ARCHIVE FOR THE ‘cloud’ CATEGORY

Marne Martin, CEO, ServicePower talks us through a variety of different scheduling solutions and how they can turbo charge service delivery...

When I think of a ‘turbo boost’, a few images pop into my head. From Superman to a luxury car that eats up the track, a turbo boost ‘supercharges’ an action, with apparent ease, whether that’s saving the innocents or posting the fastest lap times.

In relation to mobile workforce management, a turbo boost to scheduling operations can be just what’s required to achieve the next level performance to drive customer satisfaction, retention and future sales and that turbo boost can only be found in true optimisation that places the power of cognitive computing and big data at your fingertips.

The automation, calculation speed, and schedule quality inherent in true artificial intelligence (AI) based optimisation engines maximises the productivity and efficiency of mobile workforces, while reducing costs and ultimately improving the customer experience.

 

Despite stories from the industry about prolonged deployments, platforms which require heavy development and customisation, engines which can’t process large volumes of work without failing or batching unprocessed job, real AI based schedule optimisation can boost your operation, and it does so with ease.

What does Scheduling Mean?

Mobile workforce management solutions (MWFM), have at their core typically ‘scheduling’, functionality which is used to manage mobile workers and at its most basic includes job scheduling, job dispatch and mobility software.

There are generally 3 kinds of scheduling solutions available which offer varying degrees of benefits, from white board / no optimisation solutions to the real, intra-day AI optimisation that enable your business to be much more productive and scalable.

Types of Scheduling

Basic Scheduling

Basic scheduling software requires building and managing a schedule manually. It’s labourintensive, doesn’t consider travel time, and doesn’t apply any computer logic to scheduling decisions, exception handling or schedule changes.

Most of these vendors offer something similar to Microsoft Outlook with drag-and-schedule functionality. Basic scheduling isn’t scalable, and doesn’t support any kind of complexity or manage large volumes of work well.

There is no turbo boost in this option; it’s more like a bicycle.

Automated, Rules-Based Scheduling

Larger volumes and complexity can’t be handled by basic scheduling. It’s too much and too hard for manual processes. It’s inefficient, costly and inaccurate.

Software which offers simple computer logic is the next option. Vendors often call these rules based computer programs ‘optimised scheduling’, but they aren’t.

Some of them do automatically build a schedule using technician skills, availability, and service level agreements, so these are a better option than basic manual scheduling. However, if these packages can’t use a simple rule based on the skill, availability, and SLA, they can’t schedule the jobs.

These really only fill white spaces. Filling a white spot on a schedule is not optimisation.

There’s no real turbo boost here either. This is like a scooter; there’s some power, but you’re not going very far or very fast.

Artificial Intelligence based Intelligent Scheduling

True route and schedule optimisation, such as ServiceScheduling from ServicePower, uses artificial intelligence algorithms, like Simulated Annealing, and our latest algorithm, Quantum Annealing, to intelligently schedule jobs using hard and soft rules in conjunction with configurable parameters to minimise overall costs, maximise service delivery margins, and reduce response times.

Real schedule optimisation packages select the best mobile worker for each job based on skills, geography, and existing jobs, while also considering required response time, and other configured parameters. They continuously reshuffle the schedule to create the most efficient, least costly version possible, all the while automatically accounting for schedule changes and exceptions.

 

Scheduling optimisation isn’t about manually scheduling jobs, or filling white space based on some basic, hard rules. Real-time or intraday schedule optimisation is about intelligent automation and is absolutely necessary for complex field service operations.

ServiceScheduling, and our Optimisation on DemandTM product, have been proven by our customers to yield:

[unordered_list style="bullet"]

• 15-50% productivity improvement of mobile workers based on intelligently, continuously optimising the schedule for decreased response times to customers
• Up to 45% increase in SLA compliance because the optimisation algorithms can account for required response time in the scheduling decision in real time
• Between 25-50% increase in mobile worker efficiency, including decreased cycle time and reduced travel time yielding improved customer satisfaction and service delivery margins

• Ability to process IoT alerts without manual intervention [/unordered_list]

   

What’s more important to understand about real algorithm based schedule optimisation?

It’s intelligent!

The algorithms give your team the power of ‘big data analytics’. It’s using your data, creating schedules and learning throughout the process, continuously re-crunching the data, continuously re-optimising, continuously improving the schedules, productivity and efficiency, without your team spending hours manually analysing and manually decided how the data impacts your operations.

Artificial intelligence based schedule optimisation is the turbo boost that your organisation needs to get around that curve fastest, at the least cost, to win, for your customer!

See Through the Smoke Though 

Given the obvious benefits to artificial intelligence based schedule optimisation, like ServiceScheduling, why aren’t all organisations, no matter the size or complexity, using the technology?

Good question...

There are several misconceptions worth addressing. Schedule Optimisation is hard to implement. No, schedule optimisation is not hard to implement. It can absolutely be deployed on time and on budget and maintain a long term return on investment.

What’s critical is working with a vendor that understands your operations, as well as what it takes to manage a mobile workforce themselves.

Development is required to support you unique business requirements.

Development is expensive and take a long time. The software should be configurable; it shouldn’t require development to deploy and it absolutely shouldn’t require IT resources to maintain basic changes in the business going forward.

Cloud first.

