Automate the Process of Managing Time with Atlassian JIRA Add-ons

Throughout this blog, we are going to review the top Timesheet and Reporting add-ons for JIRA that are currently on the Atlassian Marketplace.  Addteq uses both of these add-ons daily for internal and client use cases. These two add-ons are Tempo Timesheets and All-In-One-Reports for JIRA.

Sometimes, tracking your time can be a monotonous task. With the Tempo Timesheets, time tracking is now effortless. According to Tempo Timesheet’s official documentation:

"Tempo Timesheets is a time tracking and reporting solution that seamlessly integrates with JIRA to help teams and managers track time for accounting, payroll, client billing; all while having enhanced efficiency and forecasting." 

Logging employee’s time helps organizations track time spent on certain projects. Which in turn, can help organizations to grasp a better understanding of their ROI. Usually, an employee in an organization will be given an issue to work on within a project, the individual will log work on the issue that is assigned to them. The work that is logged will get reflected in Tempo Timesheets, which will then allow the individual to submit the timesheet for approval to their manager. Similarly, the individual can log work on other issues to manage their time spent for particular tasks. Organizations also use Tempo Timesheets for categorizing client’s accounts that need to be billed for a certain project.

Logging work using Tempo Timesheets 

Recently, Addteq has received a ton of requests regarding a way to manage employee time as well as customer facing time in JIRA. We did not hesitate to recommend Tempo Timesheets. Because of the add-on’s efficiency of a simple UI for logging work, we stressed to our clients how this add-on would benefit managers, customers and the employees working with the organization. 

How Does Tempo Timesheets Work?

Tempo Timesheets allows users to log their time in a three different ways. Some of the ways a user can log their time is by:

1. Logging work through individual tickets using the user timesheet                               

2. Logging work through the Worklog Calendar view

3. Logging work directly into JIRA issues

Working in Tempo Timesheets

There are ways that a user can work in Tempo Timesheets to allow proper organization of their working time. For example, with the Planning Time feature the manager can plan time for their assignee. The assignee can also plan time for themselves and have it sent for approval to their manager.    

Timesheet Approvals– The timesheet approval process is an integral step for Tempo Timesheets. Once the user sends their timesheet for approval to their manager, the manager can use this screen to approve or deny the work that the employee had logged.                                                

Timesheet Projection

Once the Timesheet has been logged, the user can view the timesheet in four different ways. Each view allows the user to customize the date set in which they want to see the data. 

1. User Timesheet View

This view allows the user to see their entire timesheet for that selected week.

2. Project Timesheet View

This view allows the user to see a timesheet from a certain project. This view is useful when a user needs to see how much time was logged to a particular project.

3. Team Timesheet View

This view allows the user to see a timesheet for a specific team. This view is useful when a user needs to see how much time was logged for a team of employees.

4. Issue Timesheet View

This view allows the user to see a timesheet for a chosen issue (ticket). This view is useful when a user needs to see the time logged for a specific issue.

Account Timesheets 

In order to implement the account portion of Tempo Timesheets, Tempo Accounts needs to be activated in your environment. Because the Accounts Timesheet depends on a user’s Projects Permissions in JIRA, the accounts that are shown in these views may differ. A user might also have to request certain permissions if an Account is not listed. The Accounts Timesheet in Tempo Timesheets can be broken down into two views; the reports view and the lists view.

1. Reports View

The reports view serves as an overview for accounts and shows a user three important pieces to time tracking. The first is which projects are associated with certain accounts. The second is which project has already been billed for employee time and how many billable hours there are. And the third is which projects still have estimated, planned or remaining times. This view is perfect for an administrator who needs to understand the financial details for employee time in a project.

2. Lists View

Like the reports view, the lists view shows you the three important pieces to time tracking in JIRA. With this view though, it breaks down each issue in an account and lists the logged employee time associated. 

JIRA Dashboards with Tempo Timesheets

With the help of Tempo Timesheets, you can build customized time tracking JIRA dashboards in real-time. JIRA Dashboards come out of the box with JIRA, however, once Tempo Timesheets is downloaded onto your instance, dashboards become even more interactive by showing real-time, detailed charts and graphs relating to the timesheets logged by your team members!