Field Service News: Issue 5 - Power to the People by Field Service News

FIELD SERVICE NEWS Issue #5

fieldservicenews.com

March/April 2015

Power to

The skyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the limit when you run Solarvista. Our integrated suite of applications are designed to ensure your service business has no limits. For over 25 years, our solutions have helped keep our customers at the leading edge. Hereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s just a few reasons why... Our mobile apps work offline*. We built in automated scheduling tools. We developed our own system integration technology to connect to any system. Our new extensibility architecture means we can add custom features in days, without risk. And now we have a new line of apps for modern touch-based devices that embrace the cloud too. In short, it delivers the rich functionality that works with you, now and in the future. Visit solarvista.com, email us at sales@solarvista.com or call our sales team now at +44(0)114 221 1000 for more information. * some features require connection by their nature

The standard in service management software.

solarvista.com

@solarvista

solarvista-software

\solarvista

+Solarvista

Editors Leader

fieldservicenews.com

Power to the people Whilst it is of course quite natural for those of us working in field service us to focus on technology, it is revolutionising the way we work seemingly more and more every year, every now and then we need to take stock and assess the most valuable element in field service - the people. Because that’s what it’s all about ultimately surely? We talk about empowering our field engineers, we talk up the importance of our engineers as the frontline of customer service - increasingly the only human touch-point our customers may have with our brand.

Kris Oldland. Editor

For all the good that remote connectivity, the Internet of Things and machine to machine diagnostics brings. For all the efficiency savings, all the increased productivity, we will still need that human interaction if we cant to engender any form of customer loyalty, if we want to capture and retain those ever more slippery recurring revenues.

And as I looked across this issue almost everywhere I looked I could see a strong ‘people’ angle to almost all of our features. In the News section for example there is what to my mind is one of the best stories to have hit our desk here at FSN Towers since we launched. That is the story of how Keynote are working with food charity Planet Zheroes help fight Food Poverty in the UK. Not only is it a great example of how their system can be put to use, but it’s also a story of triumph on a human level. Through the use of technology Keytree and Planet Zheroes are able to stop wastage from some of the country’s leading food organisations and make sure that there are less hungry mouths out there on the British Streets. My heartfelt thanks and respect goes out to both companies. Also in the News section is our new comic strip Field Service Funnies and whilst I’m dishing out thank Thank You’s I should also tip my hat to the good folks at ServiceMax for sharing the cartoons with us. They were actually the result of a competition towards the end of last year where genuine field engineer stories were converted into cartoons. Once again all about the people , but I have a feeling that as in this first example the cartoons may be quite focussed on the sometimes quite astounding stupidity that occurs amongst the general public (trust me I’m probably one of the worst offenders) but I’m really looking forward to seeing more in this series. And as the theme of people continues we have coverage of the first two big events of the year so far. Firstly there was the Enterprise Mobile Technology Conference hosted by Panasonic. You can read our write up on page 32 and the event was a really fantastic start to the event calender but what truly impressed me the most was that despite being a very, very big company, the Panasonic team were both accessible and genuinely interested in their clients thoughts and needs. Special mention should go to John Harris, General Manager Engineering for a fantastic session that could have veered dangerously close to being a sales pitch in the wrong hands but instead was an extremely valuable, and highly open discussion. The other event I refer to is of course Field Service Medical Europe which was held in sunny Dublin just a few weeks ago. As you would expect from the team that host Field Service Europe the three day event was highly enjoyable and packed with excellent content. However, perhaps because of the more niche focus of this event compared to it’s older cousin, there were a few less in attendance but that simply resulted in each session moving more towards an open forum as the barriers of inhibitions were removed due to the more intimate nature of the group. However, there was one session that really opened up a lot of debate. That was the session led by Abbott Diagnostic’s Stephen Hodson as he introduced the very bold approach they have taken to creating a sales/service hybrid. You can read more about it on page 46 but it is a conversation that continued long after the session with many people in admiration at the innovative approach Hodson and his team have taken, whilst for others, taking advantage of the trusted advisor position of the field engineer in such an overt manner was just one step too far. Interestingly Hodson’s presentation came hot off the heels of an online discussion we held in our own LInkedIn group on exactly the same topic. So for further input on whether we should be turning our Field Engineers into Salesman then look no further than page 38. Finally we’re really pleased to bring you the results of our latest research project which we have run in partnership with Advanced Field Service. This time around the focus of our research has been on the types of mobility tools being used by Field Service Engineers in 2015. The research project itself is perhaps one of the broadest topics we tackled as we look at the types of device (i.e. laptop/tablet/smartphone etc), the grade of device (rugged vs. consumer) the operating systems, what we as field service professionals expect from apps, how often we think we should refresh our FSM solutions vs. how often we actually do it, we even explore who is involved in selecting the solutions and look at whether it is a good idea to involve our field service engineers in the selection process. For me though the most interesting statistics are around our engineer’s satisfaction with their devices. In brief digital is definitely here... So say the people p3

fieldservicenews.com

Contents

Contents:

News:

Creating, building, developing, nurturing... News round up. New initiative brings together industry experts to establish best practice in fleet data strategy Xplore Technologies Introduces xCapture Pro for Bobcat and XC6 Rugged Tablets Keytree helps charity fight food surplus with interactive web tool Field Service Funnies

pages 6 & 7 page 8 page 8 page 10 page 10

Features: Stopping that morning field service schedule blow up... The IoT Opportunity The new rules of cyber security Technology and Technicians in Field Service Making happy customers even happier – It’s easy, if you follow the guidelines! Hands On: Motion f5m Good implementation, starts with excellent planning... Research: Mobility tools in field service 2015 Want to bring bold ideas to reality: Try ‘ecosystem thinking’ The personal touch... Welcome to the new age... The big debate: Should we be turning our engineers into salemen? Getting smart... Latest resources Enter the ambassadors Seeds of success... Social: a Field Service Connector, Not Distraction

page 9 page 11 page 12 & 13 page 14 page 16 pages 18 to 20 page 22 pages 23 to 29 page 30 pages 32 to 35 page 36 pages 38 to 40 pages 42 to 45 page 46 page 47 Pages 48 and 49 page 50 Industry leaders, Kyle Samani, PristineIO

fieldservicenews.com

Research: Mobility tools in field service 2015

Hands On: Motion f5m As part of a new series that takes a detailed look at some of the hardware on offer for field service engineers Kris Oldland get’s his hand’s on Motion Computing’s F5m rugged tablet

he debate around which devices are best suited to a field service engineer is a long, complex and ever changing one. Arguments can be made for rugged devices or for consumer devices.

the 5th Gen Intel® Core™ processors, including the highest performing Intel® i7 vPro™ processor, provides the power to quickly move through computation-intensive applications, while increasing overall power efficiency.

Equally arguments can be made the various different form factors that are on offer. Is a tablet, smart phone or a laptop best suited to your aiding your engineers work-flow? Then there is the growing trends of convertibles (part laptop, part tablet) to consider or even the next evolution of this idea the detachable.

