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Jan Van Veen outlines how your field service organisation can succeed on a journey of continuous improvement through ongoing innovation...

Overview

We need to drive Momentum to continuously adapt to changing requirements and new opportunities and drive performance of today, tomorrow and the future. Common management practices and perspectives do not work anymore in today’s rapidly changing and complex world.

They create resistance against adaptation and change.

In this article I will provide an overview of the need and elements of the Momentum-Framework, which enables business leaders and organisations to increase Momentum. In following articles, I will elaborate on the todays management challenges and the elements of the Momentum-Framework.

The problem

Most companies focus on maximising performance of the existing operation and follow tight planning & control types of management practices. These create resistance against change.

This results in one or more of the following:

• Ongoing performance issues, without adequate, timely and sustainable interventions
• Execution of strategies and change programmes slow down, fail and cost huge amounts of resources
• No significant innovation beyond incremental improvements of current products and practices
• No preparations for (potentially) disruptive change

However, the winners of today and tomorrow already have adjusted their management practices and increased Momentum. They see their people think and act collectively and drive continuous adaptation and change.

This is why they outperform their industry and safeguard their future existence.

What is Momentum?

In the most adaptable and agile organisation people are passionate and eager to perform, develop and grow. They collectively take action in a coherent way, across the entire organisation.

Performance and progress are reviewed transparently without fear or hiding information.

They have a proactive strategic dialogue to adjust actions and approaches, align priorities and jointly make things happen. Everyone is curious about what is happening in the world, what impact that potentially could have and how to respond to it.

The Momentum Framework

The Momentum Framework consists of perspectives and practices which most successful and adaptive organisations apply. This drives their Momentum to continuously adapt to changing requirements and new opportunities.

The elements of the Momentum Framework are:

Momentum Perspectives:

The following perspectives will help drive Momentum when they are well incorporated in the company’s values. They will serve as a guiding principle in all decisions, actions and messages.

• People drive change: By nature, people can and want to drive change, if there are good reasons and no serious obstacles. Resistance does not come from people themselves, but from the obstacles organisations create.
• Capabilities drive performance: People and organisations can only deliver sustainable high performance through adequate(organisational) capabilities. Pushing performance by merely working harder and faster is considered not to be sustainable
• Future success lies beyond business as usual: In a rapidly changing world, there is no sustainable success without adaptation and adjusting the core-business, business models and organisation.

Momentum Practices
The best-in-class organisations apply modern “sense & respond” types of management practices at all levels and entities:

• Compelling direction: The organisation has a shared, explicit and compelling view of its mission and future state, which resonates in people’s minds and hearts. Everyone has a clear picture of the upcoming change.
• Strategic dialogue: The organisation has a strong practice of ongoing dialogues at and across all levels and functions for defining, aligning, adjusting and executing strategies and driving performance in a way.
• Continuous learning: The organisation regularly explores (potential) changes and trends, new threats and opportunities. It prepares adequate measures and strategies to respond to these (potential) changes and trends. Everyone openly shares experiences, results and progress, including setbacks.

Setbacks are important learning points, not input for performance review.

Momentum Road Map

Organisations which are most successful in step-by-step increasing Momentum, followed a roadmap for mobilising, increasing and sustaining Momentum.

Mobilise Momentum

In case an organisation has a fairly low level of Momentum, the first step from a few business leaders is to focus on increasing awareness and a shared concern about Momentum and sustainable success.

With their personal leadership approach and actions, they create increased interest, dynamics and action.

Increase Momentum

Once an organisation has some level of motion and energy in some parts of the organisation - often heavily driven by a few business leaders - Momentum will be further increased by mobilising a critical mass and implementing more and more of the Momentum Perspectives & Practices through the entire organisation.

Momentum gradually becomes an integral part of daily practices. However, business leaders still need to drive the new practices and prevent the people from falling back into old habits.

Sustain Momentum

Once an organisation has a high level of Momentum and applies most of the Momentum Perspectives & Practices, the next step is to embed these into the mind-set of everyone. It becomes part of everyone’s DNA.

Momentum will then become less dependent upon the individual business leaders and will survive changes of leadership teams.

 

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Assess your Momentum with our research: Momentum for Sustainable Success

Our research further defines and validates a pragmatic and complete Momentum-Framework consisting
of management practices, perspectives and practical tools. These will help you to increase and maintain
Momentum for sustainable success, to strengthen your competitive position and leave others wondering
how you did it.

You are invited to join by conducting a web-based survey. It takes approximately 15 minutes. Your input will remain confidential and will be reported in an aggregated form only.

In return you will receive in early 2017:

• Insights in how other companies manage their Momentum for sustainable success.
• Insights in how your organisation compares to others in managing Momentum.
• Insights into the new Momentum Framework for sustainable success.

Start the survey @ http://van-veen.limequery.com/792518?lang=en

Read about the research @ http://www.van-veen.nl/research.html.

 

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Nick Frank, Managing Partner with Si2 Partners, gives us a back of the envelope exercise that could yield dramatic improvements to our customer understanding...

