Firm hope offering can help with "service delivery continuity" during outbreak giving companies use of up to 15 licences throughout June.

Technical support company TechSee have made their 'TechSee Live' solution free of charge for Small and Medium-Sized Busineses (SMBs) during the Corona Virus pandemic.

SMBs who are new customers can take advantage of the virtual contact tool for up to 15 technicians until June 30. Larger enterprise firms, meanwhile, can take part in a free trial programme.

Service Management Continuity

TechSee Live creates a visual platform that field technicians can use to interact with customers through a live virtual channel using AR and overlay annotations. Crucially, it means they can work remotely and safely, observing social distancing requirements while carrying out the service visit without entering a customer's home.

TechSee uses AR, AI, machine learning and big data to produce its visual technology. Their lines have been taken up by a number of clients including Vodafone and most recently Verizon, who rolled out the tool to its technicians last week. Commenting, the Telco's Senior Vice President of Operations Kevin Service said the tool has enabled the firm to continue working but in a safe way. “We know how critical communication is, especially now as more and more people are working from home, engaging in distance learning and moving their family and friend interactions online,” he explained. “This new tool gives us the ability to provide the excellent service our customers deserve while minimizing the need for in-person interaction in these unprecedented times.”

The outbreak of the virus has seen many companies offer their services for free and TechSee's CEO Eitan Cohen acknowledges the effort the community is making. “At times like this, people everywhere have a chance to come together and make a real impact on a global scale,” he said.

For more information about TechSee's offer click here.

Software firm create 'Oneserve Community' to help key workers during pandemic.

Oneserve is offering a streamlined version of its job management software free to key workers during the COVID-19 outbreak.

'Oneserve Community' is a quick-start pre-configured solution aimed at key workers from the care sector; those that carry out emergency repairs within properties; those that keep utilities networks operating or those overseeing a voluntary group delivering essential supplies, the company says.

Service Management

Managers of key worker teams can use the application-based platform on a mobile or desktop to share jobs created and completed, avoiding paperwork, emails or phone calls. Users can check daily schedules and access specific job information with just one click. Everyone can see what is expected of them and by when. The work they carry out is then recorded within the system to create an automatic audit trail. 

Oneserve work with public and private sector firms who provide essential services and this relationship, CEO Chris Proctor says, combined with the current crisis influenced the decision to create the new platform. "We recognised the contribution they [essential service] made to keeping our nation running before we were in the middle of a global crisis, but now this service is accentuated to a completely new level," he said.

“For this reason, we were very keen to support the critical roles our key workers are undertaking. At the end of the day, the easier it is for these key workers to carry out their tasks, the more people they can support.

"These are unprecedented times, times which require a different way of thinking, a different way of supporting one another. For all of us at Oneserve, we see this free solution as a token of our gratitude to those who continue to support and protect us all.”

For more information and to request access to this free offer visit oneserve.co.uk/oneserve-community.

Firm says solution is first of its kind and can optimise work for 2.7 billion deskless workers.

The technology company Skedulo who create deskless product software says they have created the "industry's first deskless productivity cloud".

Overlooked

Deskless productivity software, the firms says, has been overlooked by other technology vendors whose digital transformation solutions will cover entire workforces but fail to recognise those in deskless occupations.

Eighty per cent of the global workforce, approximately 2.7 billion people work deskless which can be split into three categories: mobile deskless workers which includes service technicians; hybrid deskless workers - caregivers and facility service staff; and fixed-location deskless workers - retail employees and hospitality staff.

“Organizations are paying more attention to their frontline workforce – i.e., those who deal directly with customers or are closely involved in the production process." said Raul Castanon-Martinez, senior analyst, workforce productivity and collaboration at 451 Research. "These workers have traditionally remained outside the scope of IT and business communications, but increasingly organizations are prioritizing their role to improve business agility. We expect digital transformation initiatives to expand in 2020 where frontline workers will more directly drive business outcomes.”

The platform is underpinned with Dell's Boomi programme enabling flexible configuration with existing workflows and the software is currently experimenting with a dynamic messaging real-time communication tool.

Tim Haines, Senior Product Manager at Sunrun, a solar equipment company, has been able to upscale their operation after using the platform to supercede its manual, ad-hoc scheduling methods. "We can now dial into a specific solar advisor at a specific store ad compare their hours worked and performance against the rest of the time," he said.

 

Thai firm Eko offers TELCOs free use of its workplace platform during outbreak.

In an effort to support TELCOs during the Covid-19 pandemic, employee software provider Eko are offering free use of its virtual workplace platform.

Suite of Tools

Users who sign-up for the subscription-based platform will only be charged when the current situation stabilises and will have access to the virtual workstation's suite of tools including: Banner, a tool for creating visual banner announcements for staff; Broadcast, a way of communicating clear, company wide announcements; a library of documentation covering, health and safety, health insurance and travel polices for example; a real-time catalogue of checklists and attachments; and a real-time chat facility for accurate and instant communication.

As the impact of the virus takes a firmer hold globally, the need for remote technology in enabling business continuity is growing. Companies are requiring solutions that can at the very least offer a semblance of 'business as usual' and assist in continuity strategies.