The tablet also comes with options for ultrafast 4G XLTE mobile broadband connectivity that should make light work of sharing large files and images easy. Also with the promise of over eight hours of battery life and a hot-swap battery feature, the F5m should be able to last throughout your field engineers shift with ease.

Of course there is no hard and fast rule here, each case is different and different devices are suited to different companies. However, in what

First impressions... The first thing that strikes you when viewing the F5m is that this is very much a tablet designed for

of the handle a considerably useful functional addition, making the use of these features far more accessible than the more traditional tablet

is becoming an increasingly competitive market it is important to understand the strengths of both differing form factors and also of different

industry.

form factor.

“With it’s built in handle

Also the handle doesn’t actual add too much

manufacturers and devices.

moulded into the actual

To help you navigate your way to finding the device that is right for your field workers, field

design of the casing

service news is launching a news series that will give you a closer look at some of the options available to you as we see just how the devices

Motion do not shy away

stand up to the manufacturers claims. In the first instalment of this we take a look at the Motion F5m rugged tablet.

from this devices intended market...”

weight to the tablet. Weighing in at 3.3 lbs the Motion device comes in just a shade lighter than Getac’s 10.1 inch rugged tablet the E110 which is 3.5lbs although it is some way off the 2.2 lbs of either Panasonic’s Toughpad FZ-G1 or Xplore’s Ranger X both of which offer similar screen real estate despite their slimmer physique.

Processing power Where the F5m is truly impressive though is the processing power it has under the bonnet.

With it’s built in handle moulded into the actual design of the casing Motion do not shy away from this devices intended market and it’s heritage

The highly configurable device has three options when it comes to processors all of which involve

having evolved from it’s cousin the C5 (which was aimed exclusively at the medical sector.)

the fifth generation of Intel Core processors with options for the I3, I5 or I7 available.

With other rugged manufacturers such as

The review unit we tested had an I5 processor

vehicle, to the field – all while staying connected and secure.”

Panasonic and Getac and even other offerings from Motion such as the R12 moving towards a more consumerised appearance to rugged

with 2.2 GHz 5200U plus a Turbo Boost to 2.7 GHz (3MB of L3 cache, 2 Cores/4 Threads) and

Motion has also given the F5m series a significant upgrade on it’s predecessors that delivers high-

tablets, this does give the F5m a slightly dated look, but lets be honest, when it comes to selecting a device for our field engineers a

tablet ran the Microsoft 8.1 operating system plus a number of commonly used programs without any significant issues at all.

end, lasting processing power. The addition of

alongside the base configuration of 4GB the

p18 Issue5.indd 18

07/04/2015 12:55

Hands On: Motion F5m - 18

Issue5.indd 23

04/04/2015 20:18

Research - page 23

Issue5.indd 43

07/04/2015 12:56

Getting Smart - Page 42

Advisory Panel

Bill Pollock, President Strategies for Growth SM, | Nick Frank, Consultant, Noventum Service Management | P r o f . A n d y N e e l y, D i r e c t o r C a m b r i d g e S e r v i c e A l l i a n c e | A l i sta i r C l i f fo rd - J o n e s , C EO L e a d e n t S o l t u i o n s T i m J o n e s , N o r t h e r n E u ro p e S e r v i c e M a n a g e r, Wa te rs

Contact Field Service News:

Field Service News is a 1927 Media Ltd publication. Some expert views are placed on a paid for basis Mail: 9 5 H i cks Ave nue | G reenford | Lon d on | U B6 8HB | Ph o n e: + 4 4 ( 0 ) 2 0 8 1 3 3 1 9 2 7 p4

ltd

S a l e s @ f i e l d s e r v i c e n e w s . c o m | Ed i t o r i a l @ f i e l d s e r v i c e n e w s . c o m | S u b s c r i p t i o n s @ f i e l d s e r v i c e n e w s . c o m

1927 Media

FIELD SERVICE

REMOTE WORKER

ASSISTED SCHEDULER

CRM

DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT

PROUD OF OUR PAST, PASSIONATE ABOUT YOUR FUTURE. Exel Computer Systems plc are proud to be celebrating 30 years as a UK software author. Since 1985 our innovative and scalable business solutions have enabled our clients to adapt, diversify, and grow. Eagle Field Service is a complete service and mobile management solution providing real-time information and resources to field based engineers delivered direct to their mobile or touchscreen device. To find out more about our fully integrated Eagle Field Service solution or to discuss how Exel can help your business, call us now on 0115 946 0101 or email sales@exel.co.uk

www.exel.uk

Business as usual, only smarter.

EXEL COMPUTER SYSTEMS

fieldservicenews.com

Creating, building, developing, nurturing... A round up of the biggest stories in field service across the last two months... Red Hat outlines vision to help enterprise IT take ‘Mobile First’ from hype to reality

service operation.

Red Hat a leading provider of open source solutions, today announced its vision to help organisations succeed in the mobile-first economy. Customers can take advantage of Red Hat’s experience and leadership in enterprise IT, and its portfolio of enterprise-grade open source technologies – including mobile capabilities from the recent acquisition of FeedHenry – to overcome their mobility challenges.

“Empowering workers in the field with the collaborative tools and immediate information they need to manage their day effectively is a necessity when delivering service out in the field,” said John Cameron, general manager of Trimble Field Service Management.

Mobility is increasingly becoming a top priority for business as a means to drive innovation and streamline operational efficiency; however, it is also creating demand for faster and continuous development cycles that challenge traditional IT infrastructure and development methodologies. To become mobile-centric, enterprises must evolve in a way that supports both the agility of new mobile initiatives and stability of core IT. In response, Red Hat is focusing its enterprise mobility vision on four areas: platform architecture, developer experience, technology integration, and collaboration in two-track IT environments. More @ http://bit.ly/FSN_RedHat

Trimble Announces New Field Service Management Features to Improve Mobile Workforce Productivity Trimble has recently announced that it has added new features to its Field Service Management (FSM) solutions to significantly improve workflow visibility and streamline operations for businesses and their mobile workers in the field. New features have been added to Trimble’s Work Management solution, an intelligent scheduling engine and FieldMaster Technician, a downloadable mobile app that enables workers to access and update information in real-time. These solutions work together to enable real-time information sharing between mobile workers and the back office and are part of Trimble Horizon, a new dynamic platform for Trimble’s FSM solutions and service. Cloud-based and modular, Trimble Horizon enables organisations to drive an agile, dynamic field p6

More @ http://bit.ly/FSN_TRWP

Delivered as a user-friendly cloud-based tool, Intellinote for Field Service Management lets users capture, document and collaborate around service requests and other fieldwork using iPads, iPhones and desktops. Built for the field & the office, Intellinote for Field Service Management is easy to deploy and no IT is required. The solution provides customers with the ability to:

Security specialist upholds outstanding customer service with Fleetmatics...

•

Security integration specialist Scottish Communications Group (SCG) has cut thousands of pounds from its annual fuel bill following the introduction of Fleetmatics’ fleet and vehicle tracking technology. The firm, a leading supplier of integrated security systems including CCTV, access control and digital radio communications, installed the Fleetmatics system and has reaped the rewards of reduced overheads and improved customer service over the past three years.