For the vast majority of service managers and leaders, customer experience is something intuitive, as most effective professionals already have a good feel for what is important to their customers.

However, as the pace of technology commoditisation increases, so customer experience is becoming an important differentiator to creating loyalty and revenue growth. Perhaps its time to add framework to intuition, so that service leaders can communicate their experiences to their teams more effectively!

One very easy and often overlooked tool for gaining insight into how clients feel about our service is the Customer Journey Map.

It’s a very simple idea: a diagram that illustrates the steps your customers go through in engaging with your company, whether it be a product, an online experience, retail, or a service, or any combination.

It can be a back of an envelop exercise lasting 30 minutes, or a full working day working with a cross functional teams. Whichever approach you choose, it will undoubtedly provide you with insight into your customers feelings about the service they receive from you, and where opportunities may arise to drive customer loyalty or new sales.

In its simplest form the journey usually has a timeline. For example this might be lifecycle of a field service call: Request, Schedule & Dispatch, Service, Invoice.

For each part of the lifecycle examine these four key elements from the customers perspective:

1. Activities and actions of the customer in that step. This includes all the touch-point interactions between the customer and organisation
2. The motivations for the customer going to the next step in the process, what they are feeling and why do they care? These emotions are key to improving the journey.
3. The Questions the customer is asking themselves: This might be details about the work to be done, the jargon you are using or looking for recommendations on how to avoid further failure.
4. What are the Barriers that stop them from moving to the next stage of their journey.

At the end of this this thinking process, you can then validate your thoughts with clients within a structure that is easy to communicate and talk about.In general there are three reasons why managers and service designers use the journey mapping tool:

1. To improve Customer Experience across an end-to end set of interactions. The Field Service Call example would be typical of this type of use.
2. Understand the Sales journey, the critical point of interaction which influence how the customer feels about us, and what sales opportunities might arise.
3. Design the User Experience for a particular part of the journey. This has become particularly relevant as more business ‘shift to the left’ and incorporate more self service into their processes. A detailed analysis through each touch point of the software such as a FAQ page then becomes critical to ensuring that customers have a good experience.

Journey maps originated in the Service Design community, which has brought a much more user centric approach than traditionally existed in the industrial world. In addition to these basic mapping concepts, they have created tools to enable better empathy with customers and their emotions.

One such tool you might consider are personas. This is a fictitious character that illustrates the needs, goals, thoughts, feelings, opinions, expectations and pain points of the user.

By defining a typical character, we can explore the journey through the eyes of the persona and how they might interact with the different channels they come across such as websites, apps, call centres or field service organisations.

More sophisticated journey maps will also examine ‘moments of truth’.

These are the critical interactions that leave a lasting impression and often occur at touch-points known to generate anxiety or frustration.

How do you go about developing a Journey Map? Here are six simple steps you can follow for developing your own Customer Journey maps:

1. Define your goals for the journey map(s)
2. Gather research and customer insight
3. Analysis and discussion with a cross functional team
4. Sketch the journey
5. Refine and digitise, especially if you want to use the map to communicate with your people
6. Share and use: make the journey map live in your organisation

If you would like to read more about customer journey mapping, you can find more practical advice at the Service in Industry Briefing blog

 

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Field Service consultant and author Jim Baston continues his new series based upon his excellent industry focussed book  Beyond Great Service 

If you missed the introduction to this series you can find part one here

The book, Beyond GREAT SERVICE opens on a conversation that Charlie is having with a long-time customer. His company has lost the renewal of a large maintenance contract and the customer has kindly agreed to meet with Charlie to explain why they made the decision that they did. Perhaps you have had a similar conversation with one of your customers.

“I just can’t see any difference,” explains Joe. “I think you guys do good work and our building managers really seem to like you. However, I can’t justify the premium for the maintenance contract that you are asking for over your competitors. Can you?”

“Good question,” thinks Charlie. He expected this and has been practicing his response all morning, but it just doesn’t ring true to him.

“Joe, we do great work, pure and simple. We hire only the best mechanics. Our mobile fleet is in constant contact with our dispatch so we can respond quickly to any emergency, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Our field service team is polite and courteous and our quality is excellent—we have very few call-backs.” Charlie leans back in his chair, relieved that he was able to get it all out. Before he can decide if he has done a good job or not, Joe is shaking his head.

“Charlie, I know you guys do good work and that your team is friendly. Most of our building managers really like you—even Gus at 2270 Main Street, and that’s saying something. But Barnett Mechanical and 99% of the rest of your competitors can say just what you said. They hire good people too. Barnett for example, has won the Customer’s Select award three years in a row and can show you a ream of customer satisfaction surveys that substantiate their claims. I know ‘cause I’ve seen them. Peter, our newest property manager is very familiar with them from the time he spent at Acme Developments, and he can’t speak highly enough about them.

“Charlie, I guess what I am saying is that I am going to switch my business to your competitor because I think they will do a comparable job for less money. It’s nothing against you or your company. It’s simply a business decision. What would you do if you were in my shoes?”

