Save your Time with Templates and Weekly Timesheets

Have you ever asked yourself how you will ever accomplish that load of work in a faster and an effective manner? Are you having difficulty meeting deadlines set by your boss? If you try to complete it all in one day, you will most probably end up disorganized and overwhelmed. 
 
There is an essential tool that will help you to work more efficiently – a project template

This tool keeps your tasks more organized to effectively accomplish your project goals on time and of course, helps combat those feelings of overwhelm and not being in control. The core purpose of a project template is to capture, to the greatest extent possible, all the actions that need to be accomplished right from the inception of a project until its completion.

A project template :

  • Gives you a big picture of what has to be done next in a project
  • Eases the burden on the project team as they help save time, effort and money
  • Helps the project team in streamlining the project in a far more effective manner
  • Structures communication and engagements ensuring the final product is of high quality
With this latest update, we’ve included the most requested task dependency view
as part of the template for better managing the tasks. While creating a project from a template, now you can make use of shift dates option which automatically shifts dates for tasks, forums, and comments in a project. Learn more about this at Templates in Zoho Projects.

Weekly timesheet saves you time and effort

Peep into your timesheet tab and you’ll spot our brand new addition, Weekly Timesheets. We developed this new weekly time entry with the needs of your team in mind – our timesheet software allows your team to effortlessly log working hours which saves you ample time and effort in time entry.

Earlier, the only supported format of time entry was with colon i,e 3:30. We’ve now extended that further to include support for more time entry formats.

For Example
, if you enter 3.75, our timesheets will automatically interpret the entered time has 3 hours and 45 minutes.Learn more about the new weekly timesheet and supported time entry formats at
Weekly Timesheets

Well, now it’s up to you. Login into our project management software and start building your project templates for better time management.

Also, let us know what other features you are looking for as part of templates and timesheets which would save your time as comments here or mail us at support@zohoprojects.com

Comments

17 Replies to Save your Time with Templates and Weekly Timesheets

  1. The new template features were much needed and awaited, however I find the current functionality clumsy. I would prefer that you can put in task descriptions, durations and dependencies into the template with no start date or resources.In reality the most common way of putting a schedule together (also described this way in PMBOK - Project Management Book of Knowledge) is:
    1. Describe activities (milestones, tasks & task lists),
    2. Insert activity durations,
    3. Define dependencies (predecessors),
    --------------------------------------------
    This is usually as far as one can go with a template. Then once a real project starts and you want to plan it, then;
    ----------------------------------------------
    4. Determine the start date,
    5. Make project specific adjustments to template (tasks, durations and predecessors),
    6. Allocate resources.Currently one has to put in start and end dates even before you can set predecessors, and have to calculate the number of days separating the actual project start date and the template start date. It's a bit clumsy and would like to see it amended to be more user friendly.

  2. John,As of now it is not possible to log time against group of tasks/bugs. However will consider providing the same in future updates.QB connector service is a nice request indeed. Will add it the feature list.Vijay

  3. Our users working many bugs and tasks during the day..it is way too time consuming to keep time on every task/bug...is there a way to log time against a group of tasks/bugs?Also, a biggie for us is the export format needs to play nice with Quick Books...any thoughts on creating a QB Connector service?

  4. ITBB,Yes I realized that after I replied i.e. if a user couldn't find that, then we haven't done it right. We will try & find a way to make it easy.Mani.

  5. @Mani "START" - 'STOP" is great!I had NO idea it was there and I use Zoho Projects 5-10 hours per week.It may be time to update the tutorial videos, help tips, or something.

  6. @kangham Thanks for your compliments. You can check our Zoho Apps at http://www.zoho.com " rel="nofollow">http://www.zoho.com for your business needs.@P&J The current dashboard distinguishes a completed task with a tick mark. We've made a note of your request to show a completed task with a strike through link and will keep you informed once it gets implemented in one of our future updates.@TDogg You need to upgrade your account to a paid plan in order to use Timesheets. For more details check our pricing which lists out features offered in each paid plan at http://www.zoho.com/projects/zohoprojects-pricing.html

  7. There are 3 ways you can log time in Zoho Projects1. Using the "START" - "STOP" in Task & Milestone -> Tasks tab2. Using "Log time" in Timesheet tab inside a Project to log single entry3. Using "Weekly log time" in Timesheet tab inside a Project ( implemented now )

  8. ITBB,The "START" - 'STOP" option is there already ( with stop watch kind of visual representation ).Goto Task page, you can see a green clock icon before the tasks ( that assigned to you ). When you click, you can see a clock running visually & have option to STOP that. If you restart, we continue & we won't reset the timer.Mani.

  9. I know that I could benefit greatly from templates and task dependencies, because I spend 1-2 hours each Monday pushing back tasks, because a task that came before them is late.However and this is a HUGE however...I am adamantly against WEEKLY timesheet logging.
    Timesheet logging needs to happen in the moment to be accurate.Why? Because in most offices, who can accurately remember what they did yesterday, let alone four days ago?!?When there is a huge lag time like this, two things happen
    1. Details are forgotten (under-reported) or exaggerated (over-reported)
    2. Forgetfulness leads to "creative writing" with log entries (anyone remember Enron, WorldCom, Lehman Brothers, etc?)All of this reminds me of taking piano lessons as a kid.Me, my sister, and all of my friends who took lessons from this same teacher had a weekly assignment book (like most piano/music teachers).Here's what you need to practice for the week.And you log in how much you practiced each part each day.Wanna guess what happened in the backseat of the car on the way to piano lessons each Saturday morning?!?Isn't it nifty?...at 8 years old, kids being taught to "cook the books".Sure I practiced my scales and Moonlight Sonata 3 hours a day, every day.You know what Timesheets REALLY needs?A timer, like I remember from the Time Sheets software 10-15 years ago.
    This was/is big with accountants and attorneys who bill by the hour.Pick the project. Pick the task. Click a button to START the timer for that project. Click the END button to turn off the timer for that project.Oh, you spent 31.3 minutes on that task.That approach too captures the actual minutes/seconds, as opposed to the current Zoho Projects approach of forcing you to round-up/round-down to the nearest 5-minutes.So when Zoho heralds, "Weekly timesheet saves you time and effort", all I see is quick...someone go call Ken Lay or Bernie Ebbers, we've got some time to log. And we better keep the shareholders happy.

  10. I'm exploring your new features. I'm a basecamp user and I'm evaluating your product for a shiftover.
    I like your dashboard.
    Is it possible to have strike thru link on completed tasks & milestones for everyone to understand the project flow easily.
    Whenever a milestone or tasks is completed, it only shows completed which does not give a clear picture for the clients to know the jobs which are completed. Hope u understood my request.
    Wish you a blessed day!
    Agape - Prajeeth :)

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