•

Scottish Communications Group was seeking realtime insight into the movements of its 10 fieldbased engineers, who serve commercial customers throughout Scotland and as far afield as the South East of England.

“The old way of managing field work required a chain of events that wasted time and money as each service request, work order or job went through many manual and often error-prone touch points,” explained Intellinote CEO, Tony Lopresti.

Liam Mowat, technical director of Scottish Communications Group, said: “We primarily decided to use a tracking solution so we could identify and assign support call-outs to the nearest available engineer, due to the fact that we cover such a large geographic customer base. Response times are very important in upholding the level of service that our customers expect, and the system has enabled our service desk to respond even more quickly and efficiently.”

More @ http://bit.ly/FSN_Int

More @ http://bit.ly/FSN_sec

Enterprise collaboration tool intellinote announces field service management solution Enterprise collaboration tool Intellinote recently announced its new Field Service Management Solution, developed to help field service companies lower costs, increase revenues and provide a significantly enhanced customer experience.

•

Document fieldwork with fillable PDF forms, notes, pictures and geo-tagging. Share, in real-time, details of completed fieldwork with key stakeholders including customers, supervisors and accounting departments. Provide field workers with real-time access to Policies, Service Catalogs, Form Libraries and Training/Reference Materials Integrate with Billing Systems, Work Order Databases and other in-house developed/3rd party applications Work in both offline and online modes

Smith Construction Group cuts idling and reduces fuel bill with Masternaut telematics system Smith Construction Group, a civil engineering and groundwork provider, has cut its yearly fuel bill by 15% after implementing a telematics system from Masternaut, one of Europe’s leading telematics provider. The Group, which includes the skip hire arm Smith Recycling, has implemented telematics into its 60 strong fleet of heavy duty commercial vehicles, including tippers and skip lorries.

News Round Up

The Group, which includes the skip hire arm Smith Recycling, has implemented telematics into its 60 strong fleet of heavy duty commercial vehicles, including tippers and skip lorries. Masternaut’s technology has provided Smith Construction Group with detailed reports on every job done by a vehicle, detailing MPG readings, carbon emissions and idling.

The advice comes from national automotive parts reconditioning specialist DPF Clean Team, which is advising drivers to have a filter cleaned rather than replaced when clogged, in order to return drivers to the road quickly, and at a lower cost than a full replacement.

This information has helped to reduce vehicle idling by 87%, whilst overall the technology has saved Smith Construction Group an estimated 15% off of its yearly fuel bill.

DPF Clean Team Director Cameron Bryce explained: “At a time when logistics companies are updating their fleets with the latest Euro-6 trucks in order to benefit from reduced emissions, sustainability, and lower fuel costs, they need to make sure that they are making the most of this investment.

Reducing carbon emissions and fuel is helping Smith Construction Group reduce its impact on the environment, in line with its sustainability ethos.

For field service engineers too, having a van or small unit on the road whenever possible is the difference between completing, and passing up work, and money.

The technology has been used on a number of occasions in insurance claims from third parties, to prove that the vehicle in question was nowhere near the area for the alleged incidents.

“The cost benefits and efficiencies that these vehicles deliver can be wasted if operators need to take vehicles off the road for days to purchase and fit a replacement DPF, in the event of them becoming blocked.

The tracking technology has been beneficial in keeping customers up to date about when a vehicle will arrive, as well as providing Smith Construction Group with proof if a customer claims a driver hasn’t arrived.

With an industry-wide driver shortage, every day a driver is not in a cab means lost capacity, unhappy customers, and lost business.”

to influence driver behaviour and reduce fleet operating costs. Kwik Fit fleet operations director Simon Lucas said: “We have witnessed a dramatic reduction in speeding, harsh braking and acceleration by technicians who have improved their driving style as a consequence of being monitored. More than 100 fleets are now “accredited operators” to Van Excellence and Mr Lucas said: “It demonstrates clearly Kwik Fit’s commitment to duty of care and corporate responsibility and highlights that our fleet of Mobile vans is professionally managed.” More @ http://bit.ly/FSN_KWK

BDA becomes Regulated Agent for cargo screening Specialist time critical logistics provider Bespoke Distribution Aviation (BDA) has become a Regulated Agent for the screening of cargo, following a significant investment in new screening technology. The company has announced that its BDA NightExpress division has passed the stringent Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) Security Audit and is now able to process air cargo to meet all aviation security regulations.

More @ http://bit.ly/FSN_DPF The technology has helped to improve vehicle utilisation by cutting down on wasted journeys (e.g. customers not on site to take delivery), through introducing a wasted journey charge backed up by telematics data. More @ http://bit.ly/ FSN_SMT

DPF maintenance key to keeping Britain in the field Logistics companies and field service engineers are being urged to pay special attention to diesel particulate filters (DPFs) on their vehicles, as the cost of having a unit off the road at the height of a nationwide skills shortage could be detrimental.

Telematics deliver benefits to KwikFit mobile as it secures van excellence accreditation Kwik Fit has achieved accreditation to the Freight Transport Association’s Van Excellence scheme after introducing a series of safe driving initiatives capped by the installation of telematics devices in its entire 200-strong fleet of mobile vans. Following telematics implementation in the fleet six months ago, Kwik Fit has recorded an 8% saving on fuel bills as a result of technicians adopting a smoother and safer style of driving when at the wheel of the Mobile units Additionally, average fuel economy across the Mobile fleet has increased from 22mpg to 25mpg – a 13% improvement partly as a result of safer driving, but also due a reduction in vehicle idling, which is also monitored. The saving builds on improvements made in the preceding two years when economy increased from 17mpg to 22mpg after Kwik Fit started to publish fuel consumption data on a vanby-van basis following introduction of ‘track and trace’ vehicle technology. Introduction of the Telogis telematics technology has initially focused on using data recorded by the in-vehicle systems

From its Coventry hub in the UK, BDA NightExpress is already screening its own outbound freight to its Ireland hub, as well as scanning inbound and outbound freight to its hubs in Frankfurt and Maastricht. The move is part of a wider growth strategy for BDA which last year saw the company negotiate deals with such brands as Suzuki, Arvato STOK, GE Healthcare and Neways. The ability to screen outbound freight for Ireland, Netherlands and Germany is a particular boost considering recent growth in the Irish logistics market. As Irish consumers embrace ecommerce, spending €3.8m online every minute last year, the country currently offers strong potential for BDA in the etail, agricultural, medical and automotive markets that it serves. Regulated Agent status has followed a six-figure investment by BDA in a cutting edge Rapiscan 632DV system for pallet and air cargo screening, which enables the company to perform its own dual-view X-ray screening of inbound and outbound cargo. More @ http://bit.ly/FSN_CITY

fieldservicenews.com

News: Top Stories

New initiative brings together industry experts to establish best practice in fleet data strategy Industry leaders work together to establish a future path for the evolution of fleet management

new industry body is aiming to improve standards across British business fleets by establishing best practice in the use of fleet data. Fleet Data Insight brings together thought leaders from across the fleet industry, including both operators and suppliers, to share practical advice about using data to achieve operational excellence in fleet performance.