Regardless of the industry or the service provided, conversations like these happen all the time. The customer cannot see any significant differences between service providers and so elects to patronise the one that provides the most value. Since the competitors are more or less the same in the customer’s eyes, the most value often comes down to the lowest price. This is becoming ever more true as the service business becomes increasingly competitive.

 

For most service firms, any competitive advantage they have is quickly matched or even exceeded by competitors. Customer service levels and corresponding customer expectations continue to rise. Unless reminded, any added value provided is quickly taken for granted by the customer and they assume that all service providers provide similar value.

The question facing most service providers then is, how can they stand out in this increasingly competitive environment? How can they provide a demonstrable difference from their competitors – a difference worth paying for? For the answer to this, we are given a clue by the closing paragraphs of Chapter 1.

Although Charlie thinks that he would probably make the same decision, he just mumbles something about appreciating Joe’s time and thanks him for his past business. As Joe walks Charlie down to the elevator, Charlie strains to make conversation. He asks clumsily, “Rising energy costs and stiffer competition must be impacting your customers significantly. What are you doing to help them?”

Joe looks Charlie in the eye, shakes his hand and says, “You sure picked a funny time to ask that question.” The elevator pings to announce its arrival and Joe turns and walks away.

Joe’s response to Charlie’s question puzzles Charlie greatly.

He discusses the conversation with his service supervisor Ken. They focus on Joe’s response to Charlie’s question and Ken helps him come to the realisation that Joe’s response might be linked to the fact that he felt that it should have been asked earlier in their relationship. During the contract, questions like that would have given the service provider more insight into the challenges faced by the customer in achieving their goals.

With that insight, Charlie could have added great value to their relationship. By understanding their challenges, they could proactively identify and recommend actions that could be taken by Joe’s firm to overcome those challenges and achieve their goals. This would provide a level of service beyond simply keeping the equipment running well.

Thinking about your business:

• What makes you different from your competitors?
• If you asked your competitors this question, how would your answer be different?
• What do your customers value most?
•  How do you know this?
• What is it about “what makes you different” that allows you to deliver on that value?

Next time we will examine more closely the technician’s role in bringing ideas to the customer and why their proactive actions are an important part of the service and not an “add-on” selling activity.

 

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Prankul Middha, Head of Utilities & Strategic Partnerships at VideoYourNotes explains how they are accelerating productivity, improving compliance and boosting customer satisfaction for Global clients through utilising smart, storyboarded video notes...

For thousands of years the written word has been used to communicate the full range of human emotions: love; hate; longing; disappointment. This skill sets us apart from other life forms.

However, writing clear, unambiguous text requires time and experience. Time is something that is in short supply in our hectic working lives. It can be a real challenge for field services representatives when time pressured due to multiple jobs. This pressure to be productive can actually undermine efficiency through incomplete communications. Clear precise communication is difficult, under pressure it’s very difficult.

Field services suppliers are increasingly looking to digital tools to help solve this problem leading to the adoption of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Field Service Management (FSM) systems.

These systems are designed to create a unified place for customer data allowing the engineer or inspector to capture information as text or pictures into the customer record so that the correct resources and parts can be allocated to resolve the problem.

While this is great in principle, the right information does not always find its way into the CRM or FSM systems in practice. Trying to be clear and unambiguous can often result in long winded, dense prose that is difficult to understand - the very opposite of what is intended.

 

Even Winston Churchill once apologised for writing a long letter because he didn’t have time to write a short one! This can lead to higher failure rates and customer dissatisfaction – a situation that will be challenged further as more and more hand-held devices are introduced for text data capture.

We speak at 150 words per minute (wpm) but type on a laptop at 40 wpm and into a mobile device at a mere 20 wpm. That’s 7.5x less productive than speaking. Still images can also be problematic in handling a complex problem.

These very real challenges have led to CRM or FSM systems not delivering all the productivity gains they should be able to due to the poor quality of data in the system.

This is an issue we first helped overcome in sales organisations who faced similar data quality and compliance challenges for their mobile field sales teams.

Our SmartVideoNotes, which are short, structured and secure 30-60second videos are now being used in over 35 countries globally and in 8 languages. Leading companies like P&G, Cognizant, Unilever, Vodafone, etc. have discovered the power of smart, structured video to help them to make better and faster decisions.

Our solution could be deployed in an even more transformative manner to the challenges faced by field services providers. SmartVideoNotes capture the problem quickly (30-60seconds), show the real situation and can be shared with the right people or appropriate systems instantly.

Smart tagging of the data captured through speech to text recognition allows for valuable reports to be simply and quickly generated.

All this is done with the highest levels of security on systems that meet banking level security audits. Indeed SmartVideoNotes have just been awarded Cyber Essentials Certification.

