Spent $45 on a time tracking tool and it saved my bacon on a rush job

I was freelancing a big editing project last Tuesday when the client emailed saying they needed everything done by Friday instead of next Monday. Total panic mode. I had this time tracking app sitting on my desktop for weeks that cost me $45 for the year. I finally used it to see exactly where my hours were going and realized I was wasting time on dumb stuff like checking email too often. It helped me finish the job with hours to spare. Has anyone else found a cheap tool that actually helped when a deadline got moved up?

3 comments

3 Comments

park.aaron5d ago

Funny enough, a $15 habit tracker app did the same for me last month. I had a painting commission due in two weeks, and I was procrastinating because I kept losing track of time scrolling art supply sites. Plugged in my daily routines and saw I was spending 2 hours a night on that stuff, so I cut it to 30 minutes and finished the painting three days early. Did the app make you realize any time-wasting habits you didn't know you had?

andrew_baker95d ago

Respect your take on this, but I see it a little differently... tracking stuff like that just makes me anxious. I tried one of those apps for a week and realized I was spending 45 minutes a day just logging in and fiddling with the settings, which felt like more wasted time than the habits I was trying to fix. Honestly, I wound up finishing my projects faster when I just set a timer on my phone and forced myself to stop cold after it went off. Maybe it works for some people, but for me, the app became another way to procrastinate instead of actually doing the work.

max_schmidt775d ago

Oh man, I found out I was spending 30 minutes a day just reorganizing the color-coded categories in my habit tracker. Pretty sure I was trying to optimize my way out of ever actually doing anything. The app showed me I had a "planning to plan" habit that was somehow taking up more time than my actual bad habits combined.