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Bill Pollock, President, Strategies for GrowthSM guides us through how he sees the future of our industry shaping up in the next few years...

As we enter the uncharted waters of 2017, it becomes increasingly important for Field Service Organisations (FSOs) to understand the specific impact that the next 12 months (and beyond) will have on the quality of their field service operations.

In fact, the future state of Field Service Management (FSM) will depend largely on what strategic actions global FSOs plan to take in the next 12 months or so.

Since these actions will be directly linked to the multitude of drivers that are most likely to influence decision making within the global services community, this would be a good place to start.

 

The results of Strategies For GrowthSM‘s (SFGSM) 2016/17 Field Service Management Benchmark Survey reveal that the top drivers cited as influencing FSOs today may be categorised into three main areas:

1. Customer demand and/or preferences
2. Need to improve service workforce utilisation, productivity and efficiencies
3. Internal mandate to drive increased service revenues

When asked to cite the top three drivers currently influencing their ability to effectively manage field services operations, 56% of respondents cite customer demand for quicker response time, and nearly one-third (32%) cite customer demand for improved asset availability.

However, the need to improve workforce utilisation and productivity is also cited by a majority (51%) of respondents as a top driver, followed by the need to improve service process efficiencies (39%).

An internal mandate to drive increased service revenues is then cited by 31% of respondents as one of their top three drivers.

Once the key market drivers are firmly identified, FSOs need to create – and implement – the most effective strategic planning actions to address them head-on.

As reported in the SFGSM survey, the most commonly implemented strategic actions, currently, are:

• 48% Develop and/or improve KPIs used to measure field service performance
• 40% Invest in mobile tools to support field technicians
• 36% Automate existing manual field service processes and activities
• 31% Integrate new technologies into existing field service operations
• 30% Provide additional training to field service technicians and dispatchers
• 26% Improve planning and forecasting with respect to field operations
• 25% Increase customer involvement in Web-based service process
• 24% Provide enterprise-wide access to important field-collected data

These data strongly suggest that there is a pattern of synergy among the top four cited strategic actions that builds a foundation for all of the other actions that will ultimately be taken by the organisation; that is, that nearly half of the FSOs comprising the global services community already recognise the need to build and/or improve their KPI ¬-measurement program – this is essential!

This is the first step!

However, along with the development and/or improvement of a KPI program, nearly as many organisations also recognise the need to invest in state-of-the-art mobile tools to support their technicians in the field, while concurrently, automating their existing manual field service processes and activities to provide an enterprise-wide foundation for collecting data and information, and disseminating this process to field technicians (and, in many cases, to their customers) on an as-needed basis.

Further, about one-third of FSOs recognise the need to integrate new technologies into existing field service operations to make it all come together.

 

This synergy is built on, first, ensuring that there is an effective KPI measurement program in place, and using that program to establish a benchmark, or baseline, for measuring the organisation’s current field service performance.

Second, there needs to be a comprehensive internal effort to bring the technical aspects of services operations into the current (and future) timeframe – this can be done mainly by investing in an effective package of mobile tools to support the field force.

Finally, it will be the integration of these new technologies (e.g., mobility applications, the IoT, wearables, 3D printing, Augmented Reality (AR), etc.) into the overall mix of resources and tools deployed by FSOs that will empower the field force do their jobs more productively and efficiently.

The desired results, of course, would be the improvement of service delivery performance and the resultant improvements in the levels of customer satisfaction (and retention). Even the concept of Servitization, or the “transformation process in which a manufacturer shifts from a product-based business model to a services-based business mode”, could not exist in its present form without the power of the IoT behind it. In fact, it may be argued that there would be no Servitization without the IoT!

Among the many benefits that an IoT-powered Servitization model brings to the table are:

• Provides a competitive advantage with respect to the organisation’s ability to offer a state-of-the-art, differentiated, services offering that may also be “branded”, thereby providing an additional means for marketing and promoting its services to a hungry-for technology services marketplace.
• Yields increased margins for the services organisation, resulting both from improvements made on the supply side (e.g., by cutting the costs of delivering services through remote means) and the demand side (e.g., the ability to charge a premium price for premium services); etc.
• Provides the ability to more evenly forecast, predict and realise revenue streams through the implementation of remote diagnostics and predictive modeling.
• Fosters more meaningful partner relationships with customers through the sharing of equipment service data/ information, and allowing customers to be more proactive in the ultimate service and support of their installed base of equipment (e.g., initiating service calls, ordering parts, tracking problem resolution, etc.).[/unordered_list]

The future looks particularly bright for the global services community! How do we know that?

Because the future is already here – especially among the more progressive – and aggressive – FSOs that will likely lead the rest of us through these uncharted waters in 2017 and beyond.