Alan Harrison, Non Exec Director and previously Group CIO of a major Water Utility summarised it beautifully to me:

“When you have teams working remotely across wide geographic areas good communication is even more imperative. Video gives the opportunity to show the problem or issue very clearly. E.g. ‘when you walk into the plant room, this is what you will see, this is the valve that needs fixing’. You can remove the need to type an essay or try and draw a picture to explain the issue/need. This improves the effectiveness and efficiency of teams by saving time and increasing resolution on first visit, with a corresponding drop in requests for more data and clarification. If your eyes can see the problem, accurate, rapid, true communication will follow.”

 

Video is the single most powerful communication media, 5x as effective as any other media. Your organisation could now be harnessing this power to reduce failure rates, increase productivity and efficiency.

In a recent study of video by a major field services organisation, 87.5% of users used SmartVideoNotes and this resulted in a 50% time saving compared to completing their normal processes. Further, there was significant customer interest in our video solution and field services engineers reported greater customer confidence and improved perceptions of service.

Video into your workflow or CRM has the power to transform your field services teams today, not just in compliance, productivity and customer experience but imagine its power in Health & Safety.

 

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Next up in our series of reviews of the best devices suitable for field service engineers is Getac’s latest semi-rugged notebook the S410...

What the manufacturers say:

Raising the bar on the semi-rugged notebook class, the new S410 is more rugged, slimmer and lighter than ever before.

The all-new S410 boasts the latest computing innovations, including a significant CPU performance boost, enhanced graphics , and multiple options for greater flexibility. The S410 puts greater power and adaptability into the hands of mobile professionals across a range of industries.

First impressions:

Taking the S410 out of the box the notebook was light, compact looking and with a high build quality.

On boot up the device was quick to launch and I was very soon logged into the local wifi network and impressed with the speed of the connection and the responsiveness and control of the S410.

One thing that immediately struck me was the intelligent design of the built in carry handle which flexes out of the casing in a comfortable manner yet never got in the way when I was actually using the laptop. Although a relatively minor point, it is the close attention to small details such as this that I find are often key markers towards a well thought out device.

Personally, I’ve always found semi-rugged devices an odd corner of the market in terms of form factor and as more and more fully rugged devices become sleeker and consumer devices become more rugged (such as the latest consumer smartphones being IP68) one does wonder if their will be a place in the not so distant future for the semi-rugged market. However, if that is the case and the S410 is indeed part of a dying breed then on initial examination it seems to be a shining example of what semi-rugged is all about.

 

This device will never pass for a consumer notebook, nor does it want to, it’s a device built for business, that means business. Despite shaving off some 15mm in depth off of its predecessor (the S400) the S410 still has a sturdy compactness that has a reassuring, reliable feel to it.

This is a notebook that after an hour or so of getting a feel for it definitely seems suited for a life on the road, if not perhaps the great outdoors - but how do the specs stack up?

Processing power & memory:

In its highest configuration the S410 can certainly pack a punch when it comes to processing power, Top end specs come with an Intel® Core™ i7 vPro™ Technology, Intel® Core™ i7-6600U vPro™ Processor 2.6GHz, Max 3.4GHz, with Intel® Turbo Boost Technology and a 4MB Intel® Smart Cache.

The S410 also can boast up-to 16GB of Ram which would make it a lightning fast device within it’s category.

In short this should be more than enough processing power to really enable most field work to be easily accomplished quickly and efficiently, even with seriously heavy CPU intensive applications such as CAD based applications used in engineering etc.

In terms of storage space the S410 can also be specced up to 1TB so there should be plenty of file space available for even the most heavy duty file capture in the field.

Operating system:

The S410 is a windows machine and operates either on Windows 7 Pro or Windows 10 Pro - although given that the S410 can be configured with a capacitive multi-input touch-screen the better option would likely be 10 Professional which features some useful working functionality such as split screens to help improve workflows.

The Ins & Outs:

As you would expect with a notebook or laptop the S410 come awash with a variety of differing inputs and outputs.

These include:

[unordered_list style="bullet"]

• Headphone out/mic-in Combo x 1
• DC in Jack x 1
• USB 3.0 (9-pin) x 3
• USB 2.0 (4-pin) x 1
• LAN (RJ45) x 1
• HDMI x 1

[/unordered_list]

There are also options for a whole host of additional ports within the configuration specs as well.

Connectivity:

In terms of connectivity the S410’s wifi is powered by an Intel® Dual Band Wireless-AC 8260, 802.11ac which works across both the 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz frequencies -during testing it was on the 5Ghz band and was reaching speeds of 50Mbps although the technology is actually capable of receiving 867Mbps if you can ever find a connection fast enough!

 

The device also comes equipped with Bluetooth 4.2 which again is a solid, secure and fast connection for Bluetooth connections.

Ruggedity:

Being semi-rugged this is of course an area where the S410 is underwhelming compared to many of the devices that we get our HandsOn.

The S410 is tested to withstand 3ft drops to MIL STD 810G standards so it can survive more than the odd knock but it’s IP rating of 51 means that it’s not a device for the outdoors. Only partially protected from dust ingress and whilst it’s officially splash proof you wouldn’t want to risk spilling your morning coffee over it.