The software should be available in the cloud, to reduce costs and streamline security, or on premise if your security and privacy policies dictate an on premise deployment.

No software is future proof.

Software should support the evolution of your business. It needs to seamlessly and intelligently support scheduling and dispatching of any mobile worker, employed or contracted. It should support full mobilisation of processes, even those that differ by job or customer.

 

It should integrate the latest technologies like the Internet of Things (IOT) and M2M, to support new business opportunities such as proactive or outcomes based service offerings. ServicePower combined out entire platform in one easy to deploy, easy to pay for model, ServicePower Unity, for exactly this reason. It enables your team to use functionality as and when it’s needed by the business.

It’s hard to change vendors.

It doesn’t matter if you already use software to manage your mobile workforce. Safe passage programs exist, and schedule optimisation should be capable of being used in a plug and play model, to provide that turbo boost missing from existing software systems such as ServiceMax, Salesforce,  MS Dynamics or SAP.

ServiceScheduling and Optimisation on DemandTM can be used in conjunction with these software packages to improve the schedule  optimisation (or lack thereof) of what your team has already deployed.

A complete change out isn’t required.

ServicePower has architected its platform so that it can be deployed alongside industry standard CRM and ERP packages, improving the schedules generated such that you, too, can supercharge your field operations.

As an example, one of our clients, already on another FSM platform, was able to generate a 24% increase in productivity and a 29% return on investment by implementing ServiceScheduling. Our team at ServicePower has worked tirelessly to create a mobile workforce management software platform which ‘turbo boosts’ our client’s mobile workforce operations- maximising productivity and customer satisfaction, and achieving real ROI, easily, and quickly. It produces real results regardless of what other software our product must work in conjunction with to achieve those ]results.

We guarantee it.

 

---

 

Be social and share this feature

Resource Type: Research report
Published by:  Field Service News and ClickSoftware
Title: Is field service finally moving to the Cloud (2016)

---

Click here to access to the research report

---

By downloading you agree to the T&Cs listed available here

Synopsis: 

In 2015 Field Service News and ClickSoftware teamed up on a research report to look at the appetite for Cloud based Field Service Management (FSM) systems. Now 12 months on we've come together again on a fresh project to see what trends are emerging...

Having connected with over 150 field service professionals in this exclusive independent research project Field Service News, in partnership with ClickSoftware are pleased to present this detailed research report which digs deep into the findings to uncover the trends within our industry when it comes to the adoption of Cloud based field service management systems.

Download this report now to establish how your own companies approach to the Cloud sits in context with the wider trends that are evidenced by your peers, colleagues and competitors...

Download this report to find out:

• Are field service companies now finally turning to the Cloud as the platform for FSM systems?
• What are the driving reasons for Cloud adoption?
• What are the benefits being felt by those who have made the move to Cloud based FSM systems?
• What are the barriers to adoption for Cloud based FSM systems?
• Is security still the number one concern around Cloud based FSM systems?
• What percentage of those now using the Cloud would recommend it over an on-premise solution?

Overview: 

In this white paper, co-published by Field Service News and ClickSoftware, we shall review the data from our latest research, providing year-on-year comparative analysis to identify what new trends have emerged and how attitudes towards the Cloud have evolved amongst senior management within the field service industry.

Previously identified trends:

To begin let’s briefly recap the findings of last year’s research (which was the second time we had focused on the use of Cloud within a field service context as a subject for our research.)

Whilst the headline findings of that project identified that a large majority of field service companies (74%) were still using on-premise solutions, there was clear evidence that a shift to Cloud was on the horizon.

There were two key findings that supported this hypothesis.

Firstly, there was the overwhelming evidence that the Cloud was proving to be a success amongst those companies that had made the move away from traditional on-premise solutions. In fact, when we asked those respondents who had made such a move ‘would you recommend a Cloud based field service management solution over an on-premise solution?’ 100% of them replied that they would.

However, the findings were perhaps even more telling when we turned to those companies that were still using on-premise solutions.

Amongst this group of respondents, we found that over two-thirds of companies (69%) admitted they would consider moving to the Cloud when they next upgraded their FSM solution.

 

Such findings led us to arrive at the hypothesis that eventually we would see a widespread move to the Cloud. It was our prediction that we would potentially see a complete pendulum shift, with up to 75% of companies using Cloud based FSM solutions within the next five years. Last year’s research also identified that concerns around the security of the Cloud were the biggest potential barrier to adoption.

In fact, 38% of respondents that were not using a Cloud based FSM solution stated that they felt that security was the greatest issue with Cloud. Yet that same research also highlighted that this is generally not the case -     security issues were less prevalent than both connectivity and integration issues amongst companies actually using a Cloud based FSM tools.

It was our assertion last year that there was a need for greater education and understanding of the security of the Cloud, particularly at the enterprise level amongst executives within the field service sector - so that perception and reality could become more closely aligned. Once this was achieved we would likely see the shift to Cloud becoming the most widely used platform for FSM systems gaining greater momentum.

So how have the opinions of field service professionals changed across the last twelve months?

Year-on-year trends:

The headline finding of this year’s research is that we have indeed seen a continued shift towards more companies using the Cloud for their FSM systems. When comparing data from 2014, 2015 and 2016, we have also seen increasing year on year growth.

Indeed, the number of companies now using Cloud based FSM systems is well over a third, with 36% of our respondents stating that they are now Cloud users. This is a year on year increase of 8% in terms of companies using the Cloud for FSM systems.