Korawad Chearavanont, CEO at Eko, hopes the offer can help negate some of the anxiety that businesses are feeling. "The virus outbreak has been a big concern for businesses that are frantically preparing contingency plans," he said. "If our platform can give peace of mind to businesses and help to keep employees informed and feeling calmer during this unprecedented time, then it just seems like the right thing to do." 

Cash injection will be used to focus on asset-centric industries, firms says.

ServiceMax have announced $80 million in growth funding led by new investor Salesforce Ventures and existing investor Silver Lake. This additional funding is expected to fuel accelerated growth, deepen product development and support digital transformation and customer experience in verticals such as manufacturing, medical devices, energy, heavy equipment and other industrial markets.

It comes after ServiceMax has earned notable industry analyst recognition, including being named a Leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Field Service Management for four consecutive years, a Leader in the first IDC MarketScape Report for Field Service Management, and most recently named a Leader in the IDC MarketScape Report for Service Parts Management. The investment from Salesforce Ventures further enhances the commitment between Salesforce and ServiceMax, who are long-time partners, to develop innovative breakthrough technologies designed to help customers transform their businesses in field service.

"ServiceMax has been a force in equipment and asset-centric industries for over a decade," said Bill Patterson, EVP and GM of CRM Applications at Salesforce. "ServiceMax's solution on the Salesforce Platform has delivered great value for joint customers, and we look forward to further collaboration."

"We are excited to be joined by our partners at Salesforce Ventures in our investment in ServiceMax," said Ken Hao, Chairman and Managing Partner of Silver Lake. "The announcement validates the company's market position and follows a record-breaking year for ServiceMax, including the largest new customer deal closed and the biggest year in company history."

"Our mission is to help field service teams keep the world running, and the market to enable them with modern, innovative technology is a $34B opportunity," said Neil Barua, CEO of ServiceMax. "We're proud to continue to deliver the most innovative solutions available with ServiceMax's field service management solution, to ensure uptime on the world's most important assets."

Steve Mason from FieldAware outlines the importance of technology evolution in your service offering.

As a company’s overall field service maturity evolves, one way to move operational maturity to the next level is to invest in technology. Organizations setting out to implement a field service management solution either for the first time or upgrading an existing solution do so to achieve strategic, operational gains. 

While many operational benefits are achieved from different aspects of a field service management project, arguably automated scheduling and optimization deliver group productivity that significantly moves the operational performance needle.  

The gains that drive companies to implement these solutions include:

• Dramatically improving service quality to the end customer by ensuring the right resource(s) arrive at the right location(s) at the right time with the right parts and equipment.
• Increased operational productivity resulting in completing more jobs per day by the same number of field resources.
• Increased first-time fix rates and reduced repeat visits.
• Lowering greenhouse gases emissions and travel costs by reducing the average miles driven per job.
• Improved staff morale by providing a modern and productive working environment. 

While delivering these results is transformative to the way an organization supports its customers and competes in the market, many companies fail to achieve full potential.  We’ll outline an Evolutionary deployment approach that, when combined with an innovative technology solution, addresses common change management barriers and breaks a decades-old mould.

 

Field Service is Always Evolving

There are two main approaches to implementing scheduling and optimization - Big Bang or Evolutionary. 

Big Bang focuses on designing and building an entirely new service offline and then introducing it in a short-focused transformation program.  It historically worked well in enterprise-wide programs where all the gains are achieved once the project is live and the new operating model is not prone to change.

Evolutionary is an “agile” methodology enabling the introduction of smaller incremental improvements that form a series of steps towards achieving defined business goals. The company achieves incremental ROI with each step and progressively aligns the organization to the evolving new business model.

Traditional scheduling and optimization systems operate by immediately publishing their results live into the field service management solution.   It takes time to configure and model the solution in a safe environment before introducing it and works best in a Big Bang project.  New innovative capabilities provide a fully functional “what-if” environment where planners can work safely, make tweaks, and then publish schedules when they are satisfied with the results.  This new capability allows the Evolutionary approach to be successfully introduced.

Both models require leaders to design how the business will operate at the end of the program.  FieldAware finds the Evolutionary model provides for faster implementation and better adoption by following this approach:

 

Phase 1 

Implement a baseline solution with just the core system parameters configured The objective is to establish a minimum viable production solution to go live as quickly as possible.   Planners, dispatchers, and field resources use the system to manually schedule and deliver service using defined data plus tacit local knowledge.  While the business may be working very similarly to how it did before the project, the operational transparency achieved through the visibility of resources, jobs, and customers on a scheduling Gantt chart, real-time visual maps, and system reports brings a lift to productivity and quality of service.

Phase 2 

Document and capture tacit or tribal knowledge from the planning team and transform the information into system parameters.  This knowledge transfer enables the implementation of semi-automated scheduling, where planners make decisions with system guidance to take into account the rules and constraints that were defined.  Productivity and service quality improves through more compliant decision making.  The data is further refined based on feedback from the teams. 

