I'm a web developer, and about 2 years ago my company implemented a new note taking policy that takes up a very large portion of my time, makes me feel like I'm untrusted and I just don't feel as happy as I did before. We are required to write a note of everything we do through the day with time spent and submit it by the end of the day. This is in addition to our project management system where we already track our time and write our detailed notes on what we do for each task. Prior to the policy I was able to finish work on time, now I dread the note portion of my day and I usually end up spending an hour or so at the end of the day to write up my "journal" of the day. I also have zero extra time which I used to use to learn new skills and techniques. It's an absolute waste of time and is destroying my urge to learn new skills that used to help improve the company's processes and efficiency.
When I started my new role with my employer, I did this using a browser extension and a really neat time-tracker app. I forwarded every day's tracking data to my mentor and so he was able to see with a really fine grain what I was working on, and how long each task took me in a given day.
Our apps security policy put the kibosh on that and I had to destroy my account once I realized it would not be feasible to keep it going forward.
My employer is really conservative about allowing 3rd-party apps, which is great for security, and puts us in a veritable Stone Age of productivity.