Not only does this show a continuing move to the Cloud, but it is also a relatively significant increase in the year-on-year growth we saw in the previous year’s research. In fact, the increase in companies moving to the Cloud within the last twelve months is almost three times more than it was in the previous year (9% vs. 3%)

This would certainly add weight to our conclusions last year that Cloud was gaining traction as a platform for FSM tools, and that we would see this continue to increase as companies begun.

Further reading within the research report: 

• The question of security
• The benefits of moving to the cloud
• Remaining barriers to adoption
• Cloud in other areas of business
• Expert insight from ClickSoftware's Marina Stedman & Paul Whitelam

---

Click here to access to the research report

---

Be social and share this feature

Local government needs wider changes if adoption of such frameworks are to rise writes former Councillor and Chief Executive Officer with supplier Oneserve, Chris Proctor...

The recent commitment from Warren Smith, the head of G-Cloud and the DOS framework, to re-look at G-Cloud 9 with a fresh pair of eyes, is a real step in the right direction if we are to overcome many of the obstacles that remain in the way of wider adoption.

However, all of us that have been involved in local government IT procurement know that there need to be wider changes if there is to be a step change in the usage of frameworks such as G-Cloud.

The original aims of G-Cloud, that Smith seems to want to move back towards, remain sound.

Indeed, it could be argued that local government can actually get more value from G-Cloud than other parts of government, both to make the purchasing process easier and for the public sector to implement the best, most innovative solutions; from companies of all sizes.

Obviously this is much easier said than done; lamentably, local government, largely remains behind the curve, especially when compared to central government department levels of engagement.

So, whilst we on the whole welcome a full revision of the framework, in order to increase local government buy-in there needs to be more fundamental change, not necessarily just in the nuts and bolts of how the framework runs.

Having been a city councillor I have experienced how local councils can be a fearful place. Not only do you have a line manager, a supervisor, a portfolio holder and a chief executive, you also have a number of elected members and of course and electorate. All of whom are looking to deliver the best for their own masters, or at least the ones shouting loudest.

 

Decision making within this context can be like entering a bear pit, especially within councils with no overall control. Procurement decisions can frequently face scrutiny at multiple levels, leading to guessing, second guessing, political point scoring and directional changes.

On top of that, we have a whole sea change potential every four years or less in some cases. How really, can one truly expect to make pragmatic, strategic decisions in such an environment?

Does this give councils the confidence to look at large capital projects within the IT infrastructure, which, whilst improving services, would be a large expense, and not necessarily as visible as keeping front line services operating?

What needs to happen is a wider, cultural shift, one that facilitates decision making, both from a capital and an empowerment basis.

Should councillors, who, have no pre-requisite to be business experts, when they are elected have the ability to change the playing field to the extent that they do? Of course there is a more fundamental question here, but in order to facilitate proper planning and strategies, questions do need to be debated as to how this can be made possible, or at least extents thereof.

As well as the wider changes at a procurement level there needs to be more of a focus on ensuring that local government departments are fully up-to-speed with G-Cloud and it’s potential.

Local government has no fear of spending budget on SaaS. Some of our biggest contracts remain with local government but they are almost all exclusively done outside of the framework.

There is a responsibility from Warren Smith and his team, as well as vendors, to ensure that the benefits are well communicated. The G-Cloud framework was set up to give local government more access to smaller, more innovative companies, that can offer great solutions for a great price.

The obsession remains very much with the traditional vendors, which means something is clearly broken at this level.

Education needs to be placed right at the front alongside the wider procurement changes to ensure that local government is fully aware of the potentially fantastic impact working across the framework can have.

But there is hope.

If Smith can truly get G-Cloud into a position where it can provide the entire public sector with access to the extraordinary level of innovation that exists within SMEs in the UK, then that has to be good for those companies, the public sector and most importantly the tax payer.

 

---

 

Be social and share this feature

Having conducted exclusive research into the use of Cloud based Field Service Management Systems in 2015, Field Service News and ClickSoftware have once again teamed up and returned to the topic one year on to see just how their predictions based on last year's findings have borne out. 

In part one of this series we looked at exactly what those predictions last year were as well as some of the headline findings of this year's research. In part two of the series we explored the trends have emerged year on year plus Marina Stedman, Global Field Marketing Director, ClickSoftware offered her expert view as to what these trends mean for field service organisations. 

In the third part of the series we looked at whether security remains the biggest barrier to adoption for those reluctant to move to a Cloud based FSM solution and Paul Whitelam, VP of Product Marketing, ClickSoftware, offers his expert view on the survey as a whole also... 

Now in the concluding part of this feature we look at the benefits being felt by those who have moved to the Cloud, the remaining barriers to adoption and draw some overall conclusions

---

Click here to download the full research report now

---

The benefits of moving to the Cloud:

The benefits of Cloud based solutions, whether it be a FSM solution or another business tool, are by now very well documented.

Key benefits of the Cloud include: less reliance and strain on internal IT departments, more manageable costs, built in disaster recovery, scalability, and easier implementation both of the system initially and also of upgrades and updates.

But what are the key benefits that companies that have actually moved to a Cloud based FSM solution are experiencing, having made the switch away from on-premise software?

We asked our respondents to identify both the key drivers for them moving to the Cloud and the biggest benefit they have experienced since having made the switch.