One thing in the S410s favour here though is that the device is vibration resistant so would be fine being dashboard mounted for long periods of time.

Battery Life:

Where the S410 does shine is in the battery life department.

The primary battery itself (a Li-Ion battery with 11.1V, 4200mAh) should be able to offer up to 11 hours a day. However, with an optional hot-swappable battery, essentially the device is capable of continuing running perpetually.

Conclusion:

First things first - I like this notebook. I really like it. It is fast, reasonably robust yet reasonably lightweight. Hell I even like the carry handle! And most importantly I can see how this device could easily be used by field based technicians.

However, the facts are that this is not a device for anyone who spends more than a fraction of their day working in an outdoor environment.

 

For those field technicians that work in predominantly outdoor roles, where there is a danger of a device getting wet or dusty then sadly the S410 isn’t for you. However, given the processing power the S410 pack it could handle most applications and for companies whose field technicians work with high technology such as MedTec or IT infrastructure who want a reliable, powerful notebook that can take the odd knock here and there... Perfect.

 

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Tom DeVroy, senior product evangelist, Enterprise Service Management at IFS outlines three technology driven developments poised to disrupt field service...

Effective field service is about proactively managing your workforce and inventory in order to meet the constantly sliding scale of customer expectations. As a result, field service organisations are constantly looking to improve on the key metrics to better serve customers: first-time fix rate (FTF), mean time to service (MTTS) and mean time to repair (MTTR).

Three new technology driven developments are establishing themselves in the market, with the potential to dramatically impact these field service metrics to benefit both the customer and service provider:

• Advanced mobility: augmented reality, instant messaging platforms and native apps
• Predictive analytics enabling prescriptive maintenance
• Optimised scheduling and demand forecasting in an IoT world

First: Beyond mobility: augmented reality, instant messaging and native apps

A mobile workforce needs a mobile-driven field service strategy. In a recent study on mobility, performance and engagement, 60% of employees said mobile technology makes them more productive in the workplace. But field service organisations are now moving beyond simple mobility, looking for more intelligence and flexibility from their mobile computing platform in order to take full advantage of next generation devices.

Native apps are a key part of this - allowing engineers to receive instant updates, access repair information or collaborate with product experts without leaving the job site. Instant messaging platforms such as Slack and WeChat are also allowing field service engineers to keep connected, with more information and collaboration supported on their mobile device. Engineers are able to contact other colleagues for assistance in real-time – reducing the need to return to base for assistance.

Seeing is believing

 

 

ABI Research shows augmented reality is on the rise, and Gartner predicts businesses will purchase 53 million tablets by 2016. There are instant benefits for field service engineers. Mobile solutions now allow engineers to receive real-time feedback and expertise while on the job, enabling repairs to be completed more quickly and efficiently. An IFS partner, XMReality, is already working on pioneering augmented reality projects like this.

 

With this remote guidance, a support technician is able to watch and guide the engineer through every step of the repair without having to leave base. Using smartglasses, engineers are able to see a real-time and interactive demonstration of the repair job right in front of their eyes. These skills can be leveraged anywhere, any time with the capability of modern mobile technology – drastically improving FTF.

Second: Beyond business analytics: predict and prescribe maintenance:

The rise of IoT sensors and integrated technology on equipment is also enabling more efficient field service. Instead of scheduling maintenance when a fault is recorded, predictive analytics and the remote monitoring of equipment through IoT means faults can be detected before they become a problem.

Combined with business intelligence to make sense of the big data being captured through IoT, predictive analytics can be used to find actionable data to inform business decisions. Enabling service organisations to be proactive in regard to equipment performance means moving away from calendar-based scheduling, and towards predictive maintenance.

IFS has a predictive maintenance capability embedded in its field service applications, allowing better allocation of an engineer's time. With sensors deployed on the factory floor, service organisations can monitor vibration analysis of bearings and predict when machine parts will start to degrade, then schedule maintenance proactively.

Field service solutions should be able to find and collect patterns of data from past actions and use this information to create generic rules to highlight how processes and services can be improved in the future - delivering new insight into operational efficiency.

Mobile devices are now able to run intelligent diagnostics and capture potential problems. Based on the diagnostic output, the mobile device is able to recommend a maintenance plan and the various tasks needed to be performed, before the engineer gets on site. This technology is going one step further than just predicting when faults will occur, and will prescribe which action needs to be taken in order to fully maintain that asset.

Prescriptive maintenance will take into account budget, time and other constraints and provide an optimal order of actions and the work orders to fully maintain that equipment – all in a matter of seconds.

Third: Staying ahead of schedule

First-time fix rates are an important KPI for field service organisations, but recent Blumberg research shows that the industry average for first-time fixes was under 80%, meaning 20% of jobs require additional follow-ups. Inefficient scheduling results in a lower first time fix rate and longer time to final resolution, as unqualified engineers can be sent and the necessary equipment may be unavailable.