The first forum meeting focused on using data to manage risk and brought together fleet professionals from a number of prominent organisations, including Skanska, Sainsbury’s, Iron Mountain, Fife Council, BT Fleet, Waitrose. A vast amount of data is now available to fleet managers, so it is essential they are provided with the right guidance and advice to enable them to get the most out of it,”

Founded by TomTom Telematics, alongside partners Zurich, the FTA and the Energy Saving Trust, Fleet Data Insight will meet twice a year, using the collective knowledge and experience of its participants to create a series of free best practice advice guides.

“The core ethos of Fleet Data Insight is to co-create value and best practice for the industry, by the industry and to promote excellence in data-driven fleet management” said Peter Button, Chairman, Fleet Data Insight.

Each forum will be independently led by Real World Strategy and the guides will aim to provide practical information in a multimedia format. The community will also be invited to continue the discussion online via Twitter and the Fleet Data Insight LinkedIn discussion group.

“A vast amount of data is now available to fleet managers, so it is essential they are provided with the right guidance and advice to enable them to get the most out of it,” said Irvin Gray, Senior Marketing Manager, TomTom Telematics (founding partner). “We are confident that with the gold

mine of experience and best practice our partners and contributors bring, we can give fleet operators the tools they need to become more efficient, safe and profitable.” “Identifying the right data and using it properly is essential in today’s fleet. The Fleet Data Insight group addresses this need in a new way – co-creating valuable best practice and sharing this with the industry through developing a community.” Operators are invited to join the conversation in the Fleet Data Insight LinkedIn discussion group. More information can be found atwww. fleetdatainsight.com where you can apply to join the next event, join the community and download the best practice guide. The forum’s first free guide on managing fleet risk together with some best practice videos from the forum are available now.

Xplore Technologies Introduces xCapture Pro for Bobcat and XC6 Rugged Tablets Rugged manufacturer introduces additional camera software functionality to increase features available in their two leading lines...

plore Technologies a manufacturer of the most powerful, longest-lasting, ultra and fully-rugged tablets, recently announced Xplore xCapture Pro camera software for its Bobcat and XC6 Windows-based tablet PCs. The new camera software provides end users with photo editing, geo tagging and enhanced barcode scanning functionality. The addition of xCapture Pro as an integrated tool for the Bobcat and XC6 reduces the need for additional devices in the field and offers

functionality to enhance the productivity of mobile workforces. “We continue to listen to our customers and deliver the features and capabilities they’re looking for. Customers in vertical markets such as utilities, field service and insurance can take advantage of these enhanced features to improve productivity in the field,” said Mark Holleran, president and COO at Xplore Technologies. “Our new xCapture Pro camera software is another example of the innovative engineering and design

that Xplore is bringing to its robust line of ultra and fully-rugged tablet PCs.” Xplore xCapture Pro is an ideal enterprise solution for field service calls, asset management, inventory management or occasional scanning of barcodes. The software is also beneficial for users who may need to know the time and location for when and where a photo was taken, such as a field service technician or insurance adjustor who wants to document an event or condition. They can also use the software to simply edit a photo or make notes on the image.

fieldservicenews.com

Expert View: Tom Bowe, IFS

Stopping that morning field service schedule blow up... We’ve all had those days when things have gone from bad to worse to spectacularly disatrous before we’ve even had a chance to have our first cup of coffee but it needn’t that way writes IFS’ Tom Bowe... You know what I mean.

It’s 8 a.m. Two field techs have called in sick, three started late and four more are in training, your dispatchers are already biting their nails, and the schedule is looking more like scrambled eggs and less like the beautifully organised chart that 30 minutes ago was going to hit 100% of your SLAs. Perhaps you have a legacy system that just can’t keep up with demand.

all the dimensions and constraints of your service operations and evaluate them in real-time to make sure you are making the best decision to achieve target service levels. In other words achieving a level of customer satisfaction where customers return for additional product and service purchases, while you deliver that service at the highest profit and lowest cost possible.

Perhaps you use a ‘temporary’ Band-Aid application, or a hodge-podge of Excel and other manual systems. Whatever your predicament, there is a better way.

So what kinds of dimensions and constraints are we referring to?

You’ve heard it before - the right technician, at the right place and right time, with the right tools. Right? This marketing buzz only means so much. What does an optimised schedule truly mean for your business?

“This marketing buzz only means so much. What does an optimised schedule truly mean for your business?”

For one, it means the situation I described above can be addressed without daily fire-fighting and crisis management. A schedule that continually and automatically re-optimises in real-time based on changes (expected and unexpected) that happen throughout the day, eliminates human error, frazzled dispatchers, missed SLA’s and so much more.

The dimensions of field service scheduling usually include geography, capacity, traffic, work to be performed, rules about the work to be performed, parts, people and time. These constraints, and many more, each have an impact on your operating margin.

Let’s take a deeper look.

Capacity is the number of resources available to handle the workload. This can include employees, contractors or service partners and needs to address emergency jobs, appointments, installations, repairs and PM work. Capacity costs money so shift rosters are carefully planned to provide adequate coverage. But parts come into play because they need to match up with the assigned resource. And so does travel times, traffic and proficiency.

The end game is to deliver the best service possible balanced between lowest cost and highest profit. Pretty simple, right? No, actually that is kind of hard. There is a cost and usually a revenue side of every factor that drives your service business. If you had unlimited resources you could probably keep all your customers happy all the time, right? If you had engineers within a few minutes’ drive of all of your customers and they all had every part that could ever be used to service the equipment they repair, you could literally achieve the ultimate goal of 100% satisfaction because these techs would be there when equipment fails, and they would always have the right part. But that’s fantasyland, not to mention superexpensive. What you need is an intelligent system to consider

Let’s look at some examples.

The work itself is defined when the job is created. It could be an urgent job that requires immediate attention, or a lower priority PM service inserted into the schedule at the last possible moment given their proximity and availability. Maybe a technician arrived on site and could not get access to the equipment, or the repair took half the time expected.

capacity and dynamically adjust the schedule to increase productivity? Perhaps you can do one more job today or you can arrive 10 minutes early to the next one, but maybe there is a penalty clause. These are all factors in making the best decision. Rules usually define who can do a given job. Do they have the skills, certifications or even travel visas. Are they qualified, available and how much do they cost? Are they close enough, can they get the parts needed, or is someone else closer and equally qualified? All of these decisions are balanced against time. For instance, knowing where each resource is currently located, who is on time vs. running late, how far do they have to travel to their next job, and if that made sense at 8am in the morning, does the same set of circumstances apply at 9:05am? The same can be said about the value of each service call to your business. The customer’s happiness is not static. There is a time period within which your response is adequate and after that satisfaction dwindles or costs rise depending on the SLA. And 1 hour appointment windows are better than 2, 3 or 4 hours. Even better if you tell the customer the tech’s estimated time of arrival (ETA). Today, the best enterprise service management software solutions take all of these factors, and more, into consideration when providing an optimised end-to-end service delivery schedule. Optimised scheduling, as part of an intelligent mobile workforce management solution, means complete field visibility, on-time every time, anywhere. It means less human error and better efficiency. It gives you back the control you might think you’ve lost…so you can get that cup of coffee at 8:15am instead of having to manage another blow-up crisis.