Interestingly, our results showed there is some variance between the two, indicating that after making the move, companies are discovering different benefits to those that they originally expected.

Firstly, let’s look at the drivers for selecting a Cloud based FSM system.

The most commonly cited driver for moving to the Cloud was that Cloud solutions offer greater flexibility and scalability, which 86% of companies using Cloud based FSM systems cited as a reason for them opting for Cloud.

 

Other commonly cited factors in driving companies to the Cloud were ‘easy remote access’ and ‘less reliance on IT’ both of which were cited by 63% of companies.

Meanwhile, improved functionality was also widely acknowledged to be another important consideration with exactly half of respondents citing this as a benefit that drove their decision to move to the Cloud.

However, when we turn our attention to the actual benefits that companies have experienced after moving to a Cloud based FSM system - we see that improved functionality is in fact the most commonly cited benefit with over

two thirds of companies (71%) identifying this as the biggest single benefit realised.

Alongside this, improved productivity is equally common at 68% and more manageable costs were also widely cited, with over half (57%) of our respondents stating they saw this as a major benefit.

Given our assertion that the move to the Cloud is heavily tied to the replacement-cycle of FSM systems, and because improved functionality and productivity are the most commonly cited benefits, we think it reasonable to assume that many companies who have yet to update their systems are now facing a competitive disadvantage by not doing so.

This argument could also be further supported when we look at how long those using on- premise FSM systems have had their current systems. In fact, over two thirds (70%) of companies using on-premise FSM systems have had their systems for more than 3 years.

 

The results undeniably prove that older systems are more likely to be on-premise, whilst more recently implemented systems will be Cloud based.

One of the widely cited benefits of Cloud based systems is the ease of installing system updates and the introduction of new features and functionality - and this is corroborated by the research findings as directly stated by those companies that have adopted Cloud based FSM systems.

In fact, this is highlighted perfectly by the fact that of those companies  have made the move to a Cloud based FSM system 100% stated they would recommend the Cloud over an on-premise equivalent - the second time running that Cloud based systems were given such an overwhelming endorsement.

Remaining barriers to adoption:

As we touched on above, our two previous studies into the use and appetite for Cloud computing as a platform for FSM systems found security to be the ever present elephant in the room.

However, this year, for the first time ever, concerns amongst those yet to move away from on-premise software to Cloud based equivalents have been as much about connectivity issues as they have around security.

Of course, the ability to access the internet is a fundamental tenant of Cloud computing, so it is of little wonder that as concerns around security lessen to then connectivity will become the most pressing concern for those debating a move to the Cloud.

Whilst it may not be a particular issue for back end systems, one of the key benefits of Cloud computing is the ability to provide remote access to elements of such systems such as asset management, parts inventory and of course job schedules to our engineers working in the field.

 

Whilst within the UK at least, 3G data signals have now reached a projected 97% coverage, not every country has such a widespread service. This may be why connectivity issues were the most commonly cited reason why companies do not feel confident in making a move to the Cloud with over a third (35%) of companies stating this is the single biggest concern around moving their FSM system to a Cloud based platform.

Security fears then came in as the second biggest concern cited by a fifth (20%) of companies - whilst issues with legacy systems were cited by 15% of organisations.

However, despite these concerns once again we have seen a year on year increase in the number of companies still using an on-premise solution considering a move to the Cloud for their next upgrade or iteration of a FSM system.

In fact the number of companies using on-premise FSM software stating that they will consider moving to the Cloud is now approaching almost three quarters (71%).

Cloud in other parts of the business:

As we move more firmly into a world of Big Data and real-time analytics the easy-flow of both customer and asset data between differing systems is absolutely vital, as is the ability for such systems to be able to communicate with each other.

Alongside the ongoing willingness for organisations to develop APIs, the advent of Cloud computing has been the major factor in enabling such a seamless flow of data.

But what other areas within a business are predominantly becoming Cloud based and how they complement any given FSM system?

We asked both those who were using on premise and Cloud based FSM solutions if they were using the Cloud based systems in any other areas of their business.

 

Perhaps unsurprisingly, those companies that were using Cloud based FSM systems showed a greater tendency to use Cloud in other areas of their business than those using on-premise FSM solutions.

However, amongst both sets of respondents, the business tool most commonly running in the Cloud was CRM with 75% of companies with a Cloud based FSM solution also using Cloud based CRM and only 20% of those companies using on-premise FSM software having their CRM system based in the Cloud.

While we don’t know the background, we can speculate that this may be largely due to the dominance of Cloud based CRM solutions driven in part by Cloud only provider Salesforce. Their success has seen other key players within the CRM sector (such as Microsoft) focus heavily on delivering a Cloud solution as well as driving a number of smaller providers to offer similar Cloud only CRM models.

Another factor for consideration is the importance of moving data between service and sales focused systems.

It has long been a major focus for a number of field service organisations to better leverage the insight of their service teams to greater effect in terms of revenue generation and the Cloud can be a key enabler to help organisations achieve this more effectively.

Conclusions: 

The results of this trends-based research certainly support the assertions made twelve months ago.

Not only have we seen a continued increase in the number of companies using Cloud based FSM systems and replacing on-premise systems with Cloud-based solutions, we have also seen the rate at which this number is growing increase significantly at the same time In addition to this, we have seen an increase in the number of companies still using on premise FSM software who are actively looking to make a move to the Cloud when they next upgrade their FSM solution.

