Idea 18 - Ditch the time tracking - it may be making your team unhappy

I recently worked with a company in Germany. They felt their team members weren't connecting enough, and I was called in to help devise some strategies. In our intro call they told me they just wanted to know about team-building days and learn some quick tricks to build up personal relationships.

I’m always a little sceptical when I’m asked to deliver a solution before understanding the underlying problem, so I did a little digging. I chatted to a few employees and worked with the team leaders to understand their culture.

The management team were lovely, well intentioned people, and they really wanted their employees to be happy. They had introduced lots of great perks, from flextime to free fruit in the kitchen, recognition schemes, to freshly ground coffee in the morning. Yet no-one was socialising, and the teams weren’t bonding. 

The day the CEO bought free pizzas for everyone, and the team took their slices back to their desks instead of enjoying lunch together in the kitchen, was the day the CEO realised he had to do something.

In the end, we didn’t run a team away day. We didn’t have a retreat in the Alps or give away free food. We just turned off their time-tracking software and the problem fixed itself.

The law of unintended consequences

The year before, when the company just consisted of a couple of people, the CEO had read that his employees would be happier if they had flexibility in their work, so he’d introduced flextime. Yet very soon afterwards, he’d noticed that some of his team were getting in early and working late, and working far more hours than they should. He didn’t want any of his employees working too much, so he introduced a time-tracking software to spot the overworkers so he could tell them they didn’t need to work so hard.

The problem was, with the system he’d chosen, his team could only check in and log time while they were sitting at their desks or in meetings. Consequently, his employees stopped taking breaks away from their computers. And, as most of his team only wanted to stay in the office for eight hours a day, they stopped “wasting” time chatting to others.

To add insult to injury, many of the team then started reporting that they didn’t feel they were trusted.

But, worst of all, those who did work overtime just didn’t log it.

Trust your team to make the right decisions

In the month after we disabled the time-tracking software, productivity (amount of tasks completed) stayed the same, people stayed in the office the same amount of time and people still took advantage of their flexible working schedule.

However, the team socialised more, took more breaks, and spent time eating lunch. When they offered free pizza again, no-one ate it at their desks. They all hung around in the kitchen, chatting and getting to know each other.

We didn’t measure psychological safety or a feeling of community, but all team leaders reported meetings were more animated and people talked more.

Interestingly, the people who did overtime still did it, but they stopped reporting that they didn’t feel they weren’t trusted. Doing overtime was their choice.

This week’s Tip

Ditch the time tracking. Give your staff the freedom to work as they want so they feel in control.

If, for some legal requirement or a client need, you cannot abandon it entirely, be conscious of the unintended effects it may have.

Obliging your team to log every minute they work may reduce non-work chat, affecting your community, or it may make your team feel they are not trusted, impacting their sense of autonomy and ownership.

According to the US Surgeon General’s guide to wellbeing, feeling a sense of autonomy, a sense that you have control of how and when you do your work is one of the key drivers of happiness in the workplace.