Why not recognise that you now have additional p9

fieldservicenews.com

News: Top Stories

Keytree helps charity fight food surplus with interactive web tool Field service technology makes a significant impact in helping fight against UK food poverty...

nterprise technology expert, Keytree has developed an interactive tool for food charity Plan Zheroes, to help address food waste in the fight against UK food poverty. Launched today, Plan Zheroes’ new platform acts as a social network where relationships are built between food businesses and charities to ensure communication is quick and simple and food reaches those in need, safely and conveniently. When an organisation has surplus food to donate, they can now sign into a secure site, upload their information, and nearby charities will instantly receive a notification of the available food. Charities can then claim the food online, and a network of local volunteers and transporters can help transport the food where required. The platform is designed in a highly scalable way to grow with the charity. It offers a complex mapping feature and hosts communities within a website to help build relationships between food businesses, charities, local community groups and volunteers to speed up the process of regular food giving. “The platform is fully responsive from desktop

Field Service Funnies... Sometimes it’s not just the challenge of getting to the right job, at the right time with the right parts that make life hard being a field service engineer. There’s the added challenge of having to deal with the general population as well which can make pretty much make any job infinetely harder! Our new series of cartoons which we are running in partnership with ServiceMax are based on reallife field service engineer stories - we hope you enjoy them - there were certainly a few laughs in the office here when they came in! sponsored by:

p10

down to smartphone, with all functionality available across devices.

transporters into the map and transforming the new platform into a social network.”

We decided to create a responsive web solution to keep ongoing costs for the charity down so maintenance is done across a single platform rather than a website,” said Ian Jones, Principal Consultant, Keytree.

“The launch of our new platform is the important next step on our journey to fight food poverty and the devastating effect it is having on people in the UK. It allows a better connection between local networks of businesses, charities, volunteers and transporters, making the process simpler, quicker and more intuitive.

“It also works on all devices through either an iOS or Android app. We are now considering working on a standalone app and the use of SMS functionality to enable those volunteers without smartphones to also take part in the process.” Whilst 13 million people are living in poverty in the UK, 650,000 tonnes of perfectly good food is thrown away by food businesses. Plan Zheroes seeks to address this by inspiring food businesses to give their surplus food to those who need it so it will never go to waste. Maria Ana Neves, Co-founder and CEO of Plan Zheroes said: “Keytree has included some unique and highly innovative functionality to address a very complicated collaboration structure. The user experience and user-centric design is ideal for those who will use the site. The team also unlocked valuable insights such as bringing volunteers and

With Keytree’s offer of pro bono help we can now further expand the network to support even more people in need of food.” Plan Zheroes currently works with a wide range of food businesses – including restaurants, catering companies, cafes, food shops, schools, supermarkets, hotels and food markets – all of which can now register on the Plan Zheroes website and forge links with charities and local community group. Plan Zheroes partners include: Borough Market, Paul UK, Le Pain Quotidien, Gail’s bakery, the Langham Hotel, catering company Squid & Pear and Budgens. Charity partners include Red Cross UK, Look Ahead, the Marylebone Project, New Horizon and The Abbey Centre

fieldservicenews.com

Expert View: Tim Faulkner, ClickSoftware

The IoT Opportunity The Internet of Things is going to change everything, especially field service, Tim Faulkner of ClickSoftware explains why...

uch has been made of the Internet of Things (IoT). For many years now the concept of a plethora of interconnected devices working together has been mooted. Devices communicating with one another to share information, pass content, allow for tasks to be completed -all creates a grand mesh of interlocking technology that allow for people to be connected anywhere and anytime. To do this, more devices will need to become “smart”. They will require a constant connection to the internet or to other devices in order to communicate. From traffic lights, to door locks, to home heating systems, everything will be connected to the internet and working in harmony with other smart devices. Take the traffic light as just one thing that will change in the IoT. It is regulating traffic while the information it observes is sent to the central command hub, which is then shared with the vehicle and driver half a mile down the road to urge them to change speed and ease congestion. Three disparate objects are working together thanks to the interconnectivity an IoT curates. Key to this will be improving connectivity so that no matter where you go, there is a connection to the internet. There is no point having an IoT car when as soon as you leave the city, all the functionality becomes redundant. Equally, the hardware needs to change. Each piece of equipment, product, and even building, needs to have connectivity built into it. We are already seeing items like tablets built specifically for businesses to support fieldworkers in any kind of environment andeffectively communicate with other mobile workers. But IoT technology will see that taken a step further. Hard hats, wristbands, tools – all will have sensors built-in to allow for interaction with other smart devices. Because of these initial hurdles, we are still some way off that point, but we are seeing early signs of enterprise adopting the approach and looking at where connected devices can work together to make tasks a little easier. With the launch of a range of new smartwatches, most notably the

Apple Watch, we now have devices that function far more effectively when connected to another device. Arguably, this is the first mainstream example of the IoT making its way into our everyday lives. Meanwhile, at the recent CeBIT event in France, the talk of the technology show was the impending influence a Connected Economy is going to have. Think of the Connected Economy as the opening foray into a full IoT concept, with devices that have some interconnectivity and some that are wearable too. Each device gains, shares, and passes information from one to another, all of which is then captured and controlled from a central hub.

“There is a huge opportunity for all businesses in the IoT space” For enterprise companies, the potential for this technology is significant. If you are running a big logistics project for example, much of the success or failure of the project hinges on human error. Workers are constantly checking in, updating stock, and ensuring the right rosters of skills and expertise are in place.

will see the most value. Data can be collected in the field, sent back, and then the appropriate task and resource assigned. That level of automation will reduce the administrative burden and, ultimately, improve the overall customer experience. Equally, IoT will see more preventative methods employed. Devices stationed in remote locations will be able to flag when maintenance is due, or when damage has been sustained. That data can then be shared and a team dispatched to handle the issue. As consumers, we will receive a package at home and the moment the smart box is opened, that will be the signal the job has been completed There is a huge opportunity for all businesses in the IoT space. Our growing dependence on smartphones suggests the concept of always being “on” is one that appeals to people. To get to that point however, we will need to see dramatic improvements in connectivity and an overhaul of how we produce items. Connectivity now needs to be at the heart of how products are designed to ensure this grand mesh of technology interacting together leaps from the pages of theory into the practice of reality.