Meanwhile, fears around the security of the Cloud are beginning to reduce, particularly as understanding of the higher levels of security embedded within enterprise focused Cloud platforms improve.

However, there remains a proportion of field service professionals who see security as the biggest barrier to adoption and platform and solutions vendors need to continue to provide information and education on this topic.

 

Of those who have made the move to the Cloud, real life benefits of improved system functionality and enhanced productivity are widely felt, as is the positive impact of the more manageable cost base of Cloud based FSM systems, usually offered on a Software as a Service basis.

While at the current time, there may still be more companies using on-premise FSM software than using Cloud based FSM systems, the shift towards the adoption of the Cloud that we identified within our previous research is indeed gaining further momentum and at a faster pace than ever before.

The research has also proven our previous assertion that the move to Cloud based FSM solutions is tied directly to the replacement cycle of FSM at large and the evidence would certainly suggest that as more companies continue to move onto next-generation FSM, the adoption of Cloud as the primary platform will become ever more prevalent.

It seems our prediction of a Cloud based future for most FSM system implementations looks set

---

Click here to download the full research report now

---

Be social and share this feature

Having conducted exclusive research into the use of Cloud based Field Service Management Systems in 2015, Field Service News and ClickSoftware have once again teamed up and returned to the topic one year on to see just how their predictions based on last year's findings have borne out. 

In part one of this series we looked at exactly what those predictions last year were as well as some of the headline findings of this year's research. In part two of the series we explored the trends have emerged year on year plus Marina Stedman, Global Field Marketing Director, ClickSoftware offered her expert view as to what these trends mean for field service organisations. 

Now in the third part of the series we look at whether security remains the biggest barrier to adoption for those reluctant to move to a Cloud based FSM solution and Paul Whitelam, VP of Product Marketing, ClickSoftware, offers his expert view on the survey as a whole also... 

[hr]
Click here to download the full research report now

[hr]

The question of security:

So it seems that we are indeed seeing a continuation of the trends uncovered within last year’s research - in that the shift towards Cloud becoming the prevalent platform for FSM systems is continuing to gain momentum.

But how does this correlate with general perception around Cloud computing and in particular around security concerns - which were the key barrier to adoption for those who were reluctant to move to a Cloud based FSM in our previous research?

To answer this question let’s start by exploring how general perceptions about Cloud computing have changed, if at all, across the last twelve months.

In 2015 and 2016 we asked our respondents ‘Which of the following best sums up your perception of the Cloud in business?’

We gave our respondents a choice of four options:

[unordered_list style="bullet"]

• I believe it is the future of enterprise computing
• I see its benefits but still have some concerns
• I wouldn’t trust placing sensitive data in the Cloud but would use for general applications
• I think we should be keeping everything on premise, there is too much risk in the Cloud

[/unordered_list]

This year we saw the number of respondents who stated they saw “the Cloud as the future of enterprise computing” rise to over half (56%) of all respondents, an increase of 7% compared to the 2015 results.

[quote float="left"]The number of respondents who stated they saw “the Cloud as the future of enterprise computing” rise to over half (56%) of all respondents, an increase of 7% compared to the 2015 results.[/quote]We also saw a five point increase (i.e. from 35% to 40%) amongst those who stated that they could see the benefit of the Cloud but still had some concerns.

However, it is at the other end of the spectrum, where the responses offered had more negative connotations, that perhaps the greatest shift is apparent.

The number of those who stated they “wouldn’t trust putting sensitive data in the Cloud” has reduced from 13% in 2015 to just 6% in 2016 whilst the admittedly small (3%) section of respondents in 2015 who stated they felt we should be keeping “everything on-premise as there is too much risk in the Cloud” has completely disappeared within this year’s results.

It is also interesting to note that when we drill down further into the findings and look at the responses from companies based on the size of their mobile workforce that there is further evidence of a growing confidence in Cloud computing across the board.

To begin let’s take a look at those companies within the largest bracket of mobile workforce, i.e. those with 801 or more field service engineers/ technicians.

Indeed, in this bracket of companies 100% replied positively when we asked for their overall perception of the Cloud.

Over half (53%) of the field service professionals within this company size bracket stated that they saw the Cloud as the ‘future of enterprise computing’ whilst just under half (47%) stated they whilst they may have some concerns they ‘could see the benefits’ of the Cloud.

Similarly when we look at the responses to this question from those representing companies within the smallest bracket of mobile workforce (i.e. 50 field engineers or less) once again there certainly appears to be a perception of Cloud is not only improving but that this is happening across companies of all sizes.

But how does this correlate to the separation between Cloud apps that are used mainly be consumers (e.g. Google Drive or iCloud) and those designed specifically for business users?

[quote float="right"]Almost half (48%) of the service professionals that participated in our research now stated that high profile breaches in security in the consumer sector have no impact on their perception of enterprise level Cloud security[/quote]In response to the question ‘Have high profile breaches in consumer privacy influenced your opinion of the Cloud in enterprise?’ We saw a move of 7% from the previous year’s results towards responses that accepted that ‘there are far more security protocols in the business world’ and that such security breaches in the consumer world didn’t impact their thinking around enterprise level Cloud security.