It just looks like now may be the time for all of us to follow their lead!

 

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The Internet of Things has been positioned as the key technology that will lead to a true evolution of field service delivery. Bill Pollock, President of Strategies for GrowthSM looks at the challenges revealed in his latest benchmarking research and explains how IoT will help field service organisations meet these...

The Convergence of the IoT and Field Service Management (FSM)

The Internet of Things (IoT) is not a new concept.

To a growing number of services managers, the two are inseparable as they have been integrally linked together for as long as they have been heading their organisation’s services operations.

This is especially true in an environment where an influx of millennials are rapidly replacing baby boomers in virtually all aspects of the services sector; where the “marriage” between Field Service Management (FSM) and the IoT is generally seen as a “given” with respect to providing the organisation with the ability to satisfy the total needs, requirements and expectations of their respective customers.

As such, this “marriage” is somewhat analogous to the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup, or taking “tried and true” favourites like chocolate and peanut butter, integrating the two together, and coming up with something “new” that the marketplace simply cannot live without. The big difference, however, is that the IoT is much more than just a tasty morsel - it is transforming the very core of field service management.

However, the IoT, in and of itself, cannot transform a poorly run Field Service Organisation (FSO) into an efficient operation; nor can it turn an unprofitable one into a cash cow.

 

However, it can clearly help to re-position an already well-run organisation for accelerated growth, heightened market position, improved effectiveness, improved customer satisfaction and increased profitability. For a growing number of FSOs, the greatest determinants of their commercial viability – and profitability – are the efficiency, functionality and effectiveness of their IoT-based Field Service Management (FSM) solution.

There’s FSM, and Then There’s the IoT-powered FSM

For most field service organisations (i.e., Gartner estimates roughly 75%) FSM solutions are no longer “new” to the services industry – they are a fact of life. What is still news, however, is how easy they now are to implement, as Cloud technology has essentially normalized the playing field so that FSOs of all types and sizes, and serving any geography, can benefit from its implementation.

The results of Strategies For GrowthSM‘s (SFGSM) 2016/17 Field Service Management Benchmark Survey report that the top opportunities, or benefits, cited by FSOs with respect to acquiring and integrating new technology (i.e., the IoT, among others) are:

• 44% Ability to run a more efficient field service operation by eliminating silos
• 39% Improve customer satisfaction
• 35% Ability to provide customers with an end-to-end engagement relationship
• 30% Establish a competitive advantage
• 26% Improve field technician utilisation and productivity
• 25% Reduce Total Cost of Operations (TCO)

The survey data also suggest that the opportunities and benefits significantly outweigh the challenges for a clear majority of FSOs – but, they still exist.

However, the IoT helps to make it all possible by allowing the new technology – in most cases – to easily integrate with existing FSM systems.

This is particularly true for FSOs whose FSM solutions are already built on a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platform, where the addition of field service management functionality may be as easy as simply adding a module to the existing system. This is an important factor – and it should be – for FSOs as they make their decision to acquire a specific FSM solution.

The SFGSM survey research also reveals that, for a near majority of FSOs, this decision is “impacted mostly” by:

• 50% Prefer a solution that interfaces with CRM
• 47% Prefer to work with a single provider of Field Service functionality
• 47% Prefer a solution that is intuitive and easy to train on
• 45% Integrating new technologies into existing FSM solution platform

Another 35% also prefer to invest in a solution that fosters collaboration between Sales and Service as a top decision-making factor.

What the Future Holds for the Convergence of the IoT and Field Service Management

The “future” of field service is already here!

Today’s IoT-powered FSM solutions already provide FSOs with the ability to monitor equipment remotely, and transmit data into the business’ database in real-time.

 

The greatest manifestations of this pervasive technology may be best described in the providing FSOs with the capabilities to:

1. Collect whatever data that are needed to improve a process, or improve a product, based on its measured, monitored and tracked usage
2. Switch to a lower-cost predictive model vs. the more traditional – and more expensive – preventative maintenance model
3. Determine which services to offer to customers that the organisation cannot offer today (e.g., a next-level guarantee against downtime, which can be turned into a premium service, etc.)
4. Sell, cross-sell and upsell new services, packaged as competitive differentiators
5. Create a more effective KPI program that can measure, monitor and track both the still-relevant traditional KPIs, as well as the “new” KPIs that are being created through the use of the IoT

The IoT technology is readily available; the market demand is here; and the positive impact on the bottom line of an FSM solution, powered by the IoT, is quite compelling. Just like the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup, the market does not really care how the chocolate and the peanut butter are engineered into the final product; they just know that it tastes good, and the two ingredients work exceptionally well together – just like the Internet of Things and Field Service Management.

 

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