On many projects, the question “where are we on effort?” waits for month end, while timesheets are consolidated, matched against the budget and put into a spreadsheet. On a fixed-price project or a day allowance, that delay is expensive: an overrun found when the project closes is no longer a signal, it is a loss.
AlibeeZ takes the problem from the other end. Time does not need consolidating: every approved entry feeds consumed effort directly, and therefore margin and invoicing. The overrun shows up during the project.
What the panel shows
The panel above illustrates effort tracking on three projects. For each one, a bar compares days consumed with days sold: the core system rebuild stands at 184 days out of 240 (77%), the maintenance contract at 97 out of 120 (81%). The third, an ERP migration, has consumed 283 days against 240 sold, or 118%: its bar turns to alert, and the note at the bottom flags 43 days beyond what was sold, with an alert set at the 110% threshold. At the foot of the panel, the team’s billable utilisation, computed from the same time.
None of these figures is entered separately: they all follow from approved time.
Before it is consumed, time is approved
Entered time does not count yet. It enters consumed effort once approved, through a chain you define. In AlibeeZ, approval processes are configurable:
- One or several levels, triggered by role, entity or project type. For example, a timesheet approved by the manager, then by the client-side project lead.
- Delegation handled: when an approver is away, approval does not get stuck.
- Every step recorded: who approved, and when. A rejected entry can be sent back to the employee with the reason.
These chains are set through configuration, with no development, as long as they stay within those dimensions. And an entry arriving through the API or from Jira follows exactly the same chain as one made on screen.
Consumed effort you can read on three axes
Once approved, time feeds a real-time view of consumed effort, on three axes:
| Axis | The question it answers |
|---|---|
| By project | How does consumption compare with what was sold? Is the project on budget? |
| By person | Where has each person’s time gone? What is their billable utilisation? |
| By activity | Which phase or type of work is consuming more than planned? |
Utilisation, margin and consumed effort come out of the same base as timesheets and invoices. There is no competing version to reconcile between management control, project leads and leadership.
The overrun, flagged at the threshold you set
Seeing consumption is not enough if nobody looks at it at the right moment. AlibeeZ turns that around: the gap between effort sold and effort consumed triggers an alert at the threshold you set, not when the project closes. That alert can appear on the home screen of the person concerned, project lead or management control, alongside their other alerts.
On the invoicing side, the same logic applies before issuing: AlibeeZ warns you of any overrun on a purchase order ceiling, a day allowance or a budget. An overrun is then handled as a decision (an amendment, a renegotiation, an accepted loss) rather than as a discovery.
What consumed effort feeds
Margin
Forecast gross margin is computed from the quote, then recomputed with every time entry. Consumed effort is its main input: a project consuming more than planned sees its margin drop as it goes, not at the post-mortem. That mechanism is covered in our article on margin and forecasting in AlibeeZ.
Invoicing
Approved time is directly billable, with no re-keying. Better time traceability means better billing, and a shorter delay between declaration and issuing the invoice.
Your reports
Projections and reports are built your way: you pick the columns (days spent, remaining effort, gross margin…), the filters and the groupings, as you would in a spreadsheet. The figures are read from the application the moment you open the report, and can be exported to Excel or CSV whenever you need. If your finance team works in Power BI, logged time goes there too, through an automatic export.
What it changes
- Overruns caught in time: the alert fires at the threshold you set, during the project.
- A margin that follows actual progress, instead of being rebuilt after the fact.
- One number per question: consumed effort is the same for the project lead, management control and leadership.
- Defensible data: every consumed day traces back to an entry, its author and its approval.
Consumed effort is only as reliable as entry: read our article on time entry in AlibeeZ, and the one on absences and leave. For fixed-price projects, see how AlibeeZ handles forecasting.
Frequently asked questions
How many approval levels can be set up?
One or several, triggered by role, entity or project type: a timesheet approved by the manager and then by the client-side project lead, for instance. Every step is recorded and delegations are handled.
Is consumed effort really real-time?
It is fed by every approved entry, with no monthly consolidation. Reports read the application’s own data the moment you open them, so there is no gap between the report and reality.
Can we be alerted before a project goes over budget?
Yes. The gap between effort sold and effort consumed triggers an alert at the threshold you set. On the invoicing side, AlibeeZ also warns you of any overrun on a purchase order ceiling, a day allowance or a budget.
Can consumption data be extracted?
Yes. Reports can be exported to Excel or CSV, and logged time is part of the automatic export to Power BI, to feed your existing dashboards.