Workload Balance helps managers identify team members who may be at risk of burnout (overutilized) or disengagement (underutilized) by analyzing productivity data against established goals and thresholds. The dashboard offers three key views: Team Insights, which provides an overview of overall workload distribution and trends; User Insights, for analyzing individual performance; and Capacity Planning, which enables strategic workforce allocation based on historical data. This tool enables data-driven decisions about workload redistribution, hiring needs, and resource planning to maintain optimal team balance and prevent costly turnover.
To access Workload Balance, navigate to Productivity Optimization > Workload Balance.
Note: Productivity goals are applied based on each user's primary group. If a user belongs to multiple groups, confirm their Primary Group is set correctly to ensure accurate utilization data.
This dashboard utilizes Insights
This dashboard is powered by ActivTrak's Insights data, which processes and analyzes historical information with daily updates. For a complete explanation of how Insights differs from Live Data, see Understanding Live Data and Insights.
Contents
Note: Users' access to dashboards may vary based on account configuration. ActivTrak Admins can adjust access settings by assigning user roles and permissions.
Requirements
Before diving in, make sure the following are configured. Taking time to set these up correctly will ensure your data is accurate and your insights are meaningful.
- Groups (or Teams): Organize your users into teams or business units that reflect how your organization actually operates. Without well-structured groups, it's difficult to pinpoint productivity gaps or understand their impact at the department or team level. If you haven't set up groups yet — or need to update your existing ones — start with Group management before moving forward.
- Goals: Define the productivity benchmarks your groups are measured against. Setting goals at the group level allows you to track performance trends, identify areas of concern, and quantify the gap between current and target productivity. Goals should reflect realistic expectations for each team's role and work patterns. Make sure to set productivity goals before digging into your data.
Team tab
Use the Team tab to track how team utilization changes over time, identify opportunities to coach team members, reallocate work and/or adjust team capacity to create a healthier balance.
Utilization Level Distribution
This chart depicts the % of users in each workload utilization level: Underutilized, Healthy and Overutilized.
By default, a user is overutilized/underutilized if they exceed or miss their Productive Hrs/Day goal by at least 20%. The utilization threshold can be adjusted via the Insights Configuration Page. Learn more here.
Note: For accounts created prior to November 6, 2024, the default utilization threshold is 20%.
Team Workload
On the left, view an overall assessment of the team's workload balance based on the distribution of team members' utilization levels calculated as follows:
High: > 50% of team members are overutilized.
Optimal: > 70% of team members are healthy.
Low: > 50% of team members are underutilized.
Varied: Assorted workloads across members.
To the right, shown in red, green and yellow, you can view an overview of the total number of team members in each utilization level, which factors into the overall assessment on the left.
Utilization Level Trend by Week
View utilization level trends for each week. Each bar displays the % of users in each utilization level for the week.
Sometimes, significant projects or critical events require substantial effort and can be treated as exceptions (e.g., during a product launch). However, if long hours are a recurring issue, it may be time to intervene by reallocating work, hiring additional personnel, or deprioritizing projects, among other measures.
Work Habits
View high-level work habit metrics for the team, including the average start and end of day, number of breaks taken per day, average time spent per break, and average total break time.
Overutilized Users
See users who are overutilized. Depending on the situation, it may be time to intervene to prevent costly burnout.
Note: If no users are overutilized, no data will be displayed here.
Click on a user's name to drill into their Personal Insights or Technology Utilization.
Underutilized Users
See users who are underutilized. Depending on the situation, it may be time to intervene to improve coverage, capacity and workload balance.
Note: If no users are underutilized, no data will be displayed here.
Click on a user's name to drill into their Personal Insights or Technology Utilization.
Users tab
Use the Users tab to identify individuals who are at risk of burnout (overutilized) or disengagement (underutilized). Click on a user to see their weekly trends at the bottom of the screen.
Utilization and Work Habits by User
See the utilization and work-habit details for each user. The utilization threshold can be adjusted via the Insights Configuration Page here.
Click on a user's name to drill into their Personal Insights or Technology Utilization.
Workload Trend by Week
View workload trends for each week.
Sometimes, important projects or critical events require significant effort and can be treated as exceptions (e.g., during a product launch). However, if long hours are a recurring issue, it may be time to intervene by reallocating work, hiring additional personnel, or deprioritizing projects, among other measures.
Breaks Trend by Week
View break trends for each week. By default, a break begins when a user's computer is inactive for more than 5 minutes. An ActivTrak Admin can change this by adjusting the Passive Time settings.
Capacity Planning tab
The Workload Balance - Capacity Planning provides leaders and managers with a visual snapshot of employee workloads, based on historical data, enabling informed decisions about workload distribution across team members now and in the future.
Some common use cases for the insights in this dashboard include:
- Redistributing work after a reduction in force (RIF) or reorganization
- Quarterly or bi-annual resource planning for headcount allocation
- Making a business case for hiring new FTEs or contractors (especially when teams have exceeded work capacity)
User Activity
The User Activity Table displays which team members are over capacity, at capacity, or under capacity for the selected time period, calculated as (Total Productive Hours / Expected Total Productive Hours) * 100.
The calculation takes into account three settings:
- Productive Hours Per Day Goal (set in the Benchmarks & Goals tab or the Insights Configuration page)
- Active Day Threshold (set in the Insights Configuration tab)
- The % of Expected Days Worked (set in the Capacity Planning)*
A fourth setting, the Capacity Assessment Threshold % (also set in the Capacity Planning), then defines what is considered over capacity, at capacity, and under capacity.
*For accounts with HRIS Integration (Add-on), % of Expected Days Worked is not taken into account. Time Off hours are accounted for in the calculation of Expected Total Productive Hrs.
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
| 1 & 2 | Displays individual team member names (User) and the number of Productive Hrs/Day for the selected time period (Activity Date filter). |
| 3 | Displays the Productive Hrs/Day (Goal). |
| 4 | Displays the total number of productive hours worked (Total Productive Hours) during the selected time period. |
| 5 |
Shows the Expected Total Productive Hrs,
which is based on the Productive Hrs Goal x the Expected Days
Worked. Note: For accounts with HRIS Integration (Add-on), approved time off hours are deducted from the calculation. |
| 6 | Shows the total Days Worked (Active Days). |
| 7 |
Expected Days Worked, is based on the number
of workdays (using each User's configured
Work Schedules)
in the selected time period x % of Expected Days
Worked. Note: % of Expected Days worked is not taken into account for accounts with HRIS Integration (Add-on) |
| 8 & 9 |
User Capacity displays the total number of productive hours worked as a percentage of Expected Productive Hours. It is color-coded based on whether the calculation is over capacity (red), at capacity (black), or under capacity (green), using the % selected for Capacity Assessment Threshold. Capacity Assessment is also based on the Capacity Assessment Threshold. Assessment Threshold examples:
Capacity recommendations:
|
Days Worked (Active Days) Calendar
The Days Worked (Active Days) calendar displays the specific days the selected user(s) worked within the selected time period (Activity Date filter). Select the user’s name in the User Activity table to view the days worked by an individual employee. Users can select multiple users by holding down the Command key (on macOS) or the Control key (on Windows).
Monthly Trend - Days Worked (Active Days)
With the Monthly Trend report, view how the capacity of teams and team members varies across each month to see historically which months are busier or lighter for teams as a whole. You can, for example, see which months individual team members tend to take more time off and address potential absenteeism concerns, especially when employees may not be logging time off in the HRIS system.
Capacity Planning Tips
- Blog: Workforce Capacity Planning: How to Do More with Less
- Blog: Using Data to Make Strategic Decisions