Time that never reaches an invoice
The call in between, the quick answer, the read-through in the evening. Each too small to write down, together a month of turnover.
Practice / Your industry
Consulting and services
When you sell time, the return leaks most easily between the hours worked and the hours billed.
The working day
The terms
come from you.
Management, tax and legal advice, technical offices, expert witnesses, translation, IT services. Businesses whose product is time, and whose largest leak sits between the time worked and the time billed.
JobEngagement
CustomerClient
LineWork done
HourChargeable hour
AppointmentDeadline matter
An example mapping. Your business defines its own terminology.
Where effort accumulates
A useful start
has a reason.
These situations help you recognise the work. We use your actual processes to find which apply to your business.
Where an engagement stands
What was last agreed sits in an email. Anyone who was not there has to read the thread.
Billing as a monthly event
At month end somebody reconstructs what happened. That costs days and is still imprecise.
Recurring work is rethought every time
The same piece of work for thirty engagements, started thirty times by hand.
A possible overview
Two engagements need something today. Everything else is running.
6.5 hrsrecorded but not billedolder than 30 days
2deadline matters this weekthe paperwork is ready
30recurring pieces of work duedrafts are prepared
An illustration with fictional figures. Sources and responsibilities belong in the individual implementation.
06 · The night before
While the office was empty.
The picture of the business above comes out of work that would otherwise be reconstructed in two days at the end of the month.
- 05:44 Agent · time Work recorded last week assigned to engagements and held against the agreements.
- 05:57 Agent · time 6.5 hours found that are older than thirty days and never billed. Three engagements affected.
- 06:09 Agent · billing Thirty recurring pieces of work are due. Drafts written, each with its derivation.
- 06:21 Agent · deadlines Two deadline matters this week. Papers gathered, one gap named rather than filled.
- 06:30 Agent · matters One engagement with no entry for three weeks. Short version of the state written: what happened, what is missing, who is involved.
- 06:38 Agent · checks In this invented, locally bounded example the engagement data was not passed to an external model provider.
- 08:12 Human · you You come in and read: two engagements need something today. Everything else is running.
The 6.5 hours are the point. Each one too small to notice, and over a year a month of turnover.
Interaktive Veranschaulichung. Vorgänge, Zeiten und Zahlen sind fiktiv.
07 · An engagement to play through
Which work is about to disappear between the engagement and the invoice?
Chargeable hours, deadline matters, recurring work and cover arrangements each have different limits. Pick the case from the day.
From the signal to the decision
- What the agent does
- Pick a starting position on the left.
- The fixed rule
- The rule that applies appears once you choose.
- The visible result
- The visible result appears once you choose.
No starting position chosen yet.
The order of work
Which work
helps first.
Business guidance for a first scope, rather than a blanket instruction to rebuild an entire industry.
What can wait
Materials and orders
What is ordered, what is here, what is missing.
Scheduling and capacity
What is coming up, and who is where.
Include the failure cases
Confidentiality is not a setting
Where professional secrecy applies, the kinds of data, the contracts, the access, the configuration and the safeguards all have to fit together. Depending on the case, local operation can be sensible or required. Lawful cloud processing is not ruled out across the board.
Recording time must not hurt
If recording a quarter of an hour takes a minute, it will not be done. The difference between one movement and three clicks decides whether the whole thing works.
Keep the engagement separate from the person
What belongs to the engagement belongs to the engagement, not to whoever is currently looking after it. Otherwise every cover arrangement is a reconstruction.
Your first stage
Start where
the work improves.
For Consulting and services, we choose a bounded first outcome with your team. Existing specialist systems can stay where they fulfil necessary requirements. We compare time relief, payments that can end and the cost of the new way of working.
The workshop gives you priorities and a roadmap. You can continue internally or with support from Markus Kirchmair. The choice of model and agent follows the task, with data and rules retained outside an individual chat.
Explore the workshop →Ready for the next change
Keep the work simple.
The first view should show the next relevant decision. Reasoning and sources remain accessible. We leave out unnecessary features and make actual progress visible.
When a rule changes, agents can help investigate the impact, prepare the adjustment and update tests and documentation. A qualified person assesses the result and its adoption.
Try a change →Your first step
Say yes
to less.
Less unnecessary software. More room for your work. Let’s find the useful first step.