With Gusto Project Tracking, admins with the right permissions can create and manage projects to see how much your workforce costs.
After you set up Gusto Time Tracking, employees track their hours on projects and tasks, and you can run a report that shows total costs, including wages, benefits, and taxes.
Project Tracking is available on Plus, Premium, and Time & Attendance Plus add-on plans. You can upgrade at any time.
⚠️ Not supported: Project tracking for contractors and pay schedules set up by “employee type.”
Tracking hours by project lets you understand employee costs and efficiency. Here's how project tracking works in Gusto:
Create a project in Gusto when you have new clients or work.
Your team tracks hours by project and task, and can add notes.
If employees also track payroll time, they pick the project when clocking in and out.
Both hourly and salaried employees can add notes about their work.
See project data in real time. Filter total hours by employee, project, task, or date range.
Generate a report to see the full costs based on processed payrolls.
Benefits of project tracking:
Track hours and notes in one place.
Break down costs by project, task, or employee.
See workforce reports that include wages, benefits, taxes, and workers’ comp.
Build trust with clients using accurate invoices.
Included features:
Unlimited projects and tasks
Support for hourly and salaried employees
Real-time insights and workforce costing reports
Not included:
Manager approvals
Location tracking
Contractor project tracking
Overhead or material cost tracking
You can create projects for new clients or jobs and assign employees to them. Once projects are set up, employees track hours directly in Gusto, and you’ll review and approve before running payroll.
To create a project:
In the left menu, click Time & Attendance > Time Tracking.
Find the Project Tracking section and click Manage projects.
Select + New Project.
Name the project.
Add a description (optional).
Add tasks (optional).
Choose employees who can track time to the project.
Click Create Project.
Here's what project details you can edit:
Name
Description
Tasks
Team members assigned (add or remove)
In the left menu, click Time & Attendance > Time Tracking.
Find the Project Tracking section and click Manage projects.
Next to the project, click the Actions menu (three dots).
Select Edit project.
Make changes, then click Update project.
Deleting a project removes its reporting history. There's no option to archive a project.
In the left menu, click Time & Attendance > Time Tracking.
Find the Project Tracking section and click Manage projects.
Next to the project, click the Actions menu (three dots).
Select Delete project.
Click Delete.
Tasks only exist within projects. You can add, edit, or delete them.
⚠️ Deleting tasks removes their reporting history.
Add a task: Edit the project → type or select the task → click Update project.
Edit a task name: Create a new task with the correct name, then delete the old one.
Delete a task: Edit the project → click the x next to the task → click Update project.
See real-time project hours and generate reports after payroll runs.
To view insights:
In the left menu, click Time & Attendance > Time Tracking.
Find the Project Tracking section and click Manage projects.
Click the Insights tab.
Click Filter to choose the time frame and data.
Click Filter.
View the page, or click Download.
For a full detailed report on project tracking, follow the steps in the workforce costing report dropdown below.
To manually calculate the project costs for a given pay period, follow the steps below—these should match the totals you can find in the workforce costing report.
Generate a list of all projects that have hours tracked to it for the given pay period.
Only active projects will appear in workforce costing reports.
For each employee, add all hours they worked under each unique project to find their total project hours (by project).
Every project an employee worked on will have a separate total amount.
For each employee, calculate their total hours worked to find their total overall hours.
For each employee and each project worked, divide the total project hours by the total overall hours to find the project ratio amount (the ratio of time an employee spent working on each project in a given pay period).
Every project an employee worked will have a separate project ratio.
For non-exempt and hourly employees
Divide total project hours by total overall hours.
For exempt/Salaried employees
If total project hours for an employee in a week for a given pay period is more than 40, divide total project hours by total overall hours.
If total project hours for an employee in a week for a given pay period is less than 40, divide total project hours by 40 hours.
For each employee, add together all their payroll costs for the pay period:
Wages
Benefit deductions and contributions
Employee and employer taxes
Reimbursements for a given pay period.
Multiply the employee’s total payroll cost by the respective project ratio amounts for each active project to calculate the project costs by employee.
To get the overall project cost, add together all the project costs for each employee.
Here’s the scenario:
Hourly employee*
Worked 30 hours total
5 hours working on Project A
10 hours working on Project B
15 hours on non-project work
All hours were added in Time tracking.
Payroll costs for employee:
Wages: $1000
Employee and employer taxes: $100
Medical contribution: $50
You ran payroll for the pay period and now want to generate a workforce costing report.
Use the steps below to calculate the overall project costs for this employee for a given pay period.
Generate a list of active projects:
Project A and Project B
Add all hours worked for each project to find the employee’s total project hours (by project).
Project A: 5 hours
Project B: 10 hours
Add their total hours worked (including non-project hours) to find their total overall hours.
Total overall hours: 30 hours
Divide the total project hours (for each project) by the total overall hours to find the project ratio amount (the ratio of time an employee spent working on each project and non-project).
Project A: 5 / 30 = 0.167
Project B: 10 / 30 = 0.333
Non-project hours: 15 / 30 = 0.5
Add all their payroll costs for the pay period.
Wages: $1000
Employee and employer taxes: $100
Medical contribution: $50
Total: $1150
Multiply the payroll cost total by the respective project ratio amounts for each active project to calculate the project costs by employee.
Project A: 1150 x 0.167 = $192.05
Project B: 1150 x 0.333 = $382.95
Non-project: 1150 x 0.5 = $575
These are the project costs for this single employee. If you rounded decimals, there may be slight differences in payroll cost totals and project cost totals.
If there were multiple employees, repeat steps 1–6 and then add project cost totals for Project A for all employees, then do the same for Project B.
*Note for exempt/Salaried employees: For exempt/salaried employees that work on a project for less than 40 hours in the workweek, you should divide their total project hours in step 4 by 40 hours (instead of dividing by their total overall hours worked).