An automated system which is instantly updated thanks to connected devices will go a long way to eliminating the risk of human error, and should allow people to get on with the job they have been asked to do, rather than the often timeconsuming administrative elements. Cisco has predicted that the Internet of Everything, their take on IoT, could be worth $14.4 trillion of value for enterprises globally ahead of 2022. The reason for this is because the concept opens up a whole new platform for businesses to operate in, from streamlining costs, to using cloud services to hosting data, to designing and implementing the new smart devices. It is streamlining of costs where businesses p11

fieldservicenews.com

The new rules of cyber-security

The new rules of cyber security The world is changing rapidly and yesterdays defences are no longer suitable for todays type of cyber attack...

s the Internet of Things, Big Data, and Cloud computing all become commonly heard phrases within Field Service we must start to consider the very real question of cyber-security with ever greater attention. But what does Cyber security look like in 2015? One of the significant themes that came through from the victims of high profile cyber attacks in the last year was that they all had heavy investment in IT security, regular testing programmes and almost certainly long lists of accreditations. However, even his was not enough to keep them safe from groups of attackers and the resultant losses and associated fines for such detected breaches. This year the cyber security landscape will once again continue to develop swiftly as attacks likely become even more frequent and sophisticated and from more corners of the world than ever before. The one thing that will remain the same however is that investing in the wrong defences will again result in an openness to cyber attack and the potential of real damage. Cyber threat actors are commonly split into three groups: nation states, cyber criminals and cyber activists or hacktivists. As 2015 evolves these threat factors look set to continue to advance their capabilities. Often nation states – who see cyber attacks as being a cheap, effective and most importantly plausibly deniable espionage tool – can be the dark hand behind theft of proprietary or sensitive data for the benefit of one of their home-grown enterprises. Cyber criminals, motivated by financial gain, have traditionally targeted a company’s customer base, stealing personal details or credit card information to use in fraud or to sell.

generating embarrassment.

An evolving landscape It is also predicted that many global political developments will also have their impact on shaping the cyber threat environment across 2015 and beyond. Countries that not too long ago would have been clumsy and naive when it comes to their cyber capabilities have now established sophisticated capabilities by nurturing their local home-grown hacktivist groups.

every asset against every possible threat. The key is to understand which threat actors are likely to be targeting your organisation, what are your key assets and then how do you protect those. Modern Cyber defence needs to be intelligenceled, risk-based and prioritised – it is no longer just a compliance exercise. There are five mistakes that organisations cannot afford to make during 2015: 1.

Meanwhile new hubs of cyber criminal activity will emerge and will set their focus on new targets. Driven by the disparity between the rich nations and the poor on an international level, plus the growing access of IT and as such rapidly developing IT skills of members of the latter. All of this is also becoming easier and being better facilitated by new ways of communicating, such as cyber criminals’ and activists’ use of the Dark Web to buy and sell hacking tools and techniques, using anonymous currency such as Bitcoin. Another trend that we will likely see continue on from 2014 is the gradual blurring of the lines of the roles and loyalties of these threat actors. Last year we had the emergence of criminals acting with a degree of impunity when targeting politically expedient victims, or hacktivist groups becoming involved in attacks in support of government agenda. As sophisticated tools and techniques become more widespread, and the distinctions between the threat actors become more blurred, the long-term outlook for cyber threats is concerning. The constraining factor previously was that the people with the intent to conduct widespread and high-impact cyber attacks – the activists and the criminals – did not have the capability. This may not remain the case for much longer.

5. Cyber activists, motivated by a range of factors – including most simply personal amusement, but also factors such as, anti-capitalist sentiment, environmental concerns, religion and nationalism – base their activities on disrupting operations or p12

How best to defend your organisation Very simply throwing more money at the problem is no longer a viable solution. With finite resources, it is just simply impossible to protect

Taking a broad sweep approach: You cannot fail to build your cyber defences around a granular understanding of threat. In 2015 all cyber-defence programs should be intelligence led. This includes collecting operational and strategic information that helps you understand the specific nature of the threat. It may also be necessary across your supply chain, as vulnerabilities in subcontractors or suppliers often affect a larger organisation (or vice-versa) – attackers will always focus on the weakest link. Spending too much time, effort and money on prevention and not enough on detection. Companies need to just accept that breaches will be inevitable in today’s world and spend time developing and testing response plans, moving form different types of attacks to highlight which plans are most important. Treating cyber security as an IT issue rather than a business risk. Many organisations accept that cyber security is a business risk, rather than an IT-specific issue – but not many act on this by integrating cyber security risk management with wider business risk management processes. Not identifying and protecting your most important assets. Companies need to focus their budgets on prioritising protection. Many tend to be excessively targeted on delivering company-wide compliance, yet don’t effectively protect their key assets. Final many companies simply do not have the technical defences to deal with sophisticated and persistent threats. Across 2015, an increasingly broad group of highly capable actors will target critical assets across a wide range of organisations.

fieldservicenews.com

Expert View: Marne Martin, ServicePower

Technology and Technicians in Field Service Technology is changing the face of field service and continues to do so. However, another significant challenge we face is the generational shift in our workforce writes ServicePower’s Marne Martin...

ield service organisations face increasing competition, declining margin and high customer expectations. But, they also are challenged by new technologies, such as social, mobile, cloud, analytics, IoT and M2M, and wearables. Each new technology has potential to revolutionize field service just as field mobility technology did several years ago. ServicePower is spending much time and effort in innovating our field service management software. We are working hard to be innovative and stay ahead of the latest technologies such that our customers have the best in class FSM solution today, but are also positioned to take advantage of new advances as they hit the market. We are completely mobilizing the field service call, enabling the field based tech to complete all on-site processes in one trip. We’re incorporating social collaboration to ensure that the tech has access to materials and expert assistance from the office to get the job finished. We’re partnering with one of the world’s leading research institutions, the University of Manchester, to further improve our scheduling algorithms. Our hard work has been recognised through winning the 2014 M2M Evolution for IOT Excellence Award, and being named as a Visionary by Gartner in its 2014 Magic Quadrant for Field Service Management. However, we cannot dismiss perhaps the most important element in the delivery of field based services: the field technician.

workforce. However, according to Aberdeen more than half of field service organizations wait until there is an opening to fill to recruit a new technician, rather than doing so pro-actively. While it’s important to find a great technician with the skills required to perform the services offered by the organisation, it’s just as important to also understand the needs and motivations of its young (averaging 32 years old), technically savvy recruits, and do so prior to needing to fill a position. To that end, it’s also important to identify what will ensure the highest retention rates with the new workforce.

Technology Adoption With the young, and we’re really talking about Millennials, which in 2015 are projected to surpass the Baby Boom generation as the largest living generation, comes adoption of more and more consumer oriented technologies. Aberdeen says that 62% of best-in-class field service organisations are incorporating some level of BYOD strategy. That’s happening because these young recruits are helping to speed the transition due to high adoption rates of mobile, connected technologies for personal use. As a matter of fact, in America, 2 of every 5 households only have wireless telephones. Technology is changing our personal and professional lives.

Service Evolution The newest generation of young, tech savvy and collaborative field service technicians grew up with computers and social networks, text, email and chat. It’s how they communicate.

How does the emerging workforce, which is young, technically savvy and collaborative, affect your ability to provide exceptional field service? Let’s look at the following important issues regarding the technicians in your workforce.

Recruitment One of the top challenges field service organizations face right now is the retiring p14

This isn’t a negative for field service. Adoption of these communication methods only improves customer service. As we field service management software vendors improve our ability to ensure the tech with the right skills and best knowledge of or proximity to the service location are intelligently scheduled, as with the ServicePower ServiceScheduling

product, field technicians armed and comfortable with the latest mobile technologies can tap into the social, mobile and cloud technologies, as well as utilize wearables, to diagnose an issue while on-site, access the documentation or videos and chat or video chat with experts in the office whom can help ensure that the product is fixed in one truck roll. For the customer, further downtime and inconvenience are eliminated. For the field service organisation, costs are minimized, customer satisfaction and brand loyalty are improved.

