Insightful Review

Insightful (formerly Workpuls) is a workforce analytics software. The San Francisco-based company was founded in 2016. It started out as an employee monitoring solution, but it later switched to a more holistic approach that includes:

• Time tracking
• Real-time analytics
• Project management
• Automatic time mapping.

It’s designed to help both SMBs and enterprises boost their productivity and effectively manage office, remote, and hybrid employees. It doesn’t matter how flexible your work arrangement is — Insightful will accommodate it. 

You can choose between Cloud and on-premise installation options for Windows, Mac, and Linux. However, there’s no mobile app available, which is a bummer. 

Aside from that, this solution does seem promising. But, would it be a good fit for your company? 

Well, this Insightful review will help you find out!

Insightful Features

At a glance, this software has a lot to offer. Let’s take a closer look at what it does.

Analytics Dashboard

Insightful has a productivity platform to deliver you the data you need.

You can receive email reports daily, weekly, or monthly. You can then share them with your employees and see which areas need improvement.

However, many users have complained in their Insightful reviews that the report templates aren’t versatile enough. On the brighter side, you can customize the analytics to match your team’s size and goals.

So, what kind of data can you expect?

You’ll get real-time reports on the number of employees who are currently: 

• active
• productive 
• slacking (gasp!) 
• on a break 

You can track their progress and trends over time and even benchmark their performance.

Additionally, you’ll always know:

• When they clock in/out
• What app they’re currently using
• The task they’ve been assigned

You can also gain precious insight into the total number of productive, neutral, and unproductive hours. And if you need something specific, you can search the dashboard by:

• employee’s name 
• team 
• project 
• task 

Overall, the software manages to provide a window into your team’s activity while they’re working. The reports are comprehensive and very easy to understand. 

Employee Monitoring

This feature goes hand in hand with the previous one. Insightful’s all-seeing monitoring functions will let you know when someone plays online doll dress-up games on company time.

Here’s how it works:

When installing the app, you can choose whether it will be visible or hidden from your employees.

It will track the top apps and websites used individually, as a team, or on a company level. All the apps are categorized as:

• productive (green), 
• unproductive (red) 
• neutral (grey)

You can also label them yourself. That way, the software won’t mistakenly count your social media manager’s time spent on Facebook as unproductive. 

Of course, all activities will be documented via screenshots. You can set it so that they’re taken randomly or triggered by your employee’s suspicious activity.

Time Tracking

One of Insightful’s core features is time tracking. It’s essential for project and client management. Time is money — and you’ll want to record every billable second.

You can review your team members’:

• Active time
• Allowed break time
• Break time overages
• Manual time
• Idle time.

On top of that, your employees are free to fill in their own time. You can check and approve their manual entries later.

Project Management

Insightful also has Kanban boards for basic project management. They allow you and your team members to collaborate on tasks and track time on each one individually. You can mark them as to do, in progress, and done. 

This feature is practical for projects of a smaller scale. The only problem is that it’s too simplistic. In addition to that, Insightful doesn’t integrate with dedicated project management apps. That means you’ll have to spend a lot of time juggling between apps.

Auto-time Mapping

This software has another ace up its sleeve — automatic time mapping. Basically, it can predict how much time certain tasks will take. It will automatically assign time and work to your projects, so you can focus more on completing your goals.

Best of all, Insightful has options that are customized for specific industries and enterprise teams.

This AI-powered tool is undeniably convenient — and only available in the most expensive plans. Of course, you can always create plans manually if that’s how you prefer it.

Time and Attendance

Insightful’s Time and Attendance dashboard makes sure that you always know when and what your employees are working on. 

The time clock app can start automatically as soon as they log in. Or they can clock in/out by themselves and take breaks! Either way, the software will record all their hard work in timesheets. You can then filter them for custom dates, teams, and employees for more precise reports.

Furthermore, you can export the timesheets as PDF, CSV, or XSLX files. Your preferred financial systems can help you calculate the billable hours, labor costs, and payroll.

Security

Insightful will be collecting your data (some of it very sensitive even!), so security is of utmost importance.

Let’s see how reliable it is:

Its uptime track record is 99.9% — that’s excellent server availability. All your info is stored for two years.

The app also boasts about multi-certificate security. It’s AICPA SOC 2, ISO 27001, and GDPR compliant. 

What’s more, all data at rest is encrypted with AES-256 and with HTTPS, SSL, and TLS 1.2 while in transit. All in all, the service’s encryption standards are pretty strong.

And there’s more good news!

As a client, you can access your data through an HTTPS connection. Your passwords are protected via an advanced hashing algorithm. You can use two-factor authentication for your account, too. 

Insightful also isn’t too nosy. Its employees will only access your info if an account admin asks for support. And you don’t have to worry about third parties either! This service won’t under any circumstance sell or disclose your data.

Interface and Ease of Use

Insightful’s stylish and sleek dashboard presents you with essential facts about your company. All the metrics are pretty self-explanatory, but there’s extra info when you mouse over them. They’re also highlighted, so you can determine at a glance what’s important.

The main tools are clearly labeled — there’s no second-guessing what’s what. You can find:

• Real-time Insights
• Employees
• Teams
• Screenshots
• Time and Attendance
• Apps and Websites
• Activities
• Projects
• Settings.

Overall, the software is very intuitive and easy to grasp. 

Customer Support

You can contact Insightful’s reps via web chat, phone, and email. Enterprise users also have the privilege of dedicated agents.

I’ve sent an email and a message to one of the live chat agents. In both cases, the response time was very good. They answered my questions and were friendly and polite. All things considered, it was a positive experience. Other users in their Insightful reviews have also praised the service. 

And there are extra resources, too. You can check out the help section, blog, and webinars. The help center is a bit barebones, but it covers the most important topics.

Insightful Pricing

The cost is based on three main products:

Employee monitoring is the most basic plan centered around activity tracking and timekeeping. Each next package adds new features, such as time spent on tasks, project management, and auto-time mapping.

Enterprise, however, has a unique offer. It includes:

• On-Premise Deployment
• Role-Based Access
• Audit Logs
• Dedicated Account Manager
• SLA
• 24/7 Phone Support.

There’s a 14-day free trial where you can try out all the features. It doesn’t require a credit card, which is great. 

But, you’ll need to contact one of Insightful’s representatives to help you set up your trial — and that’s a bit of a hassle. 

Verdict

Insightful is ambitious and tries to do a lot at once. It mostly succeeds.

The analytics are coherent and just what you need to skyrocket your productivity. I love that you can adjust them to your team, too.

The activity monitoring is similarly flexible. You decide which apps are productive.

Furthermore, time logging is simple and unobtrusive. Generally speaking, the app is exceptionally user-friendly and robust at the same time. 

Of course, it’s not without its flaws.

As of yet, it doesn’t have a mobile app. It could really tie things together, especially for team communication and project management.

The email reports are also a bit too simplistic. You should be able to tailor them to your precise needs instead of relying on templates.

And last but not least, the project management tools are very limited. And there are no integrations to help with that! But, according to the website, they’re coming soon as an add-on. 

With that said, I can easily end this Insightful review on a positive note. SMBs and enterprise companies looking for valuable insight into their performance can learn a lot with this app.