A project management blog for manufacturing and engineering
Learn how the Standard Time timesheet can be used in manufacturing. You probably already know you can scan barcodes on the shop floor, but there is so much more in there.
Office workers can enter time manually into a weekly timesheet. Managers and supervisors can view employee hours in that same weekly timesheet or in a spreadsheet style grid. You can export to Excel, and run scheduled reports on the timesheet data. This little video may give you some inspiration to try this in the office.
Here’s an overview of the connection from Standard Time® to QuickBooks® Online®. And more specifically, how to create an invoice in QuickBooks from time and materials in ST.
Time and materials are collected using barcode scans on the shop floor. Once collected, they can be sent to QB for invoicing.
Shop floors can get messy but that is because work is being done. In the end, you still need to track work orders and employee time , even in a hostile environment. Consider barcodes, or even RFID for time tracking in such places.
RFID is completely solid-state, and immune to dust and chemicals. just swipe and go. Nothing bothers RFID… not dust, dirt, grease and grime, grinding dust, or oils. It’s really the best choice for hostile shop floors.
Here’s a little video to inspire and remind you to try Standard Time® with RFID or barcodes.
Even welders can run a barcode scanner! And even web developers can light a torch… or maybe not. Anyways, tracking time with barcodes is still the best way to track work orders on the shop floor.
Where is that last order? In welding yet? Or still in plasma? If you don’t know, consider scanning barcode labels for each stage of the process. It’s really easy and lets you know where every job is at.
The little inspiring video below might spark your interest.
How are you billing clients for the work orders that pass over your manufacturing floor? In most low-performing companies, it’s a loose informal process. They sort-of know how much time was devoted to each work order, and billing occurs on the sparse information at hand. Maybe that’s a good guess, or maybe the operators on the floor are writing down (most) of their time, or maybe it’s just a flat fee agreed upon earlier. (Check out this YouTube video below.)
That’s the low-performers. How about you?
That’s not you. You are using Standard Time® and pulling actual time records off the shop floor using barcodes. You’re getting exact time and materials. Each time segment is timestamped four times, and contains the employee, job, and task. Each inventory item is also scanned and deducted from inventory, and included on the client invoice. Your invoices are about as precise as they can be. That means you are collecting all the revenue due you.
Serious… it all starts with a simple barcode scanner. Once you start scanning work orders on the shop floor everything changes. Your whole outlook on client billing changes. Your processes change. Your inventory and ordering changes. The progression from low-performer to high is natural and simple.
Get a barcode scanner and change how you bill clients from the shop floor.
This video will get you started.
Everyone knows that Standard Time® is a time tracking app. But did you also know that it tracks inventory and bill of materials?
It does! (see the video below)
And it does it with barcode scanners. You’re probably familiar with the barcode time tracking capabilities. You scan usernames, projects, and tasks. A timer starts, and you track manufacturing hours. Easy. But you can do the same thing with barcode labels and inventory items.
Create a label for the inventory SKU. Scan that label, and the inventory item is automatically deducted from stock. You can also scan the manufacturer’s SKU or the vendor SKU. Any of those will work the same. And when the quantity in stock is reduced below a preset value, the parts can automatically be reordered using scripts.
Scanning BOM’s are similar. In that case, the BOM lists all the inventory items for an assembly. When you scan the BOM label (or SKU) all the inventory items on that BOM are reduced from stock. And again, any inventory item that falls below the “reorder quantity” is automatically reordered using a script.
You may be wondering about reorder scripts. Those are special user-programmable scripts that send emails or contact websites for reordering inventory. You must program these reorder scripts yourself, which often involves the IT department.
Learn how to start a timer with an RFID tag reader. (scroll down for the video) You can buy a starter kit for about $30 that contains an RFID reader and some cards and tags. That’s all you need to track time with RFID. Check amazon.
Already got RFID readers installed?
Now that everything is in place, you can start and stop a timer in Standard Time® using with just a simple RFID scan. Wave a proximity card in front of the RFID scanner and a timer starts. Wave it again, and the timer stops. Now you’ve got some serious time tracking data to work with.
Every RFID scan in Standard Time includes the following information. Of course the end user doesn’t realize or care that all this is automatically collected. They just wave their card and go on. But you can use this intel to improve manufacturing, assembly lines, or just for employee time and attendance.
What is collected in every RFID tag scan:
Seriously? All that is collected in one scan? Yup. Pretty powerful.
What you can report on with RFID scans:
Watch the video and try it out.
Manufacturers: Use a mag card reader to start and stop a timer. Consider swiping cards to start and stop a timer for manufacturing purposes. Swipe once to start the timer, and swipe again to stop. The video below describes how.
This technique allows you to associate any employee badge or card to a Standard Time® username. Swipe once to start a timer for the associated user. A selected project and task will start. The timer will run until you swipe again.
Manufacturing and assembly shops can collect information like total product build times, total employee hours, packaging time, and shipping. Find out how much time you spend on each kind of work, and improve each one by a small percentage.
Download Standard Time here, and give this a try with your own magnetic card reader.
Reward yourself, Sparky! Get an app that tells you your average job length, your effective billing rate, plus invoices clients. Plus has project proposals. Plus has timesheets for every employee.
Don’t let this shock you, but if you’re running an electrical contracting business, you need this information. This is how you trim costs and keep rates competitive. It’s not by watching all the other contractors in the biz; it’s by watching your own biz. How much are jobs costing you? How much are you bringing in? What effective billing rate are you making? What percentage are your electricians utilized, verses being paid?
Watch the video below, and decide if this is something your electrical contracting company can use. Then download the timesheet here.
The only real way to make sure you’re staying true to sales and marketing priorities is to track the time you spend with clients. Without a time tracker you’re only guessing. Here’s what happens: (scroll down for video)
You take the time to identify sales and marketing priorities. Good. You identify top clients. Excellent. And you set strategic products and services that benefit your organization. Wonderfully done. Great sales and marketing plan!
Now how are you tracking actual results against those priorities and strategies?
That’s where most sales and marketing professionals stop.
Truth is, they just don’t want the hassle of extra admin time to track their hours. So they really never know if their staying true to the plan, or wandering into secondary areas they explicitly hoped to stay out of. Track your client hours, and you’ll have the information to compare against your strategic plans.