because all data entry was at the individual user level:the most accurate source. And because a person's supervisor had to "Verify" each timesheet before it was considered final, the responsibility had been properly placed on the individual and their manager, for information that might some months later be questioned for some reason by a client or company executive.

We also improved organizationally as a part of this process, a surprise extra benefit. Because each project had to be defined to Kronlog, it made us think out who-will-do-what up front before a project started, more formally than in the past.

We also sat down and worked out "types of work" done by each category of employee (e.g. programming, design, documentation). As a result for the first time we had company-wide statistics on whether for example our internal unbillable design work was climbing year over year, and whether our programmers were spending most of their time testing and documenting, work that could be offloaded to less expensive resources. Also certain research work that qualified for government grants, was collected far easier than in the manual days of the past.

How easily did staff adapt to Kronlog? Ironically even though their chosen line of work by definition changed how their customers did their work, some of our staff grumbled at first when they had to complete their Kronlog data entry by Monday noon each week. They were so used to the previous sloppy way. Sometimes in the past, XLS timesheets weren't submitted to Billings until they were weeks late. This new enforced discipline took a while to get used to; we quickly found out who the regular timekeeping laggards were, and had counseling sessions with them on the importance to the company of our time records.

In the end, a few months later, everyone had settled into the new timekeeping method, and it became a routine process. An individual's timekeeping burden was in fact no more time consuming than in the old XLS-cell-filling days, because Kronlog intentionally tries to keep the user data entry as simple as possible.

Supervisory time however had increased, because to Verify a timesheet (a Kronlog option we turned On), you had to review a person's work weekly, and sign off on it (which as a supervisor, you should be doing anyways!). Department heads got the greatest benefit, because of the endless reporting now available. Customers also liked the new system better, because they had billings to any level of detail they wanted, that could be called out of Kronlog at any time.

Three years later, we're still happily using Kronlog, and like it enough to have agreed to write this testimonial to its benefits!

Datawest Canada