In fact, almost half (48%) of the service professionals that participated in our research now stated that high profile breaches in security in the consumer sector have no impact on their perception of enterprise level Cloud security - an increase of 8% more than in 2015.

Expert View - Paul Whitelam, VP of Product Marketing, ClickSoftware

Something that comes through clearly in this research is the increasing benefit that respondents are seeing from moving Field Service Management to the cloud. When comparing respondents’ view on the main benefit of moving to the cloud in the 2014/15 survey with this year’s research, “greater flexibility and scalability” was still the number one cited benefit, growing by 6% from 79% last year to 86% today. In addition, nearly two-thirds (63%) of respondents ranked both “easy remote access” and “less reliance on the IT department” in equal second in terms of benefits gained, similar values to last year.

Our experience as a software vendor in the field suggests that the priority given to “flexibility and scalability” not only reflects the ability to control operational costs but also that field service companies are prioritising customer satisfaction – and want to flexibly tune their cloud-based software solution to meet user requirements in this area. As products become more commoditised, service delivery becomes the differentiator. Companies need to improve their customer experience while keeping operational costs in check, servicing the needs of the business and the customer.

[quote float="left"]“The ability to rapid introduce new applications and services across an entire field service operation, without having to rely on the availability of the right IT infrastructure, plays a critical role in empowering field service engineers and delivering fast service differentiation...”[/quote]In many cases today, a customer’s only engagement with the supplier of their goods or services is when they need something fixing. In the retail space for example, it might be a field service visit to repair a washing machine, in the utilities industry it might be when a central heating boiler breaks down. That field service engagement may be the only opportunity to impress the customer during the lifetime of a product that might last five, 10 or 20 years.

The ability to rapid introduce new applications and services across an entire field service operation, without having to rely on the availability of the right IT infrastructure, plays a critical role in empowering field service engineers and delivering fast service differentiation. Real-time communication via smart devices between field service professionals, dispatch teams and customers increases efficiency and enhances customer service. Examples of these include using traffic monitoring systems to direct engineers to each job as quickly as possible and on-line tracking to keep the customer updated on when they will arrive.

Embracing the latest cloud and mobility technology helps companies to develop a far more collaborative, immediate and customer-focused infrastructure and to enable a culture where customer service is the priority. One where a mobile network of technicians and engineers are both enabled and encouraged to put the customer first and, as brand ambassadors, are driving customer loyalty and potentially identifying opportunities to sell more products and services to the customer while on-site.

[hr]
Click here to download the full research report now

[hr]Be social and share this feature

Having conducted exclusive research into the use of Cloud based Field Service Management Systems in 2015, Field Service News and ClickSoftware have once again teamed up and returned to the topic one year on to see just how their predictions based on last year's findings have borne out. 

In part one of this series we looked at exactly what those predictions last year were as well as some of the headline findings of this year's research. Now in part two we will look to see what trends have emerged year on year plus Marina Stedman, Global Field Marketing Director, ClickSoftware offers her expert view as to what these trends mean for field service organisations...

---

Click here to download the full research report now

 

---

 

Year-on-year trends:

The headline finding of this year’s research is that we have indeed seen a continued shift towards more companies using the Cloud for their FSM systems. When comparing data from 2014, 2015 and 2016, we have also seen increasing year on year growth.

Indeed, the number of companies now using Cloud based FSM systems is well over a third, with 36% of our respondents stating that they are now Cloud users. This is a year on year increase of 8% in terms of companies using the Cloud for FSM systems.

Not only does this show a continuing move to the Cloud, but it is also a relatively significant increase in the year-on-year growth we saw in the previous year’s research.

In fact, the increase in companies moving to the Cloud within the last twelve months is almost three times more than it was in the previous year (9% vs. 3%).

This would certainly add weight to our conclusions last year that Cloud was gaining traction as a platform for FSM tools, and that we would see this continue to increase as companies begun to upgrade their older legacy systems. Further evidence that the shift to Cloud is happening at a faster rate is revealed when we look at how long those companies who are now using a Cloud based FSM solution have been doing so.

 

Of those companies now using Cloud based FSM solutions a third (33%) have been doing so for less than six months.This is a slight uplift compared to similar responses in 2015, which in turn were higher than the results of 2014.

Indeed, across the three years that we have conducted research into this topic we have seen an increase of 10% amongst those companies that had recently (within the last 6 months) made a move to the Cloud at the time of the relevant research project.

This would again support our previous hypothesis that the somewhat relatively slower move to Cloud computing as a platform for FSM solutions (when compared to other business operations tools such as CRM) is largely tied to companies’ timetables for moving away from their existing, legacy systems.

Given that field service is a mission critical area of operations that is gaining ever more importance (as service revenue becomes more frequently a major proportion of many organisations’ total revenue), importance of preparing and planning for a FSM system - whether it be Cloud based or on-premise, is perhaps understandable.

 

Also, when we consider that companies have traditionally regarded the shelf life of FSM software to be somewhere between three and seven years (with some companies even ‘sweating’ their software solutions well beyond the ten year mark) the implementation of new FSM systems takes time.

However, it is clear that the trend towards Cloud adoption is accelerating and on the main when companies do upgrade their FSM systems, they are more likely to opt for the Cloud as the platform for their new system.

