By Steve Moran
It’s been a long time since I was an hourly employee, but when I worked hourly and had to punch a clock — first as a janitor in my college dorm and later as a hospital orderly — I quickly learned that if I clocked in 10 minutes early and clocked out 10 minutes late, my paychecks were bigger.
That meant another meal out (remember when you could get a complete meal for $.99 at Taco Bell?) or a night of drinking.
The Mindset That Creates Clock Creep
I was in my late teens and early twenties, and I never once thought about what it might mean to my employer or their operating budget. While I didn’t really think about it, if you had asked, I would have told you they were like a bank with unlimited resources.
If only one team member does this, the financial impact is next to nothing. But if you have a handful of employees padding their hours, it starts to have a real impact on the budget and the bottom line.
It Matters and is Fixable
I recently spoke with Brett Landrum, the CEO of Procare HR (a Foresight partner), about clock creep. The first thing he pointed out was that most senior living organizations have no idea how big the problem is. That is, virtually every time they have conducted an analysis for companies, leaders end up shocked at how much money they are losing to clock creep.
Brett then talked about four strategies they use to get clock creep under control:
1. Address It Head-On
Talk about it with the team. Explain why it’s a problem and communicate your commitment to stopping it. Transparency beats passive-aggressive policy changes every time.
2. Consider the Human Impact
If you have team members with significant clock creep, it’s easy to be mad at them. But it may be how they’re keeping their families afloat. Spend some time thinking about the impact it will have on those team members (or be prepared to let them go).
3. Fix the Root Causes
Look at what’s driving your clock creep. If you’re perpetually understaffed, there will be more clock creep, and the solution is to fix your understaffing problem, not just crack down on time theft.
4. It Takes Great Data
It starts with a payroll system or dashboard that allows leaders to see the aggregate impact in terms of dollars and track improvements once they have committed to addressing the problem. While having data and a good data dashboard, it requires someone to be specifically paying attention to the problem and addressing it.
The Bottom Line
Clock creep isn’t just about time theft—it’s about setting clear expectations and building a culture of accountability. Address it early, address it honestly, and you’ll save your business from slowly bleeding money while building stronger trust with your team.
