Timesheets

Phase: Execution | Audience: Internal | Project: WEB-2026-01 Corporate Website Development

Understand it first

In simple words: Timesheets show how many hours each person actually worked on the project compared with the plan. Hours × rate = actual labour cost.

Think of it like: A household maid's attendance register: planned days vs actual days, used to calculate the salary.

When is it created?	Weekly during execution
Who prepares it?	Each team member logs; PM reviews
Who approves or uses it?	Project Manager
What happens next?	Feeds actual cost (AC) in the EVM tracker

How it connects to other documents

Planned hours come from the WBS and Resource Plan.
Actual cost feeds the Budget Tracker (EVM).
Overruns are explained in the Issue Log.

The sample document

Below is the actual document for project WEB-2026-01. Read the purpose first, then go through each numbered section.

Issued by: [Your Company] Technologies Pvt. Ltd.

Purpose: Planned and actual hours by role up to the end of week 4. These hours feed the actual cost in the Budget Tracker.

Item	Detail
Document no.	WEB-2026-01/TS
Version	1.0
Date	30 Oct 2026
Owner	Project Manager
Audience	Internal
Phase	Execution

1. Cumulative to week 4 (5–30 Oct 2026)

Role	Rate (₹/h)	Planned hours	Actual hours	Variance	Planned cost (₹)	Actual cost (₹)
Project Manager	800	35	40	+5	28,000	32,000
UI/UX Designer	700	83	103	+20	58,100	72,100
Frontend Developer	750	34	34	0	25,500	25,500
Backend / CMS Developer	850	28	28	0	23,800	23,800
QA Tester	500	2	2	0	1,000	1,000
Content Writer	400	24	24	0	9,600	9,600
Total		206	231	+25	1,46,000	1,64,000

2. Week 4 entries (26–30 Oct)

Role	Main tasks	Hours
UI/UX Designer	Home page rework (I-03), round 2 revisions, sign-off pack	34
Backend Developer	Staging environment, Git repository	16
Frontend Developer	Theme scaffolding, design tokens	12
Project Manager	Design sign-off, client calls, reporting	11
Content Writer	Content chasing, SEO keyword list	6

Note: The designer's extra 20 hours (₹14,000) match the reserve held for risk R1. The PM's extra 5 hours came from additional client calls about late content.

WEB-2026-01/TS · v1.0 · Internal. Bracketed items such as [Client Name] are placeholders.

Key takeaways

Compare planned vs actual hours every week.
Look for the reason behind each overrun.
Here, 20 extra designer hours caused most of the cost problem.

Common mistakes to avoid

Filling timesheets at month end from memory.
Not linking overruns to causes.
Ignoring small weekly overruns until they become big.

Next lesson: 30. Weekly Status Report