Time Tracker

I work for a generally benign employer that overall treats its employees well. This year, however, has seen the introduction of an insidious new tool that all employees are required to use that I find highly offensive: Time Tracker.

Time Tracker is an online tool to track employees' time off, i.e., time away from work. As of this year, I am required to enter a "request" for not only my vacation days, but for holidays as well, measured down to the hour. A few moments after I enter my "request," I receive an email graciously informing that my request for time off has been approved. Thanks, benevolent employer! (To be fair, my company also provides two paid days off per year to every employee for community service activities, which is admirable.)

The mandatory use of Time Tracker bothers me in several ways. First, the implication is that all my time belongs to my employer, and they graciously will allow me to have a set number of hours a year to myself, subject to advance approval. This is a slave mentality more suited to nineteenth-century farm workers than to twenty-first century knowledge workers. In my mind, Time Tracker should be reversed: all my time belongs to me, and I am willing to grant some of it to my employer, subject to my prior approval.

Second, I am a knowledge worker, whose output cannot be measured in hourly increments like a factory worker and who therefore is not paid by the hour. I have agreed to perform certain responsibilities in return for a set salary. There is no meaningful way to measure my output in any given hour, and my work can be done in or out of an office. Consider: if I have an idea in the shower this morning, that I incorporate into a client presentation while on my computer at the coffee shop this afternoon, that enables us to win the client's business tomorrow, how many hours have I worked? What was my output per hour? Who knows? Who cares? The truth is, I do whatever work I need to do whenever I need to do it to fulfill the responsibilities I have committed to do. Time Tracker belittles that commitment.

Third, the introduction of Time Tracker sends me the message that my employer doesn't trust me. I have to account for my free time by the hour, but not my work time. Where was Time Tracker last week when I was at the office from 8:00 am to 8:30 pm trying to get a deal closed? If I take the afternoon off to play with my kids but field a call from a client during that time, am I working or not? Before Time Tracker, these conundrums didn't matter; I believed my employer trusted me to do the job when and where it made sense. Now, it seems my company is telling me, we don't trust you after all: you need to account for (and get prior approval for) every minute you are not working. It's silly.

Finally, the email from HR explaining why we are adopting Time Tracker is a model of corporate doublespeak. It says using Time Tracker "allows us to help team members make their work-life balance a top priority." (Really? It seems like trusting me to get the job done whenever and wherever I want to would be a lot more helpful for making work-life balance a top priority.) Using the tool also allows us to "accurately account for time." (Hint: buy a watch. It works for most of us.) And, for managers, incorrect time balances for their employees can "adversely affect your [department] budget." Time is money! Watch out for those lazy employees trying to steal it!

Time tyranny like this invites subtle forms of rebellion: long lunches, the occasional unrecorded afternoon off (horrors!). I decided to rebel by entering my annual allotted paid time off in the first days of the year. So, it looks to the system like I was gone for the whole month of January. Won't someone be surprised when they see my revenue results for January--how productive I was while not working! Maybe they'll encourage me to take more months off........