Strategy Field technicians are your face to the customer. They are often the only point of contact a customer has with your organization post sale. So, how do we find the best and brightest field technicians, and keep them? 1.

Pro-actively identify what your customers want. 2. The Boomers are retiring. Pro-actively identify how to attract Millennials to your organization. 3. Identify how to keep workers engaged with your field service operation. a. Train them effectively. b. Offer and support utilization new technologies such as wearables, which contribute to their success. c. Provide access to the tools, information and experts to make them heroes to your customers 4. Support social communications a. Document how and when to use it for company purposes. A 140 character Tweet can be a huge PR success or a nightmare for your operation 5. Encourage adoption of new technologies like route optimization, IoT and M2M and video. The business value of these tools empowers the field technician to create happy customers and make their own day a success!

CAN’T SEE THE LIGHT AT THE END OF THE FIELD SERVICE TUNNEL? IFS’S TRUE END-TO-END FIELD SERVICE MANAGEMENT SOLUTION PROVIDES A ROADMAP THROUGH THE FIELD SERVICE MAZE. IFS Field Service Management provides an agile and flexible service solution that automates and optimises your entire field service chain. Let IFS pave the way to a more successful field service operation.

FOR AGILE BUSINESS

www.IFSWORLD.com/uk

fieldservicenews.com

Expert View: Bill Pollock, Strategies for GrowthSM

Making happy customers even happier – It’s easy, if you follow the guidelines! Bill Pollock takes a look at how we can turn our happy customers into delighted customers...

he main difference between being able to make unhappy customers happy, and happy customers even happier, is the point of initiation. At least with unhappy customers, even if you do not know why they were unhappy before contacting them (or having them contact you), you can rest assured that you will get the chance to learn very quickly! Ironically, however, it may actually be a bit more difficult to make a happy customer even happier than it is to make an unhappy customer happy in the first place – and you certainly would not want to accidentally do something wrong that might make them unhappy instead. It’s all a matter of listening, understanding, responding effectively and working under the auspices of an intuitive set of guidelines that should largely come as second nature to the vast majority of the organisation’s customer contact personnel (including yourself).

expansion, downsizing or consolidation – make the appropriate recommendations for updating and/or modifying their existing service level agreements, or upgrading to newer or different models and technology. •

Keep track of the things you have done in the past to make them happy – do more of the same, and learn what other things or actions would also make them happy.

•

Customers love to feel they are getting something for nothing – any documentation or materials that you believe may help your customers to utilise their systems and equipment more efficiently, or provide them with additional product or service information, will generally be gladly accepted.

•

What we have seen from our research is that the best approach for making happy customers even happier is to focus on the following guidelines: •

p16

Make sure that you and your customer services team understand how the customer uses its systems and equipment as part of their ongoing business operations – make suggestions occasionally on how they can improve efficiency, save some money, go green or reduce waste, etc.

•

Take steps to better understand the difference between the customer’s wants and needs – provide them with targeted information and advice that they can use to concentrate more on what they “need”, rather than on what they think they “want”.

•

Understand the customer’s plans for future

•

Customers also love to hear what other users like themselves are doing with their equipment – so, without divulging any customer-proprietary information, occasionally provide your customers with examples of what some other companies are doing, again, to improve efficiency, save some money, or reduce waste, etc. Provide your customers with new product or service information before it is otherwise widely distributed or disseminated – customers always enjoy receiving information before it is distributed to the general public. Share your organisation’s thought leadership collateral with your customers – most customers especially like to be made aware of White Papers or Case Studies that help them to understand the enhanced value propositions of the equipment and services they are using, or how their peers have benefited in ways they may not

have anticipated through the use of your products and services. •

Provide a more “personal” side of your communications with your customers in order to establish a closer, and less formal relationship – but, be careful not to get too “personal”; just close enough so they feel they can depend on you to act as their surrogate within the company whenever a problem becomes larger than what both you and they, can handle by yourselves.

•

Strive toward making your relationship with your customers a true “partnership”, rather than just merely a “vendor-customer” relationship – this is the true essence of Customer Relationship Management, or CRM.

Of course, all of these guidelines are merely just words written in a magazine article; the true test can only be exercised by you and your customer and technical support teams on behalf of the customer. In any case, you should always feel comfortable in relying on your own instincts in order to initially assess the situation, determine the appropriate course of action, and override any of these (or any other) guidelines on the basis of your accumulated expertise and experience. If you are truly going to succeed in establishing – and maintaining – a strong relationship with your customers, then you must first have both the capability and the confidence to use your own judgment in taking the specific actions that will make your happy customers even happier.

ClickSoftware provides visibility of your service operations enabling you to master the moment of customer engagement every time. We understand that your customers come first. Our mobile workforce management solutions enable you to deliver a superior customer experience by: ■ Providing clear visibility of your field workers and contractors ■ Improving field efficiency and productivity ■ Reducing operating costs From small businesses to large enterprises, 700,000 field resources around the world are managed by ClickSoftware each day.

For more information visit www.clicksoftware.com

Available in the Cloud Follow ClickSoftware in the Cloud

www.clicksoftware.com

fieldservicenews.com

he debate around which devices are best suited to a field service engineer is a long, complex and ever changing one. Arguments can be made for rugged devices or for consumer devices.

Of course there is no hard and fast rule here, each case is different and different devices are suited to different companies. However, in what is becoming an increasingly competitive market it is important to understand the strengths of both differing form factors and also of different manufacturers and devices.

First impressions...

To help you navigate your way to finding the device that is right for your field workers, field service news is launching a news series that will give you a closer look at some of the options available to you as we see just how the devices stand up to the manufacturers claims. In the first instalment of this we take a look at the Motion F5m rugged tablet.

What the manufacturers say... Motion describe the F5m as being “built for demanding environments that require robust enterprise software compatibility” and claim the tablet offers “the durability and functionality you need to seamlessly go from the office, to the vehicle, to the field – all while staying connected and secure.” Motion has also given the F5m series a significant upgrade on it’s predecessors that delivers highend, lasting processing power. The addition of p18

The first thing that strikes you when viewing the F5m is that this is very much a tablet designed for industry.

“With it’s built in handle moulded into the actual design of the casing Motion do not shy away from this devices intended market...”

modern aesthetic should be quite low down on the list of desirables. And actually whilst it might seem a touch ungainly , even cumbersome at first, in reality within a very short time of carrying the tablet around the practicality of the handle soon becomes apparent and a much welcome additional feature and one which would certainly be appreciated by many an engineer using the device. In particular the placement of buttons just to the side of the handle that act as trigger for the optional barcode scanner makes the inclusion of the handle a considerably useful functional addition, making the use of these features far more accessible than the more traditional tablet form factor. Also the handle doesn’t actual add too much weight to the tablet. Weighing in at 3.3 lbs the Motion device comes in just a shade lighter than Getac’s 10.1 inch rugged tablet the E110 which is 3.5lbs although it is some way off the 2.2 lbs of either Panasonic’s Toughpad FZ-G1 or Xplore’s Ranger X both of which offer similar screen real estate despite their slimmer physique.

