Time and resource planning

The plan and the timesheet describe the same week. One says what was supposed to happen, the other what did. If they live in different systems, hours, projects and approvals have to be reconciled between them before anything can be invoiced. Whether that happens in the system or in a spreadsheet decides how long it takes.

Why planning ends up in Excel

Not out of laziness. A spreadsheet lets you break the rules when reality demands it: double-book someone over a weekend, add an assignment the system does not know about yet, move a person in the middle of a period. If the planning system forbids that, people do it somewhere else, and the spreadsheet is back.

So we build for the exceptions from day one, and make them visible rather than impossible.

What a planning system has to handle

• Time reporting by project, activity and client, with the details you need to invoice and follow up. No more fields than that.
• Resource planning where a double booking shows up when it is entered, not when two people turn up for the same job.
• An approval flow with clear roles, reminders and a sensible last day for approval.
• Corrections after the fact that leave periods already invoiced intact.

How do time and invoicing connect?

Through one set of data, not two. The same reported hours go on to both invoice management and payroll, the latter through a payroll integration. If the same hours are typed in twice they drift apart, and someone has to reconcile them by hand before every invoice run.