Are UK field service companies keeping pace with the rest of the world? In this exclusive four-part report for Field Service News, Bill Pollock, President & Principal Consulting Analyst, Strategies for Growth SM, explores how UK companies compare...
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Jan 05, 2016 • Features • future of field service • Kirona • research • Research • Bill Pollock • field service • field service management • Strategies for Growth
Are UK field service companies keeping pace with the rest of the world? In this exclusive four-part report for Field Service News, Bill Pollock, President & Principal Consulting Analyst, Strategies for Growth SM, explores how UK companies compare with their global counterparts.
Download the full report! Click here to download it now!
Each year, Strategies For Growth (SFGSM) conducts a series of Benchmark Surveys among its global outreach community. The content of this report is derived exclusively from the UK/Europe responses to our 2015 Field Service Management (FSM) Benchmark Survey and, thereby, represents a geographically-specific universe base from which to identify key FSM usage patterns and trends. The research coverage was sponsored by Kirona.
For example UK/Europe survey respondents identify the following as the top factors, or challenges, currently driving their desire to optimise field service performance (compared to the overall global results):
- 56% Customer demand for quicker response time (up from 52% overall)
- 47% Need to improve workforce utilisation & productivity (up from 43% overall)
- 47% Need to improve service process efficiencies (up from 40% overall)
- 41% Customer demand for improved asset availability (up from 35% overall)
Thus, the data clearly reflects that UK/Europe Field Service Organisations (FSOs) appear to place somewhat more emphasis on each of these key market drivers, focusing on customer demand and workforce utilisation, productivity and efficiency, than their worldwide respondent counterparts.
Therefore, it should come as no surprise that they are also planning to invest more in mobile tools in support of their respective field forces than other global geographies represented in the overall survey universe.
However, in order to effectively address these key challenges – and strive to attain Best Practices status – UK/Europe respondents then cite the following as the top strategic actions they are currently taking:
- 64% Develop / improve metrics, or KPIs, used to measure field service performance (up from 52% overall)
- 49% Invest in mobile tools to provide field technicians with real-time access to required data and information in the field (up from 42% overall)
- 35% Integrate new technologies into existing field service operations (i.e., iPads, Tablets or other devices, etc. (up from 34% overall)
Improving the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) used to measure performance is cited as a top strategic action by 64% of UK/ Europe respondents, compared to only 52% overall.
In fact, the percentage of UK/Europe FSOs currently developing/improving their respective KPIs, at 64%, is higher than the 62% cited by the survey’s Best Practices respondents (i.e., those attaining at least 90% Customer Satisfaction and 30% Services Profitability).
The remainder of this report provides insight into each of these and other related areas that may be influencing your organisation’s quest to attain Best Practices, as well as highlighting those resources that the leading UK/Europe organisations already have in place – or are planning to implement in the next 12 months.
Field service as profit centres
The survey results reveal that 65% of UK/Europe respondent organisations currently operate service as an independent profit centre (or as a pure, third-party service company), similar to the 66% reflected among the overall survey respondents, but far fewer than the 81% cited among Best Practices organisations.
Even so, there are still more than a third (35%) that operate as cost centres in support of product sales.
While there appears to be some consistency or continuity in these percentages from other surveys conducted by SFG℠ over the past few years, this nearly 2:1 ratio strongly validates the fact that profit centres now represent the dominant business model within the UK/Europe services community and, based on responses from other questions in the survey, this trend is likely to grow even stronger over time.
It is noted, however, that the percentage of organisations running service as an independent profit centre varies – sometimes significantly – by size of organisation (based on annual revenue or turnover).
The percentage of organisations running service as an independent profit centre varies – sometimes significantly – by size of organisation.
Not surprisingly, organisations reporting total annual service profits of greater than 30% come in at 76% – one of the highest levels charted among all of the segments covered in the survey.
As such, they are not only operating service as a profit centre – they’re actually making a significant profit by doing so!
Bespoke or out-of-the-box
More importantly, the UK/Europe respondent base clearly confirms that the predominant mode of Field Service Management (FSM) solutions currently being deployed is mainly off-the-shelf, either with some customisation (53%; compared with only 37% overall), or basically right out-of-the-box with no customisation (2%; compared with 6% overall), comprising more than half (55%) of the respondent base in total.
This figure is 9% higher than that cited by global Best Practices organisations (i.e., 46%)
Roughly one-quarter of UK/Europe respondents are either using home-grown, or internally-developed automated systems (15%), or bespoke solutions developed by a systems integrator (9%).
As such, UK/Europe organisations are far less likely to deploy a bespoke solution either internally, or by a systems integrator, compared with the overall survey respondents, but are far more likely to deploy an off-the-shelf solution and, then, have the specific types of customisation they require built-in to tailor it to their organisation’s requirements.
