The following post is taken from the Journyx Webinar “How Journyx Helps our DCAA Clients Manage Employee Time & Projects.”

Government contracting can be tough on the executives responsible for making sure employees and projects are tracked accurately. Of course, it is possible to get by on a number of systems, but there are certain tools that can make the process much easier, allowing supervisors to work on more pertinent tasks that will improve the overall profitability of a company far more than logistics measurement. The trick here is accountability. The best tools will provide a solid backbone on which the supervisor can bolster his or her approach to this important problem.

Project Coordination Capabilities

A supervisor will need to make sure that the right people are on the right jobs. Though this isn’t limited to government contracting, making sure that the people who can perform a task most efficiently are the ones assigned to it will increase the odds that you will stay within budget and schedule. Therefore, the supervisor needs a tool that will allow him to track individual employee efficiency and view it in the context of other employees’ effectiveness on a given task. This information should be easily readable through reports, charts or graphs. Preferably, the supervisor would have access to all three.

Project Budgets and Schedules

Speaking of going over budget or schedule, the supervisor needs to have access to these two key pieces of data throughout the lifecycle of the project. Of course, this seems obvious until a deadline is breathing down the neck of a project team and no time or money is left to meet it. When dealing with the government, specifically of fixed-cost contracts, this discrepancy can result in major financial turmoil, since the business itself will be responsible for any funds spent on a project above the contracted budget. Therefore, metrics that show how a project is coming along do not only need to be present, they need to be crystal clear.

Who is Available?

Again, resource availability may seem like an obvious piece of information in theory, but can actually be very tricky. Let’s say there is an individual in the company who could save quite a bit of time with his expertise on a project. The supervisor schedules him through the clunky system currently being used. This is usually not too big of a deal; the supervisor will let him know when it is time for him to work on the project. However, when that time comes she discovers that he is out of town -- for the next three weeks. And he is unreachable by phone or email because he is backpacking on the Appalachian Trail. Insight into not only when an individual is available, but when he or she is not available (whether due to sick leave, planned vacation or religious holiday), will prove invaluable when it comes to structuring a contracted project.

Check out even more tips on tools that supervisors can use to make interaction with the U.S. Government simple, as well as how Journyx can provide a cost-effective system that meets your DCAA needs through the Webinar, “How Journyx Helps our DCAA Clients Manage Employee Time & Projects.”