Although not a new technology, schedule optimisation is a foundation on which new technologies can thrive. By combining scheduling with data from IoT devices, the next generation of schedule optimisation tools go much further and help to forecast field service demand, SLAs and potential resource needs – all in real-time.

IoT-enabled sensors can trigger actions when an event changes, and automatically re-schedule jobs around this. This combination allows field service organisations to improve FTF, MTTS and MTTR by consistently scheduling the right engineer for the right job, at the right time.

When one hand washes the other

Take one recent example. A custodial services company - that uses IFS to optimise their field scheduling - is responsible for maintaining and replenishing washroom supplies for a large number of hospitals, restaurants, and other commercial facilities. The company has a sizeable contingent of mobile workers who provide delivery and replenishment services.

Much of the work is done on a planned basis, so delivery schedules are organised in advance to streamline operations. In addition, the optimisation software analyses all SLA obligations, geographic considerations and other relevant parameters to design service routes that minimise travel times and costs, and produce the highest possible productivity levels.

 

Since optimising its field scheduling software, the company has saved nearly $3 million in fuel costs alone – thanks to the optimal routes and planning the software generates and its integration with field workers' mobile devices.

Don't get left behind

These new technologies are going to bring serious benefits to field service organisations because they are so tightly integrated with delivering improved customer service and improved bottom lines.

In what is a dynamic and changing market - with tech-savvy customers demanding higher and higher levels of service - it is vital for organisations to be able to implement these cutting edge technologies.

The new breed of enterprise solutions takes away the risk

Traditional field service management solutions are simply too cumbersome and inflexible to enable field service organisations to reap the benefits. To quickly benefit from these latest advances, organisations need the backing of a new generation of flexible, agile enterprise solutions.

Traditional enterprise solutions can take months or years to simply implement, let alone adapt to an entirely new technology. The new breed of modular enterprise solutions are designed to remove the time and pain of modifying existing processes, and instead maximise the opportunities of new technology. These agile systems negate the need to fully customise legacy systems - a costly and timely process - and are enabling organisations to quickly adopt new technology, without the risk of losing out on a competitive edge.

These disruptive technologies and the digital transformation they require offer benefits that resonate throughout the whole service organisation - from the top-down. Strategic planners have real-time visibility to plan tasks and schedule the workforce in an industry with many unknown elements, from customer unpredictability to traffic, and even the weather.

 

This, in turn, directly empowers technicians, providing them with the right tools and information at their fingertips to better perform their job. But ultimately the most important stakeholder reaps the benefits - the customer receives the best possible level of service.

 

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Sergio Barata, General Manager EMEA, Telogis looks at the ever evolving nature of the professional driver

The life of a professional driver has changed dramatically over the last few years.

Gone are the days of being cast off in virtual isolation on the road. Instead, drivers are now part of a hyper-connected organisation joined up by tech, and this is allowing managers and a network of drivers to be linked in totally new ways.

One man and his truck has turned into one man, his truck and his digital network. Almost every piece of driver activity can now be turned into data in real time and then optimised for the operation’s benefit.

It’s saving vehicle-based businesses millions of pounds and completely changing how a driver operates in the cab.

But this hasn’t happened overnight. What are the steps that have got us here? And how does it affect the job role today? Here we look at the milestones that have changed the concept of a lone driver and how the driving experience has been turned on its head.

Telematics rolls into town

The first major development that connected drivers was the advent of basic telematics. It allowed managers to see where their drivers went, the miles they covered, and the fuel they spent. For the first time, drivers were now sent on jobs knowing that bits of information about their driving would be fed back to their managers.

Drivers responded by paying greater attention to the management of their vehicles, communicating with head office via traditional telephone systems to find the quickest route to get the job done.

Software hits the cab

The next step came when operators began demanding intelligent software which could provide greater insights through data aggregation and analytics.

With software-based services, managers were able to measure variables such as harsh braking, speeding and fuel consumption, with information collated and stored in the cloud for remote management. Relative to the size of each taskforce, the output was business critical data.

Enter MEM

‘Mobile Enterprise Management’ software, or MEM, connects each member of the workforce more closely than was previously thought possible. In a fleet context, it allows vehicles and drivers to communicate and interact with data in real time, gaining insights from other parts of the network which can be applied to their own vehicle.

This information, sourced from thousands of lone drivers across the network, can also be fed into other separate parts of an organisation’s network.

Whether it’s a small commercial operation or a sprawling international supply chain, mobile and the cloud can connect an entire organisation from the front line to the back end, helping businesses optimise their operations and drive ROI.

The Lone Driver 2.0

It is in this context therefore, that we are able to establish a new profile for the lone driver, combining traditional expertise with the new role as an enabler within the wider data ecosystem of an organisation

Drivers are a no longer a remote asset once they leave the conventional four walls of the enterprise.

They are now an extension of that enterprise, creating a constant stream of data and interactions which are fed back to their organisation’s operations team via a cloud-based platform, ensuring all aspects of the network are optimised.

The data driver

This means that in the modern era, lone drivers are more important than ever before.