Phase 3

Semi-automated scheduling and optimization, introduce business scheduling objectives such as minimizing travel time or balancing work across the team into the system configurations.  Planners and dispatchers can use a safe “what-if” planning environment to interact with the optimizer’s calculated results and refine the schedule iteratively.  They dispatch jobs only when the best results are achieved.  During this period, planners refine the optimization engine for various regions and business requirements, improving optimization performance, and improving result quality.

Phase 4

Achieving fully automated scheduling and optimization.  The planning team has transferred all tacit and tribal knowledge into the optimization settings and parameters.  There is complete adoption because they have engaged throughout the change program. The repetitive tasks of planning and scheduling are automated, freeing up resources to address the higher value work that differentiates the business and drives it forward.

The evolutionary journey approach, when combined with advanced systems that contain “what-if” planning capabilities, break down the change management barriers.  Planners and the field resources are part of the change program and contribute to its success.  Each phase, has wins for every stakeholder, and centrally the company benefits include:

1. Increased customer satisfaction
2. Increased bottom line through group productivity improvements
3. Improved working environment for service delivery teams
4. Reduce greenhouse gas emissions

 

Further Reading:

• Read further articles and news from Steve and his colleagues at FieldAware here
• Find out more about the solutions offered by FieldAware here
• Follow Steve Mason on Twitter @stevegmason

 

 

It used to be that investing in a Field Service Management (FSM) system gave your business a competitive advantage over your competition. The prevalence of FSM in the marketplace now means those that don’t take advantage of the latest FSM systems may begin to face a competitive disadvantage.

The world moves pretty fast, if you don’t stop and take a look around once in a while, you’ll never know if the latest packages can bring you a greater return on investment, more efficient running, greater employee engagement and happier customers.

 

Eagle Field Service, By Exel Computer Systems

So, what do Exel offer that would warrant a look at the Eagle Field Service FSM solution? Apart from it being fully integrated - and that integration extending into the EFACS E/8 suite of business solutions, offering you much more functionality than other providers can.

To look at the field service aspect specifically, we can look at two concepts that Exel consider will give you the edge over your competition. Firstly, that of scheduling your engineers.

 

Assisted Field Service Engineer Scheduling: 

Exel’s concept of Assisted Engineer Scheduling was born out of the realisation that service call handlers had to obtain and retain a lot of knowledge regarding engineer skillsets, the types of jobs likely encountered and the average time to complete them, amongst many other things.

The Assisted Scheduler relies on over 25 parameters to determine the optimum engineer/job planning schedule. It presents the call handler with the optimum option, as well as a few more alternatives ranked in order of suitability. Information is provided for each option, should the call handler wish to determine the reasons for the order – the final decision lays in the hands of the call handler.

No matter the experience of the call handler, your client’s concerns are allayed quickly, as the call handler is able to deal efficiently and professionally, from request to engineer dispatch.

 

"We realised that a company's service engineers are often a hugely under-utilised sales force. They often work closely with the client and can build a high level of trust, and they often have greater access to areas of the client’s site..."

 

Service Customer Resource Management (CRM)

Service CRM is a concept that was realised after talking to engineers to gain an understanding of their experience. Some of these engineers had been conscientious and pro-active enough to identify further business opportunities for their company.

Following this, we realised that a company's service engineers are often a hugely under-utilised sales force. They often work closely with the client and can build a high level of trust, and they often have greater access to areas of the client’s site.

They are in a position to identify potential value-add or upgrade possibilities and either feed that back to sales, or potentially arrange a quote there and then. This can all be done via the Eagle Field Service mobile application and relayed to the back office in real-time.

“There’s no need to tab between different systems, all the information that people want is in one place. Moreover, the scheduling of service engineers isn’t just easier than before, it’s also more powerful, resulting in a more efficient routing of engineer visits, and better optimisation of engineers’ time.”

“Roll it all together, and the combined effect of a reduction in paperwork, the elimination of duplication and data entry, and better engineer scheduling, has enabled a significant improvement in engineer utilisation” Nick Stokes, Safestyle. To read about Safestyle’s experience, click here.

 

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Further Reading:

To learn more about Eagle Field Service, please view the brochure, here.

To read more about Assisted Engineer Scheduling, please view the data sheet, here.

To read more about Service CRM, please view the data sheet, here.

Or, alternatively, get in touch with the team @ Eagle Field Service here.

Sign up for HSO's latest webinar.

Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service is uniquely placed to assist in the digital transformation journey. As a leading Microsoft Gold Partner and Inner Circle member, HSO brings real added value to your business through unrivaled field service experience and functionality enhancements with HSO Dynamics Advanced Field Service.

Join Danny Wieder, Field Service Consultant and Stephen Manley, Business Development Manager, for a 30 minute webinar, where they will take you on a field service journey and explore real-life customer  stories.

Topics

• Field Service trends, challenges and opportunities
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service & additional functionality developed by HSO
• Take a ‘peek’ at some of the emerging technologies
• Real-life case studies and experiences
• Questions

Register now to find out how to win more business and increase profits with digital field service transformation.

The Webinar takes place on 19 March.

IFS’s business applications for FSM, ERP and EAM can now connect large and fast-changing data pools using Boomi’s integration capabilities, global enterprise applications company says.