[nkrisc]

Likely they don't have any higher level way to gauge or measure productivity, which is why they fall back to something they can see: how many people are there and for how long. If they could measure how much work is actually getting done, they'd probably forget to even gaze upon the serfs toiling.

[sixstringtheory]

This seems like a big use-case for JIRA. It can do all sorts of reporting, and if you're engaged and looking at it every day you can see work as it gets done (as long as people use it in a way you've all agreed, which is a separate and simpler problem). Even a simple Trello board would go a long way (my personal preference).

Ironically, many places will use JIRA/Trello/etc, and then still have the sync meetings where you repeat all the actions you've performed on the board!