They are responsible for creating a vast amount of this data, whether that be through logging their commercial hours, carrying out their Driver-Vehicle Inspection Report or simply driving their vehicle, generating performance data.

The future?

As technological innovation continues apace, the adoption of autonomous vehicles looks likely to represent the next major change in field operations, with some critics citing this development as the beginning of the end for drivers.

On the contrary, drivers have demonstrated their ability to adapt to technological change on many occasions already, and their longevity won’t end here. With their increased importance in the data ecosystem, the profile of the lone driver may yet change. But they will still be important as ever.

 

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Nick Frank and Dag Gronevik of Si2 Partners joined Kris Oldland for our latest podcast where the talk was all about KPIs, in this excerpt we look at whether KPIs should be under constant review...

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Want to know more? Check out our Podcast with Nick and Dag on this topic here

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KO: Why are KPIs so important to driving a business forwards?

DG: First of al I think KPIs have one fundamental role and that is to drive behaviour. One of the risks with KPIs, as many people have realised is that they are interpreted and perceived as a controlling measure. But if you look at it from a driving the business perspective it really is all about driving behaviour.

To be able to link that behaviour you are looking at with strategy, budget,what the competition is doing, what customers are expecting... It’s quite a tricky cookie to crack but if you do it right, it is very powerful. One of the things people tend to forget is that we say Key Performance Indicators, there is the word Key in there, so people mix Key Performance Indicators, with performance indicators and it becomes a bit of a soup of KPIs. We should be really targeted on the ‘key’ word.

KO: It is a bit of a hackneyed phrase now but ‘what you can’t measure you can’t manage’ comes to mind. Is it really that simple, that we need to be measuring these things so we can improve?

NF: Actually that’s an old Peter Drucker phrase, but also I think it is quite often mis-quoted. Because he was also of the opinion that yes, you need the measures to gauge and give feedback on performance but actually there are things, part of performance that you can’t measure when your dealing with a person. In fact one of the key roles of a manager is to be able to provide this feedback to their people that can’t be measured or quantified.

[quote float="left"]The really big challenge that we are dealing with here is people and how people react. I think a lot of managers forget this because many managers equate measures with control.[/quote]The really big challenge that we are dealing with here is people and how people react. I think a lot of managers forget this because many managers equate measures with control. They want to control their business, they want to control their people, they want to prove to their bosses that they really know what they are doing.

So they measure everything and they tend to look at what has happened rather than predict what is going to happen and I think this is a mistake that many people make, they have too many and they are always looking backwards.

KO: It’s that rear view mirror approach - i.e. you can’t drive a car forwards competently, if your constantly checking the rear view mirror. 

You’ve both mentioned influencing behaviour and influencing people, but KPIs are essentially all about cold, hard numbers, and that is a very rational and logical way of looking at what is not always a logical and rational issue, because people are different and not so easily quantified.

Is that the big challenge in terms of getting the right KPIs - in that we can’t just base our decisions on percentages all of the time?

DG: I think you have certain measure that are unavoidable, especially financial ones, that are measuring trends which are very important to keep there year-on-year, but you might also have KPIs that you might only keep for one year.

For example, a short term project or program or a local project that you want to monitor and give more visibility to. I think that is also an area where you can keep KPIs. But I think it is important to keep that perspective of the long term measure that you can actually see trends, because if you can manage that well, then you also have control of your business.

KO: So are KPIs something that should be under constant review?

DG: I think that you will alays have a core set of KPIs as I mentioned but other than that yes I think so. You have an agenda that you review every year, you have an operational plan and as a support to that operational plan you need good measures to track progress.

Also they [KPIs] allow you to communicate to the organisation, if you are behind - what could be the reasons? Then you have activities supporting all these measures and KPIs so you can actually address the issues quite quickly and effectively.

KO: What is interesting here is the fluidity you describe, that whilst of course you have your solid KPIs at the heart of the business, in addition to that there is this layer of shifting metrics that are adaptable to where the business is at any given time. For me that is something that can be often overlooked, it’s almost like KPIs are carved into stone tablets some times.

On a similar subject let’s talk about the different KPIs that you would set for the team compared to those you would set for management...

NF: I think as a manager you want to be in control of the business, you want to problem solve and you need a level of detail and that’s part of your job - to be able to drill down from high level metrics to the operational metrics in order to do that and in order to answer the questions from your own management.

That’s very different from what you need to do with your people and what you need to do to drive your people. I’ve found if your talking to field service engineers their eyes just glaze over if you start talking in too much detail.

They are just really interested in what they can impact.

[quote float="right"]Managers are one set of stakeholders, but the people who work in your team, who work at the coal face, they have another set of needs and it’s important to recognise that they are different and to actually find the measures that motivate them and they can do something about[/quote] Therefore, it’s actually very important to separate out the two. It comes back to what Dag was saying at the beginning, there is a reason we do this it.

It’s to drive the business forward and be more effective in terms of our processes but also mainly our people.

