We reference "6.5 hours saved per manager, per week" in a few places on this site. Numbers like that are easy to state and easy to be skeptical of, so here's where it actually comes from.
The method
We asked a group of location managers across several teams already on Nuclear Software to log time spent specifically on scheduling and approval tasks for two weeks: building schedules, chasing approvals, and reconciling reports against what actually happened. We compared that against the same managers' estimates of the same tasks before they switched off spreadsheets, based on their prior workflow.
What it actually measures
The 6.5-hour figure is the median reduction across that group — not an average pulled up by a few extreme outliers, and not a best-case number. Some managers, particularly those coordinating across multiple locations, saved considerably more; managers with a single small team saved less, since there was less coordination overhead to remove in the first place.
Where it holds up best
- Teams coordinating shift coverage across more than one location.
- Organizations with a multi-step approval chain that previously ran through email or chat.
- Managers who were manually rebuilding reports from schedule and approval data every week.
We'd rather share a number with its method attached than a rounder one without it. If your team's situation looks different from the study group, talk to us — we're happy to estimate based on your actual setup instead of a generic average.