With investors shocked and world thrilled by the ongoing crisis, companies need to find new ways to save some bucks. Using the attendance tracking and leave management software comes as a great way to reach this goal.

The first signs of a global recession have been induced by the Covid-19 pandemic that has started in 2020, with imposing lockdowns in nearly all countries around the world. This was the first and sadly not the last sign of an upcoming downturn. Moreover, the pandemic itself is far from over.

Plague, Sword, Famine and Startups

Currently, nearly all of the Horsemen of the Apocalypse have visited the world - Plague and Sword are already here, with Famine waiting to boost the crisis even more.

Plague

According to World Health Organization (WHO) data there were 4.6 million covid cases reported globally during the week of 27 june to 3 July. The week before was similar when it comes to the global number of cases. As of July 2022 there were 546 million confirmed cases and 6.3 million deaths reported globally.

Considering that, the pandemic is far from fading, which some states returning to restrictions and global transportation chains disrupted. One of the most interesting examples of the former comes from Macau, where the authorities decided to close the casinos - a bold move for one of the global gambling hubs.

Also, there are new variants reported, with the BA.5 variant reported to be super-contagious, first observed in Shanghai. To address the issue, the city performs mass testing fo Covid. The overall impact of the pandemic on the Chinese economy resulted in lowered growth predictions and growing unemployment rate. But the effects are not limited to China. According to The World Bank the global growth is expected to drop from 5.7 percent in 2021 to 2.9 percent in 2022. The earlier predictions have set the level of expectations on 4.1 percent - significantly more.

Sword and Famine

Regardless of the disruption brought by the COVID-19 outbreak, there was a major disruption and a humanitarian crisis brought by the war in Ukraine. The country is one of the major global food producers as well as one of thre biggest contributors to World Food Programme (WFP) - the UN agency that provides food to countries in crisis. According to the agency, Ukraine contributed up to 40% of all wheat available in the programme.

According to Our World in Data, both countries engaged in the war are heavily contributing to global food production, with 56% of global sunflower oil being produced in these countries. Also, 19% of barley, 13% of wheat and 4.4% of corn are produced either in Russia or Ukraine.

This situation contributes both to the rising global food prices as well as pumping up the inflation that reaches levels unseen in decades. According to the New York Times there are nearly 50 countries globally that have raised the interest rates, with some leveling up by staggering levels of 15 percentage points (Ukraine), 10.5 percentage points (Russia) or 2 percentage points (Ghana, Egypt, Argentina). The global economic powerhouses also have decided to raise interest rates, with the US leveling up by 0.75 percentage points and Eurozone by 0.25 percentage points.

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…and Startups

With the rising costs of money globally, the companies, with startups being in the avant-garde, face shrinkages in investments. This applies both to investing in their own business as well as investing in external companies, for example via VC funds.

According to the United Nations-delivered World Investment Report 2022 the looming triple (food, fuel, financial) crisis is going to keep growth fragile and investment levels low. With the reduced availability of money from any source given, the companies, including startups, SMBs and enterprises alike, need to find new ways to save and secure the money for the development. Sometimes these need to be found fast.

How to save money with leave management and time tracking software

Implementing a time tracking and leave management system like Calamari is one of the easiest and most effective ways to find savings fast. These ways include:

Work with freelancers and external contractors

Access to skills is crucial for companies, no matter what is to be done - from programming and design to dirty work in production. With the stable levels of unemployment rate, finding a good employee who works for an affordable paycheck is getting increasingly challenging.

That’s why employing freelancers and free agents is increasingly popular. A good freelance partner provides the company with access to the desired - these people are usually well educated with 77% of EU-based freelancers having at least a Bachelor’s degree and 54% having a master’s degree. With the rise of COVID-related remote work and increasing awareness of work-life balance, employees are increasingly eager to work as freelancers, with 58% of US-based employees considering going freelance.

They are waiting to be hired, with their rich experience, high skills, and education. On the other side of the same coin, the company pays not for all the HR-related stuff around cooperation with freelancers with benefits or paid leaves to name just a few.

Shifting at least a part of the workload to freelance contractors is a great way to save money, yet time tracking software like Calamari needs to be a core component of their working environment to keep all the information secure and legible.

Source talents in other countries

Hiring freelancers is one way to save money. Another is to source talents in countries where the costs of living are significantly lower. Working with software developers from Eastern Europe or help desk specialists from India is a great example of doing so.

Yet hiring offshore talents comes with several challenges, with challenging time off and attendance management being one of the key ones. A sophisticated time and leave management software like Calamari includes the national independence days and information about holidays celebrated by various cultures and countries. With that, it is easier to build and maintain a multicultural and distributed, diverse workforce.

An interesting advantage of pursuing this way of saving money is increasing the company's diversity. According to 69% of executives, increasing the diversity in the company is a serious issue that needs to be addressed properly. With challenges come opportunities. Companies and corporations identified as diverse are 35% more likely to outperform the competition and 70% more likely to work effectively in new markets.

Thus, sourcing offshore talents can be an inspiring way to explore new opportunities as well as save some bucks.

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Decrease in employee turnover

Looking for new talent to support the company is one side of the coin. The other one is about keeping people who are already working for the company in place.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics 4.25 mln. people quit their jobs in January 2022. That shows a nearly one million increase from 3.3 million in January 2021. There are multiple reasons behind this shift - from the rising popularity of remote work and gig-economy to increased mental health awareness and abandoning the toxic or dull work environment. And the dull working environment is what is to be tackled.

Providing the employees with modern and sophisticated tools to deliver their jobs is one of the key elements of building a good employee experience. For example, Calamari automates both the time tracking and leave management, providing the employees and the HR department with convenient tools to work. By that, it builds comfort and when incorporated into a larger tech stack it can prevent employees from looking for a new job - according to Tech Target the positive experience in the workplace is what prevents one from abandoning the job and looking for the new one.

Automating the dull and repetitive HR workflows

In the uncertain world today, access to talents is critical for the company to operate. Yet talent sourcing is one of the most engaging and time-consuming HR tasks - and the time is a critical resource to be liberated.

Using Calamari to track time and manage leaves is one of the best ways to refocus the HR team from dull, administrative day-to-day work to sourcing talents and headhunting, effectively increasing the team's contribution to the company’s growth. Especially considering the fact that up to 70% of candidates are passive job seekers - they will not apply or even look at the offer unless asked to. And found it in the first place. These are talents that may contribute to the company growth and making the HR dept focused on spotting them is a good way to find savings in the volatile world today.

Reliable business data

Last but not least - the company can be optimized and improved in many ways. Yet these ways need to be found first. Finding them is impossible without access to the data.

Calamari gathers the data about the time the employees were working - either by time tracking device or time off manager. This can be used to gather information about multiple business aspects including: The absence patterns, The ROI on a particular project is enriched by the information about the employee commitment, Top performers including projects and employees, And many more.

Storing these information in one, reliable and actionable system like Calamari is the first step to analyzing them in a more regular and organized manner.

Summary

Savings can take many forms, with reducing spending being the top-of-mind choice. Yet optimizing the usage of the existing resource is not to be underestimated. Only by combining these two approaches, it is possible to thrive even despite the ongoing crisis.

If you wish to know more about the possible savings coming from using Calamari, don’t hesitate to contact us now!

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