Managers are one set of stakeholders, but the people who work in your team, who work at the coal face, they have another set of needs and it’s important to recognise that they are different and to actually find the measures that motivate them and they can do something about - so that if they take an action they can actually see that they are impacting how the business is working.

You really should think of them as two different sets of stakeholders therefore you should separate out the different sets of KPIs.

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Want to know more? Check out our Podcast with Nick and Dag on this topic here

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Marne Martin, CEO ServicePower explains the benefits of an integrated dedicated and freelance workforce and why scheduling them shouldn’t be a chore...

Service is going through an exciting change as businesses are finding more productive ways to satisfy the needs of their customers, while also improving their bottom line. We aren’t talking about “just” overflow or managing seasonality, we are talking about executing on a strategy that can fundamentally change how and the speed at which you provide service to your customers. As business moves forward, more and more companies have come to realise the benefits of a labour model that can really harness both productivity and customer experience advances.

In the past, technology, work flows and field service management techniques weren’t particularly reliable at managing a labour model that wasn’t either a dedicated workforce or a freelance workforce. But times are changing.

 

The capabilities of software that can handle the complexities of using both a dedicated and extended workforce are here. Having done this now effectively for more than a decade for many of the best known enterprises, here is our advice on such “hybrid” labor models, ensuring the highest productivity and customer satisfaction levels.

Let’s consider the reasons many organisations deploy a labour model utilising both a dedicated and extended workforce.

Availability

Customers want service now. An extended workforce enables expectations to be met when demand is high, and also buffers cost when demand is low. Using a mix of labour resources with appropriate credentialing and training expands your capabilities at a lower cost while also getting service to your customers sooner.

Cycle time management

Using cycle time calculations from business intelligence applications, businesses may distribute work to the mobile resources with the lowest cost or most desired cycle time metrics, both of which may fluctuate between employed and contracted resources, given current conditions, to meet customer demand. Cost can also be factored into this understanding that time is money.

Quality control

Organisations which deliver field based services may manage job distribution based upon quality of service metrics. Maximise your customer experience by ranking well liked technicians higher so that if they have capacity, they get the job.

Seasonality

Being able to simultaneously search and book employed or contracted mobile workers enables you to manage your workforce consistently, while also meeting KPIs during demand fluctuation.

Catastrophic events

Catastrophes are happening at a higher rate than ever before. It’s critical in those catastrophic situations for feet to hit the ground immediately to provide care and services, for instance to insurance policy holders. If you are a business that handles catastrophes, if you don’t have an extended workforce and also one that is tied into your core technology solutions, you should.

Extraordinary territories

The cost of expanding the reach of service where there isn’t significant and steady job density is high. To decrease costs and improve productivity,it’s best to schedule and route mobile workers to jobs in the closest proximity to each other, to the mobile worker’s start and stop locations, and within the areas they know best. If jobs are infrequent, the cost of credentialing and training a freelancer may well be more efficient.

Infrequent or out of the ordinary jobs

The same can be said for ‘out of the ordinary’ jobs. Consider smart home system installation or customer product education visits commonly associated with outcome based services. Both type of job requires special skills. Do you employ uniquely skilled individuals and wait for work to come in, or contract a scalable workforce able to provide these services as needed? Clearly the latter is the best choice for many businesses.

Cost control

Similar to quality or cycle time control, using business intel to derive job cost by labour channel enables organisations to evaluate the least costly mobile worker for a job, depending on skills, travel, and salary for instance. The least costly resource may be a contractor rather than an employee.

We suspect one or more of these scenarios apply to your business.

Intelligent, integrated dispatching

Mobile workforce management software traditionally, especially within the field service industry, meant scheduling. There are several flavours of scheduling, however folding contractors into the mix requires more than attempting to plug them into those existing scheduling solutions.

Utilising an aggregated dispatching software platform provides those same jobs sources with the ability to send their work alongside other aggregated work, improving operational efficiencies and reducing costs, for every member of the service delivery chain.

Adding an integrated platform with a robust, intelligent and real time scheduling algorithm to intelligently and quickly determine the best routing scenarios, while also having the ability to ‘reoptimise’ the schedule, moving the jobs in time as well as between employees and contractors based on real time conditions, is a major plus.

ServicePower has been instrumental in the deployment of integrated, mixed labour strategies since 2004 including the configurable options through our broker product to fully automate the intelligent and dynamic scheduling of either employees or contractors through a robust, fully configurable rules engine, enabling our clients to seamlessly provide the best, fastest and least costly services within their industries.

 

ServicePower Unity takes that one step farther by providing our entire mobile workforce management platform via a SaaS deployment, for one low cost. We’ve taken the ability to dispatch any field resource and made it simple to deploy and easy to pay for whether your labour force are dedicated or freelancers

Scheduling mobile workers to meet customer demand is far less complex when you have a partner that understands the needs of your business and technology that supports an integrated dedicated and extended workforce.

ServicePower processes more than three million job interactions a day with proven ability to drive customer experience whether your technicians are your employees or freelancers. Let us help you to make it easier for your teams to evolve your workforce strategy and customer experience.

 

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