The best project trackers are automatic

Forget about spreadsheets – all the activity and time you spend on your projects can now be tracked automatically while you work. There’s no more need to log project time manually or cross-reference multiple documents: automatic project time tracking captures everything, so you can quickly review and manage projects performance from one place.

What are automatic project trackers?

Automatic project tracking apps capture all the time your teams spend on different activities across your projects as they work. They record all the time you spend in web and desktop apps to a private timeline, and use AI to intelligently link work to projects for you. Once you've logged this activity publically, your data is then pulled into project dashboards which update in real-time, keeping all project activity and budget spend transparent.

The benefits of automatic project tracking

This all sounds cool, but how is automatic project tracking such a drastic improvement for project managers and their teams?

1. You don’t have to remember to do anything

Since they run automatically, you don’t need to remember to start timers or log anything. You and your team can focus on project work without any interruptions or distractions, knowing everything you do is being backed up and processed for you.

2. Project invoices become a lot more accurate

By capturing all the hours spent on a project, you get a complete account of project work for transparent, accurate billing. Overlooked tasks like communication, travel and project management make it to your timesheet, so you can be confident you get paid for all the work you put in.

3. Reporting takes seconds instead of afternoons

All your project work is captured and fed into one place, meaning you don’t have to scrabble around to piece project performance together. Automatic trackers like Timely provide simple customized report templates to help you share highly-detailed client reports and stakeholder updates in just a few clicks. Since all project data is updated as people log project hours, you never risk reporting using outdated information.

4. You get a real-time overview of project health

Most automatic project tracking apps offer powerful project dashboards to simplify project management. You can get a true picture of a project’s health in real-time – including how much budget you have left, who’s doing what and how long each phase is taking. Everything about your projects becomes visible from one secure place, so you know exactly how you're progressing against project KPIs.

5. You can manage teams much more proactively

With full visibility over your whole team’s time, managing project resources becomes a breeze. You can see if people are sticking to priorities, where workload is distributed unequally, and who is working over their capacity. By spotting obstacles early, you can make proactive changes to keep everyone supported and on course.

6. You can forecast and budget with certainty

By seeing how long each project task and phase actually takes, you can improve cost and time estimations for similar projects. By providing you with a complete dataset of all your project activity, automatic project trackers enable you to forecast accurately. You can even schedule the time you think you’ll need and measure it against the reality to continuously improve your estimates over time.

How automatic project tracking works

Automatic project tracking sounds intense, and while the technology behind it is certainly very advanced, actually using it is refreshingly straightforward. Here’s how automatic project time tracking app Timely does it:

Timely automatically records each employee's daily work activity
It uses AI to link these activities to the right project and draft timesheets
Employees review and approve their timesheets to make their project data public

When we say Timely records everything on your projects, we mean everything. You can see how long you spend in meetings and managing email, communicating with your team on Slack, or using project management apps like Asana and Trello. You can even track your GPS location to capture travel spent on each project!