Team workload tracking without timesheets

You can see who has room this week without logging an hour: count each person's open tasks, weigh them by rough size, and read what's due in the next seven days. In a spreadsheet, and in Arkscape.

It's Monday at Halden Architects. A new task has come in on Northstar Offices, sending the fixture schedule to the lighting designer, and Elena asks who can take it. Everyone says they're busy. They probably are. The question is busy with what, and due when.

Timesheets don't answer that. They tell you where last week's hours went, not what this week holds. What answers it is the work itself: what each person has open, how big it is, and when it's due. This guide shows how to read that in a spreadsheet, and how Arkscape, a project tracking tool for architects, designers, and engineers, shows it from the project board, without ever measuring the person.

The four numbers that show who has room

Start with open tasks, the plain count of what each person has that isn't done. On its own it misleads, because five small tasks aren't the same week as five large ones.

So give each task a rough size, agreed with the person doing it: small for an afternoon, medium for a few days, large for a week or more. Count small as 1, medium as 2, and large as 3, and the total is that person's load: a way to tell a heavy list from a long one, never a measure of anyone's time.

Then read what's due in the next seven days. It's the number to look at first, because it's the week's real pressure, whatever the total says.

Last, count what isn't agreed yet: tasks someone was sent but hasn't said yes to. Until they agree, that work isn't really on their plate, and the person who sent it believes it is.

One more is worth a glance: how many projects each person is split across. Three or more usually means time lost switching between them.

In a spreadsheet

Keep one sheet of tasks, one row each, with the person, the project, the task, its size, whether they've accepted it, the due date, and the status. On a second sheet, list your team and let formulas count for each name. COUNTIFS does all of it: open tasks are rows for that person that aren't done; due in seven days adds a date range from today; not yet agreed adds an acceptance that isn't Yes.

Read it on Monday morning, because the week ahead is the part you can still change. Look at what's due in seven days, then at anyone whose load sits well above the team's middle, then at anything waiting for a yes. Give the new work to the person with room, and ask them before you write their name down.

The sheet works until it becomes the third copy of the same work. Tasks live on the project tracker and in people's own lists, and the workload sheet is rebuilt by hand from both. It's only true on Monday; by Wednesday two tasks are done and three have arrived.

In Arkscape

In Arkscape, each project is a group with its own board, and every card has one Responsible person who has accepted it. Nothing is copied into a workload sheet, because the board already knows.

Open a project group's Reports tab and Workload by person shows, for everyone responsible for at least one card, their open cards with the overdue share marked, how many are Overdue, how many they Completed in the period you choose, and how many are Awaiting their acceptance. Team members with no cards appear underneath, so an empty week is visible too. The Due in 7 days tile and the Deadlines panel cover the week ahead, naming who is responsible for each card.

Each person's whole picture, across every project, is in their own Ark report, opened from Reports in the ... menu on Your Ark. It's private to them; group admins and organization admins can't open it. On every plan, including Free, everyone also gets a short week summary on Fridays: what's due in the next seven days, what's overdue, and what's awaiting their response.

Reports never include time online, login activity, or anything from outside the group. They show the work, not the person. Who can see a group's report is a setting: under Reports access, it can be open to All members, Admins & leads (the default), Admins only, or Hidden.

What Arkscape doesn't do here

Two things work differently from the spreadsheet. Arkscape counts cards and has no size field, so it can't weigh a large task above a small one; split a big task into the cards it really is. And there is no manager's view of one person across every project, because that view belongs to the person. For the Monday conversation, ask people to bring their own numbers.

If your firm needs hours for fees, utilization, or invoicing, that's a timesheet in practice-management software, and neither a workload sheet nor Arkscape replaces it.

Which to choose

Keep the spreadsheet if one person updates it every Monday and that's enough. Choose Arkscape when the sheet keeps falling out of date, when "who agreed to what" is the real question, or when people across several projects need to see their own week without anyone filling anything in.

Group reports come with the Business plans, from $25 per user a month with a 14-day trial, and with the Connect ($10) and Pro ($20) Personal plans. The Friday week summary is on every plan.

Common questions

How do you measure team workload without timesheets? Count each person's open tasks, weigh them by rough size, and read what's due in the next seven days. That shows who has room this week, which last week's hours can't.

How many open tasks per person is too many? There's no universal number. Compare people with the team and with their own usual weeks, and give more weight to what's due this week than to the total.

Should the team see each other's workload? It works best when people see their own numbers first and the conversation is about the work. In Arkscape, a group's admins decide who can open its report.