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Timesheet/Profit Tracker for small business

LOTE

LOTE

Structural
Sep 9, 2018
155
My business has grown to 4 people, and I am looking for a solution to track my team's time to specific projects so I can track profitability by project. We do not have billable hours, no do we tie hours worked to payroll, so this will just be an internal tracking tool.

I am looking for a tool that I can assign a project number, have subtasks (usually 4 per project), have my team log their time remotely to that project and subtasks (without seeing the contract value). I would like to enter quote value (and % chance of winning project), signed contract value and keep track of what portions of the project have been invoiced and what still needs to be invoice (not necessarily linked to my accounting/invoicing software). Then use that data to track profit per project and estimate future revenues.

Any solutions that people have experience with?

I have researched QBO Plus, but it doesn't seem to have subtasks, and the Estimates feature just hasn't worked for me. My business isn't big enough for something like Deltek. Anyone have experience with Honeybook, Monday.com, or ClickUp? It's hard to gauge from the websites what will actually work.
 
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I've never found a good solution. Most are either too simple to give the answers I want or too complex to use efficiently (and even after 2 years of trying, still can't seem to get the answers I want...). I've resigned myself to creating my own system...eventually.
 
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I used a software called Ajera at a previous company that was pretty good at doing the things you want.

I prefer a custom spreadsheet system.

ClickUp, and Notion are very customizable systems that you can use to do this any many other tasks as well.

 
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Having worked for a few companies I've seen different systems implemented:

[ul]
[li]Spreadsheets - Free, but as everyone has open access it soon becomes chaotic.[/li]
[li]Harvest ( - The subscription gives access to time tracking, reporting and invoicing. As simple or complex as you want it to be and generally quite good.[/li]
[li]Toggl ( - Basic subscription is good for tracking core hours, reporting etc is at additional cost and is quite steep.[/li]
[li]Notion - Free (ish) but you will have to invest time to create a custom system. You get out what you put in...[/li]
[/ul]

Personally I have a custom setup in Notion, works fine for me at the moment as I'm only a one man band.
 
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Been at this for 30 years. Nothing beats the simplicity of a spreadsheet.
 
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We use Wrike and BQECore. We looked into Ajera (I used a lot at a previous firm), which does most of what you want and can get very complex, but the upfront cost was excessive at the time for us, if I recall we were quoted something like 10k to 15k for 3 people (min purchase of 5 user license) 5 years ago + monthly fees.
 
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Hey LOTE, sounds like you are looking for a simple solution without all the bells and whistles of the products you mentioned above.

I have used spreadsheets and highly customised solutions in the past but they never give me the data I want, in the format that I want. Usually there is additional overhead to present the data in a way that is meaningful to my business. Also with a spreadsheet everyone on my team is able to see the same information I am able to see.

All the big name software I have looked at in the past has way too many features that I don't need, and charge a hefty price for them.

I should be able to help you out, but I just need some more info from you:

1. Do you need a solution for projects that are already contracted, or for projects during the business development/quoting phase? or both?

2. Are your projects fixed priced? Or time and materials?

3. I assume you want to project future revenues based on profit margins on similar projects you have completed before?

Looking forward to your response!

Regards,


 
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