Expert View: Marina Stedman, Global Field Marketing Director, ClickSoftware

As we said in last year’s report, the cloud is not a new concept, in fact it’s nearly twenty years since Salesforce, a company that has only ever offered cloud-based solutions, was established.

While the field service industry has taken some time to catch up, “move to the cloud or remain on-premise” is a key topic in the field service industry today.

While field service staff have typically been managed and dispatched to customers in a fairly traditional and hierarchical manner, that’s a difficult model to maintain nowadays as demanding consumers, used to instant “uberized” service and status updates expect everything to be delivered faster, more flexibly and more responsively.

The power of cloud computing and the ubiquity of mobile devices means companies can now redesign their entire FSM process to the benefit of both the engineer and the customer, giving everyone instant information about their jobs, projects and appointments whenever, however and wherever they want it.

The findings from this survey clearly show that the Cloud is the way forwards for field service, with every single organisation that has moved to the Cloud saying they would recommend it over an on-premise solution and over two-thirds (69%) of users of on-premise FSM systems, considering the Cloud for their next upgrade.

 

When considering perceptions of the Cloud, over half (56%) now see Cloud as the future of enterprise computing, an increase of 7% in just 12 months. Organisations of all sizes see the benefit. 58% of organisations with large field teams (more than 300 field service engineers) said that Cloud is the “future of enterprise computing”, (a change of 9% from 49% in 2014/15) and 57% with smaller field teams (less than 50 engineers) agreed, compared to 40% in the previous survey.

Working with customers all over the world, ClickSoftware has found the Cloud to be a great leveller, enabling every organisation, no matter what size, location or business model to rapidly adopt and improve upon the same applications and processes that drive enhanced customer service for everyone.

---

Click here to download the full research report now

 

---

 

Be social and share this feature

One year on from our investigation into the appetite for Cloud Computing as a platform for field service management systems, ClickSoftware and Field Service News return to the topic to see how trends have evolved within the last twelve months and to find out if our prediction of a gradual shift towards Cloud ultimately becoming the norm in field service is starting to come true...

---

Click here to download the full research report now

 

---

 

In 2015 Field Service News partnered with leading Field Service Management (FSM) software provider ClickSoftware on a research project, which aimed to take a measure of the feelings toward Cloud computing as a platform for productivity tools amongst field service professionals.

Now one year on both parties have returned to the topic to see if the trends we identified and the developments we predicted have materialised and to build an up-to-date picture of both the adoption and appetite for Cloud computing as a platform for Field Service Management systems.

In this white paper, co-published by Field Service News and ClickSoftware, we shall review the data from our latest research, providing year-on-year comparative analysis to identify what new trends have emerged and how attitudes towards the Cloud have evolved amongst senior management within the field service industry.

Previously identified trends:

To begin let’s briefly recap the findings of last year’s research (which was the second time we had focused on the use of Cloud within a field service context as a subject for our research.)

Whilst the headline findings of that project identified that a large majority of field service companies (74%) were still using on-premise solutions, there was clear evidence that a shift to Cloud was on the horizon.

There were two key findings that supported this hypothesis.

Firstly, there was the overwhelming evidence that the Cloud was proving to be a success amongst those companies that had made the move away from traditional on-premise solutions. In fact, when we asked those respondents who had made such a move ‘would you recommend a Cloud based field service management solution over an on-premise solution?’ 100% of them replied that they would.

However, the findings were perhaps even more telling when we turned to those companies that were still using on-premise solutions.

Amongst this group of respondents, we found that over two-thirds of companies (69%) admitted they would consider moving to the Cloud when they next upgraded their FSM solution.

Such findings led us to arrive at the hypothesis that eventually we would see a widespread move to the Cloud. It was our prediction that we would potentially see a complete pendulum shift, with up to 75% of companies using Cloud based FSM solutions within the next five years.

 

Last year’s research also identified that concerns around the security of the Cloud were the biggest potential barrier to adoption. In fact, 38% of respondents that were not using a Cloud based FSM solution stated that they felt that security was the greatest issue with Cloud.

Yet that same research also highlighted that this is generally not the case - security issues were less prevalent than both connectivity and integration issues amongst companies actually using a Cloud based FSM tools.

It was our assertion last year that there was a need for greater education and understanding of the security of the Cloud, particularly at the enterprise level amongst executives within the field service sector - so that perception and reality could become more closely aligned. Once this was achieved we would likely see the shift to Cloud becoming the most widely used platform for FSM systems gaining greater momentum.

So how have the opinions of field service professionals changed across the last twelve months?

Has there been the continued trend in the number of companies making the move away from on-premise FSM software to Cloud based equivalents that we predicted we would see? Has the perception of Cloud security improved amongst Field Service Management professionals? And has the appetite for Cloud based FSM systems gained any greater momentum?

