Tips for keeping track of time Forum

[Anonymous User]

I started 4 weeks ago as a corporate big law associate and I feel like I'm struggling to properly keep track of my time. I'm currently on 3ish deals and my days recently have been spent doing a ton of small discrete tasks. I'm constantly switching between matters and trying my best to keep track of my time on each but I often find myself working straight from 9-7 but only billing about 6 hours of that. I just don't know how to track every email I'm sending/reading when I'm constantly switching what I'm doing. We aren't allowed to bulk bill which makes it all harder. Wondering if anyone has any advice/tips to help with this. TYIA.

[RaceJudicata]

Does your timekeeping software have a timer button feature that allows you to set up multiple times and click between them? If so, use that feature.

[merde_happens]

As the poster above stated - use your timer buttons. Moreover, before you start *any* task, take the time to start/stop your timers as needed. Whatever you're doing can wait the 30 seconds it takes for you to adjust your timers.

You're going to lose a couple minutes here and there on email shit, but you shouldn't be losing hours if you're truly working 9-7 "straight."

[Anonymous User]

Don't stop your timer when you feel like you're being inefficient, but you're actually working too.

E.g. you encounter some word in a doc and don't know what it means and you need to look it up. Keep the timer running don't turn it off and on. Another scenario is when you have to reread something a few times to understand what it means. Don't feel bad that you're working slow/inefficient and stop and start timers. Stuff like this will add up to a lot of lost time.

[boredtodeath]

Our timer software allows us to set up a new "button" for each individual billing code for each client. Do that. If you haven't been doing that as new client-matter codes are given to you, it's going to take some time to set up, but once you do it will make tracking your time a non-event.