However, the most perplexing statistic may be the fact that nearly one-in-four UK/Europe organisations (22%) are still running their field service operations basically via a series of manual processes (and spreadsheets) – higher than the 18% attributable to the overall respondent base!
Download the full report! Click here to download it now!
Watch out for Part 2 , where Bill Pollock reveals the key drivers for European and UK field service organisations.
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Feb 19, 2015 • Features • aberdeen • Aly Pinder • FSN20 • Fujitsu • Future of FIeld Service • Hilbrand Rustema • Martin Summerhayes • Noventum • Bill Pollock • IBM • Steve Downton • Steve Street • Strategies for Growth
Across December and January we asked our readers to nominate candidates for the inaugural #FSN20, a list of the twenty most influential people in field service. We received nominations from across the globe through social media, email and even a...
Across December and January we asked our readers to nominate candidates for the inaugural #FSN20, a list of the twenty most influential people in field service. We received nominations from across the globe through social media, email and even a phone call or two directly into the news-desk.
Armed with a list of candidates, a Field Service News panel selected the final list of twenty based on the number of nominations, their impact on the industry (past, present and future) and their sphere of influence in both the physical and digital world.
After much long deliberation, heartful debate (read arguing) and enormous amounts of coffee we managed to whittle our list down to a final twenty which we pleased to present to you here the inaugural edition of the #FSN20. You may not agree with our selection and if you don’t tell us, tell your friends, tell your colleagues, hell tell the world – because at the heart of it that’s what this list is all about, getting people talking about excellence in field service and raising the profile of those leading us to a better future.
We are now announcing who made the list in alphabetical order in four sections across four days. So without further ado we are pleased to bring you the final five of the #FSN20
Aly Pinder, Senior Research Analyst, Aberdeen
One of the most prolific authors in the industry and also one of the nicest guys in Field Service to boot. Pinder had more nominations for this list than any other candidate, which speaks volumes.
Having written or co-authored over 50 research reports, and benchmarked more than 4,000 service executives across 5 years with Aberdeen, he writes and speaks with authority and understanding and is widely respected across the market.
Bill Pollock, President and Principal Consulting Analyst, Strategies For Growth
Pollock is one of the industry’s most respected authors and commentators with a long and distinguished career focused on field service.
Having worked for Gartner, Aberdeen and been a founding partner of The Service Council, his analysis is highly sought after and he has authored some of the most detailed research available in the industry. His white papers, blogs and posts are widely read across the globe.
Hilbrand Rustema, Managing Director, Noventum Service Management
Co-author of seminal service book, “Service Economics” and managing director of one of Europe’s most prominent Service Management consultancies, Noventum Service Management, Rustema has been at the heart of evolving service thinking across the continent for many years and remains at the forefront of the sector today.
Steve Street, IT Security & Infrastructure Architect, IBM
Steve Street, IT Security/Infrastructure Architect, IBM – In a long industrious career with computing giants IBM Steve has been an excellent servant to service science. He has worked with many of the key leaders and thinkers in this area including Professors Irene Ng, Scott Sampson and fellow Cambridge University Alumni Andy Neely on a wide range of initiatives to unite academia, government and industry in the development and promotion of service science as a discipline.
He remains a key figure in the evolution of the area and his work is shaping the way leading organisations are seeking to deliver services.
Martin Summerhayes, Head of Strategy and Business Development, Fujitsu
One of a few on the list that started their a career as a service engineer, Summerhayes’ career has been quite remarkable.
He was the man who devised HP’s service strategy which became a billion dollar proposition, he has advised London’s Metropolitan police force working with local and national government, paramilitary and commercial companies, before taking on his current role as Head of Strategy for Fujitsu. And he still finds time to take a proactive role in promoting service excellence in the UK nonprofit group, The Service Community.
Follow Martin @martinsummerhay
Special Mention - Steve Downton, Downton Consulting
Whilst Downton sadly passed away in 2013 his long-standing legacy remains both in the approach he developed to service as outlined in the book, ”Service Economics”, which he co-authored with Hilbrand Rustema and Jan Van Veen, as well as in the non-profit organisation he created, ”The Service Community”, which continues to operate as a significant organisation dedicated to sharing best practices amongst service companies operating the UK.
Steve’s impact on the field service industries will be long felt.
See the rest of the list here: Part One, Part Two, Part Three
Field Service News is published by 1927 Media Ltd, an independent publisher whose sole focus is on the field service sector. As such our entire resources are focused on helping drive the field service sector forwards and aiming to best serve our industry through honest, incisive and innovative media coverage of the global field service sector.
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