AI Is Everywhere in Agencies, But It Barely Shows Up on the Timesheets

Hubstaff Releases "More Profit, Less Burnout: How Smart Agencies Scale"

INDIANAPOLIS, Nov. 11, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Hubstaff, a leading time tracking platform, is expanding its research on how AI is transforming the workforce with its latest agency report. "More Profit, Less Burnout: How Smart Agencies Scale" uncovers a surprising gap in how agencies measure the impact of AI on their work.

What: AI Adoption is Widespread, but Undercounted
Hubstaff's report reveals that while AI is widely used across agency operations, its true influence is often missing from the data leaders depend on to plan capacity.

According to Hubstaff's findings, 65–73% of agency teams already use AI, and 86% report productivity gains. Yet, time tracking data shows that only around 4% of logged hours directly involve AI-related tasks.

The big takeaway? With low logged hours, agencies may be underestimating AI's contribution to efficiency. Few hours spent using AI also means agencies may be missing the boat on meaningful adoption.

Who: Agency Leaders Must Measure AI Efficiency Gains
AI is helping agency teams move faster (67%) and focus more effectively (69%), freeing them from routine tasks that drain creative energy. However, those productivity wins rarely appear in agency timesheets or project dashboards.

"Agencies are gaining hours every week with AI, but they're not tracking those wins," said Jared Brown, CEO of Hubstaff. "You can't optimize what you don't measure."

The report suggests that while agencies are quick to adopt AI tools for tasks like research, reporting, and project management, most still rely on traditional time tracking categories that fail to capture these new efficiencies.

Why it Matters: Agencies Need a New Lens on Time Tracking
As AI becomes more embedded in everyday work, agencies face a strategic question:
If AI drives measurable results but isn't being tracked, how can leaders accurately plan for an AI-powered future?

Consistent, accurate timesheets have always been important for agencies, but as AI adoption becomes more widespread, the edge for agencies will be seeing how the work gets done. Understanding what's automated, which apps are in play and by whom are now non-negotiables for capacity planning.

When agencies make time visible and predictable, they can connect AI-driven productivity gains to actual capacity, turning invisible efficiency into measurable growth.

Read Next
The full report, "More Profit, Less Burnout: How Smart Agencies Scale," explores how top agencies are balancing productivity gains, improving capacity planning and driving profitability in the AI era.

This release follows Hubstaff's research, The AI Productivity Shift and Workstyle Revolution: Debunking Myths and Unlocking Distributed Team Potential. Keep following Hubstaff for future reports on time tracking, productivity monitoring and workforce analytics.

About Hubstaff
Hubstaff is a time tracking platform built for global teams. Track time, automate payments, monitor productivity, and get actionable productivity insights — all in one tool.

About the Research
Research findings are built on anonymized work data collected from more than 140,000 users in the Hubstaff platform. For more detail on our methodology, please see the Workstyle Revolution: Debunking Myths and Unlocking Distributed Team Potential and the AI Productivity Shift Report.

SOURCE Hubstaff