While actively searching for a job as a UI/UX designer, Olena Kovalenko noticed that about 50% of vacancies involved working with time trackers. The designer asked the community if they supported this approach. Here’s how the responses were distributed.
While actively searching for a job as a UI/UX designer, Olena Kovalenko noticed that about 50% of vacancies involved working with time trackers. The designer asked the community if they supported this approach. Here’s how the responses were distributed.
This is quite convenient for both parties, especially if there are several part-time projects with hourly pay.
It depends on the time tracker and the overall situation. In general, a time tracker is a useful thing for your development. This way you can understand how much time you spend on different tasks. If you have a mentor, then a tracker can help improve your work process.
I really like it. It organizes and speeds things up.
Since I really work during working hours and I have nothing to hide, it would be okay for me even with him (maybe I’ll change my mind later because I haven’t had such an experience yet).
My answer in the survey is «let there be tracking, so they pay.»
When I set out to make a custom website for a business, I never counted the hours or tracked the time. I called the cost conditional (because it wasn’t about earning money, but a bonus from gaining experience). The client didn’t push it because I warned him that it would take a long time, we were learning. Now I’m recording time in Jire on my project. Just out of curiosity. I see that the hours fly by, but I can’t see the work. Sometimes I have to rewrite the code again because I was testing different possibilities…
I’m fine. The first week was awkward, as if someone was peeping at me through a crack. Then for another two months I worried whether I had forgotten to turn it on. Now I don’t care. I don’t mind my own business at work. If the company is calmer like that, no problem. The main thing is that they don’t force me into the office.
I have been working with a time tracker for many years. But no one except me has access to it. Most customers didn’t even know about it. It allows me to analyze how much time I spend on which projects and change pricing.
Time tracker, to me, looks like a separate type of slavery. Imagine, no matter in what field, you are given some task and depending on your abilities you perform it quickly or slowly. That is, if the average working day is 8 hours, and you, for example, due to your experience, perform the task in 4 (well, you wrote the code or something like that), then you will be paid as if for 4 hours? As for me, such a pleasure.
I worked in companies with trackers, it was really annoying, especially when the time wasn’t logged into the system and I had to fix it, sometimes there were complaints that I worked too much or too little. It would be interesting to try a company where there are no such trackers
I’ve only once had the experience of working with a company that used a time tracker. Not only did it start automatically (even if I was just doing something else), it also acted like an annoying antivirus.
The company couldn’t pay me for 1.5 months. The tracker is not to blame for this, of course, but the association is now unpleasant.
In any process, it is important to maintain balance and take into account the accompanying conditions, and that is when control tools are perceived adequately.
Here are some statements from IT professionals that confirm this.
I worked with and without a tracker. I wanted to work without a tracker, you understand that people trust you, but as soon as tracking was introduced, interest in the work began to decline.
I also work where there are trackers, but there is a but: as explained, the tracker is for adjusting work: if you take more time on a particular task, then we will take this into account in the deadlines. This position is nice, because not all tasks can be closed in the same time. And it is nice when they pay extra for overtime, because sometimes you have to work more. So you need to take these points into account.
In principle, when it comes to deadlines, I’m not against trackers. When it comes to tracking what I’m doing on the PC, the work doesn’t stick. After all, sometimes to do something you have to go to sites where you have saved refs.
I took on projects with a time tracker a couple of times on Upwork. On the one hand, it’s really cool to draw, knowing that time is running out, and if you’re stupid, it’ll be obvious, and the customer might ask, «What were you drawing and erasing, drawing and erasing, and I’m paying for it?» On the other hand, it was fun to watch how the reward figures increased every hour.