Executive Summary: Key findings:

• Over a third of companies are now using Cloud based Field Service Management (FSM) systems
• The rate of adoption of Cloud based FSM systems has increased dramatically year-on-year with almost three times as many companies moving to the Cloud in 2015/2016 than did in 2014/2015
• The move to the Cloud appears to be directly aligned to the move away from legacy systems with over two thirds of companies that are still using on-premise FSM solutions working with FSM systems that are at least three years old
• Similarly, of those using Cloud based FSM solutions, a third have made the move within the last six months - which would suggest that not only is the rate of adoption of Cloud based FSM solutions increasing, but it is doing so at a quicker pace than in previous years
• This is further supported by the fact that over two thirds of companies that are currently using Cloud based FSM solutions would consider the Cloud for the next iteration of their FSM system
• The most common key driver for companies adopting Cloud based FSM solutions is that the Cloud offers greater flexibility. However, once implemented, increased functionality is the number one benefit felt by companies using Cloud based FSM systems
• Amongst those who have implemented Cloud based FSM systems, the move has been overwhelmingly positive with 100% of these companies stating they would recommend a Cloud based FSM system over an on-premise equivalent
• Finally, fears around the security of the Cloud, which was seen to be the biggest barrier to adoption in previous research are abating. Just 6% stated that they felt they wouldn’t trust placing sensitive data in the Cloud whilst over half of respondents felt that the Cloud was the future of enterprise computing.

---

Click here to download the full research report now

 

---

 

Read the next part of this research report where we will look drill deeper into the findings of this year's research... 

 

---

 

Be social and share this feature

In his leader for this issue, Kris Oldland looks at whether we are entering a storm of new technologies that could have a truly disruptive influence on Field Service as well as welcoming a number of new columnists to our fold...

 

---

 

Click here to download a digital version of Field Service News issue 13 now

 

---

 

It’s a phrase I’ve used a few times in this editorial leader, but I think in this issue of Field Service News we are seeing ever greater evidence of a perfect storm of technologies coming together to push forward field service evolution faster and further than ever before...

The obvious starting point of this storm is the Cloud and it is the Cloud where we turn our attention for this quarter’s research. This is the third year running that we have explored the question of whether field service companies are adopting the Cloud as a platform for FSM solutions so we have the opportunity to really define some emerging trends.

Indeed there were some interesting statistics turned up in the research this time around with the key headline findings being that adoption of the Cloud is definitely picking up speed, whilst one of the big barriers to Cloud adoption, namely concerns around security, seems to be gradually abating.

You can read the full report based on the findings starting from page 29.

Another technology that I believe will certainly push the frontiers of how we approach field service operations is Augmented Reality, an assertion that leading industry analyst and regular Field Service News contributor Bill Pollock agrees with in his latest expert view column on page 22.

Of course it is almost impossible to talk about Augmented Reality without at least touching briefly on the topic of Pokemon Go! The mobile phone craze that has turned people of all ages, in all corners of the world, into hunters of small digital creatures that seem to live in Augmented Reality.

However, I am pleased to report that this was just a minor side note in our exclusive interview with Scott Montgomerie, CEO of Scope AR, a specialist Augmented Reality provider that have their eyes firmly set on field service as an industry ready to embrace AR. You can find this interview on page 36.

Then we have the Internet of Things - perhaps the poster boy of technology that is driving change in modern field service.

One company working heavily in this area, with a plethora of high street brands, is Verisae and in our exclusive interview with Jerry Dolinsky their CEO, he explains not only how IoT can improve field service operations, or why it is apparently on the wish list of OEMs and third party service providers alike, but also why it is important to have certain baseline technologies in place before you can approach an IoT implementation. This interview is on page 18.

Of course all of this technology gives us the opportunity to push the way we approach service thinking, and such shifts in thinking and innovation are at the heart of Jan Van Veen’s feature on page 22. Jan is one of a number of new columnists to have joined our ranks this issue, with Michael Blumberg, Jim Baston, and Coen Jeukins all contributing to the issue as well. Each of them brings with them a wealth of experience from the service management market.

 

It is testament to the ever-growing stature of Field Service News within the global field service community, that we are able to welcome four new contributors, form four different countries, bringing four different perspectives to join our collection of highly talented and highly informative guest columnists.

And the growth of our stature is truly as much to do with the fantastic support we have received from our readers and sponsors from day one as it is to do with the great team I’m fortunate enough to head up here, so thanks to you all!

It is our role to be a central touch point for the field service community and right now that is an incredibly exciting place to be!

 

---

 

Click here to download a digital version of Field Service News issue 13 now

 

---

 

Be social and share this feature

Kirona a leading field service mobilisation company, have announced it has been selected as a G-Cloud 8 Digital Framework supplier.

G-Cloud 8 is the latest version of the framework agreement from the Crown Commercial Service (CCS) which supports the UK Government’s policy to centrally manage the procurement of common goods and services through an integrated commercial function at the heart of government.

The G Cloud Framework can be used by organisations across the UK public sector including central government, local government, health, education, devolved administrations, emergency services, defence and not-for-profit organisations.

 

“We are delighted to have been awarded G-Cloud 8 supplier status by the Crown Commercial Service,” said Neil Harvey, CTO at Kirona. “This is testament to the strength of our offering and the quality of our team. The G-Cloud framework provides government organisations with the ideal marketplace to purchase high quality, cost-effective services. We are looking forward to new opportunities presented by the framework and to helping more government organisations improve their productivity and service.”

As a G-Cloud 8 Digital Marketplace approved supplier, Kirona will offer software as a service, including its Job Manager mobile application to enable delivery of data and services to field resources to carry out their job efficiently, eliminating paperwork, speed up job completion and support data capture on a range of platforms and devices. Kirona’s Xmbrace Dynamic Resource Scheduler provides intelligent appointments and dynamic scheduling of resources or assets.

 

---

 

Find out more about Kirona in the Field Service Directory

 

---

 

Be social and share this story