For each payroll, there are costs associated with a specific job or pay rate, and there are costs only associated with the employee.
Job specific items
The payroll items below are associated with a specific job/pay rate:
Regular hours
Overtime hours and double overtime hours
PTO hours
Sick hours
Holiday hours
Non-job specific items
The payroll items below are not associated with a specific job/pay rate:
Benefit deductions and contributions
Taxes
Reimbursements
Additional earnings (ex. commissions and bonuses)
For a given payroll line item, our report uses the steps below to calculate the cost of each job.
Add all job-specific payroll line items together to get the overall total.
Add all job-specific payroll line items for each unique job to get totals per job.
For each unique job, take the total per job and divide it by the overall total from step 1 (repeat this step for each unique job).
This provides the percentage to apply to the non-job specific payroll line items to then attribute to each job for the purpose of job costing.
Apply the percentages for each non-job specific line items (additional earnings, taxes, benefit deductions/contributions, and reimbursements), and attribute the amounts to each job accordingly.
Multiple employees grouped by jobs
The same calculation is used for each employee per payroll item, then summed up for each payroll where the job titles are the same in order to get the job costing total.
In this example, the employee worked two jobs during the pay period: Doctor 2 and Doctor 4. The employee also earned non-job-specific pay: Commission.
Use the steps from above for the calculation to apply to the payroll report below.
Steps 1 and 2: Add all job-specific payroll line items together to get the overall total, and add all job-specific payroll line items for each unique job to get totals per job.
In this example, for all job-specific payroll line items, the employee earned $4000 in total.
As Doctor 2, the job specific pay totals $1000.
As Doctor 4 the job specific pay totals $3000 total.
For future reference: The employee earned $1000 in commission.
Step 3: Take the total per job and divide it by the overall total to find the percentage to apply to non-job specific line items:
Doctor 2: $1000 / $4000 = 25%
This percentage of the non-job specific earnings will be attributed to Doctor 2.
Doctor 4: $3000 / $4000) = 75%
This percentage of the non-job-specific earnings will be attributed to Doctor 4.
Step 4: Apply the percentages from Step 3 to each non-job specific line items and attribute the amounts to each job accordingly:
Commission total is $1000, and percentages are 25% and 75% respectively.
Calculate the commission amounts to be attributed to each job:
25% x $1000 = $250 for Doctor 2
75% x $3000 = $750 for Doctor 4
The same 25% and 75% percentages for this example should also be applied to all other non-job specific payroll line items (taxes, benefit deductions/contributions, reimbursements, etc.).
Set up Time Tracking/Projects first. Have employees track time to projects, then process payroll for that date range.
Note: Gusto Project Tracking is not compatible with pay schedules set by "employee type".
Go to Time & Attendance → Time tracking.
To get here in the mobile app, go to the Time section.
Scroll to Project tracking and select Manage projects.
Select Generate report next to "New project".
Choose what to include and the report format.
Choose Generate report → Download CSV (top-right).
If you have an accounting integration with QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, or Xero, you can group your payroll information by project with your chart of accounts.
Mapping by projects (instead of job codes or departments) is good for businesses with multiple people in the same role and when some employees work hours in one role and other hours in another role.
Project mapping is not available for Aplos or Freshbooks.
If you use QuickBooks Classes, you can also map your projects to classes in step 9 below. The same expense account can be used for each team and have an assigned QuickBooks Class—this keeps the reports in QuickBooks much cleaner and easier to understand.
Make sure you've already:
Connected to QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, or Xero from Gusto.
Mapped your chart of accounts.
Created project-specific accounts in your accounting software.
Set up time tracking by project for your team.
In your Gusto admin account, head to the App directory and choose your software (QuickBooks Online or Xero).
Go to the Settings tab.
Next to "Journal entry consolidation," click edit.
Select by project.
You can map your chart of accounts by just one category: projects, jobs, or departments.
Click Submit.
Go to the Mapping tab.
Scroll to the “Mappings by project” section. For each project you want to map, click Override.
If your company uses QuickBooks Classes, you’ll first have the option to choose a Class to map the project to.
When exported, the payroll entry will tie to your dimensional reporting needs in QuickBooks Online.
For each of the project's line items, choose the account you want it to correspond with.
Your progress is saved as you go. When you’re done mapping, click the x icon to return to the main Mappings page.
Repeat for each project you want to map.
If multiple projects share tracking categories, there will not be separate line items when synced to your accounting software. Instead, the project wages will be lumped together.
These transactions will be exported by project to your accounting software account. If any projects are left unmapped, they'll sync based on the original chart of accounts mappings.
Q: Can I customize the project work week to match my pay schedule?
A: At this time, project work weeks will not match your pay schedule and will go based on a 7-day period.
Q: I have non-exempt employees who track time for payroll. How does this work for them?
A: Non-exempt employees still clock in and out as usual. Projects are tracked independently, in a separate tab of the Time tracking section.
Q: Can I see real-time workforce costs for my projects?
A: For now, you're only able to view real-time project hours that have been tracked by your team in their hours section. You can see up-to-date workforce costs for a given project after you've run payroll.
Q: How does this work for employees who track time for payroll, projects, and tasks?
A: Employees who track time for payroll and projects can select which project and task they're working on when clocking in and out.
Q: How does this work for employees who only track time to projects?
A: Employees who track time for projects but not payroll will be able to track project and task time using a separate weekly timesheet in the Time Tracking section of their account. If you add the employee to time tracking for payroll, the weekly timesheet will be replaced by the ability to select a project from a dropdown menu whenever an employee clocks in and out. Project and task hours tracked on the old timesheet will still be reflected in workforce costing reports.