Processing power Where the F5m is truly impressive though is the processing power it has under the bonnet.

With it’s built in handle moulded into the actual design of the casing Motion do not shy away from this devices intended market and it’s heritage having evolved from it’s cousin the C5 (which was aimed exclusively at the medical sector.)

The highly configurable device has three options when it comes to processors all of which involve the fifth generation of Intel Core processors with options for the I3, I5 or I7 available.

With other rugged manufacturers such as Panasonic and Getac and even other offerings from Motion such as the R12 moving towards a more consumerised appearance to rugged tablets, this does give the F5m a slightly dated look, but lets be honest, when it comes to selecting a device for our field engineers a

The review unit we tested had an I5 processor with 2.2 GHz 5200U plus a Turbo Boost to 2.7 GHz (3MB of L3 cache, 2 Cores/4 Threads) and alongside the base configuration of 4GB the tablet ran the Microsoft 8.1 operating system plus a number of commonly used programs without any significant issues at all.

Operating system For the operating system the tablet comes with an option of the 64 Bit Professional version of either Windows 7 or Windows 8.1. Given Motion’s intent for the tablet to be moved seamlessly from office to vehicle to field there on the surface seems to be a sensible choice and given the meaty processing power the F5m has it sits much more comfortably in the category of laptop replacement than many other tablets are capable of. However, whilst improvements between Windows 8 to Windows 8.1 have improved the interface there are still plenty of critics of the Microsoft OS. In their desire to meet the demands of both the PC and Tablet market Microsoft many believe they have not quite mastered either. The regular need to move from the mobile oriented tile interface to the more traditional desktop format is one issue often sited as being a particular frustration of the user experience, and the simplicity and fluidity of other leading tablet operating systems Android or IoS appears to be somewhat lacking. However, I use the phrase ‘appears to be’ carefully there because in fact if you take the time to learn some of it’s tips and tricks, Windows 8.1 can actually be a very effective and usable interface indeed. That said perhaps the one of the most effective tricks of Windows 8.1, especially for business users, seems to be missing from the help files. That is a function called Snap which provides the option to split screens a la Windows 7 (perhaps why it’s not included in the help files?). Although with the touch-screen interface it’s not obvious unless you know it’s there. For those Windows 8.1 users who aren’t aware of this feature you need to keep your finger on the screen when dragging an app in and then hold the app and hover either slightly to the left or right of the screen until a black line appears in the centre and the second app will then ‘snap’ into place. The ability to have two separate apps accessible without having to swap between them is certainly very useful when working with a limited amount of screen real estate and in a field working environment could significantly improve productivity. The fact this feature is hidden away perhaps sums up Windows 8.1 as a whole. On first glance it may not be the most intuitive

of operating systems, particularly in the tablet sector, however if you spend a little time learning it’s secrets, it has a lot of features that can massively enrich the user experience.

The pen is mightier than the on screen keyboard Of course one of the key benefits of having a Windows operating system is the ability to work with familiar applications, however for those applications that require anything more than light data input the lack of a dedicated companion keyboard for the F5mcan make life that much harder. Unlike sister devices the R12 or the CL920 Motion offer no companion keyboard for the F5m. This leaves the user with two out of the box options, either using the on screen keyboard or the included digital pen. As with almost all on screen keyboards text input can often be inaccurate and when entering a mix of words and texts it can be frustrating switching between the various input modes of the keyboard, so this isn’t really a great option for anything other than brief input and form completion. As for the pen, the handwriting recognition algorithm was able to make sense even of my spindly handwriting and would certainly be a better option than the on-screen keyboard. However, the requirement to hit the insert button after every few words can soon become a tiresome task and once again I would see writing a maintenance report of any length a frustrating experience. That’s not to dismiss the benefits of the pen itself which is a comfortable in hand and feels very much like a real pen, especially when compared to something like Samsung’s S-Pen which accompanies their consumer focussed Note series of tablets and smart phones. The pen also utilises the same technology Wacom technology as the afformentioned S-Pen allowing for far greater pressure detection than a standard stylus, something that could prove an important tool in mitigating issues around fraud detection should digital signatures be required. Where the pen could really be of use is when combined with the F5m’s camera powered by Motion’s own photography software Snapworks (which is designed to be optimised for annotation with the pen or touch) and has a very simple yet effective sharing mechanism. Such a tool can make a big difference when it comes to encouraging a collaborative nature amongst field engineers as well as improving an engineers efficiency when it comes to reporting. p19

fieldservicenews.com

Of course with the device having bluetooth capability and one USB port one could also theoretically use a 3rd party keyboard for longer reports (For some reason Motion list a keyboard as an accessory to their other tablets on their website but not for the F5m)

A picture is worth a thousand words… The primary camera on the tablet is a rear facing 8 mega pixel camera which is at the higher end of the spectrum when compared to the specifications of other rugged tablets and is more than capable of taking images clear enough for reporting purposes. There is also a second front facing camera which is 2 mega pixels which provides a good quality image for making internet calls – again aiding collaboration between workers. When we made a test Skype call both the picture quality and audio were of good quality. However, the test call was in a quiet location and the lack of a headphone jack could cause potential problems for making such a call in a louder environment.

A minimalist approach to I/O options... This leads us to one of the potential drawbacks of the F5m, the lack of input and outputs ports. With one solitary USB port (albeit a USB3 port for faster data transfer) you can’t help but think there could have been additional I/O options included and when placed alongside some competitor models it does seem a bit sparse, especially given Motion’s claim that the device is designed to move from office to vehicle to field – sure we may not need that many inputs when we are in the field but what about when we are in the office? An extra USB port could come in very handy, as could an external storage option such as a SD card reader or even a VGA or HDMI port should our engineer be required to give a presentation. In their defence Motion do offer a number of accessories including a dedicated office dock which offers much of this functionality as well as other options such as an Ethernet connector (again with a USB 2.0 port) a long range RFID reader and a magnetic stripe reader which all connect via the device’s docking connector, but you can’t help but feel that possibly some of these solutions could have been worked into the actual device itself without adding further to the tablets footprint through accessories. p20

Hands On: Motion F5m Rugged Tablet

Ready for the longest days... Of course one of the most important factors of a device to be used in the field is the reliability of the battery life and here we found the F5m to be excellent. The device was fully charged within just an hour and a half and comfortably lasted an eight hour day when we tested it with a reasonable amount of use (i.e. the same we would use a laptop for in a full working day away from the office). On top of this the tablet also boasts hot swappable batteries so should your field workers face extra long days they are able to extend the performance time without hassle.

School of hard knocks The F5m certainly feels and looks robust enough and having been independently certified as MIL-STD 801G it is capable of surviving a fair few bumps. In fact the drop test for meeting this standard requires the device survives no less than 26 separate drops at differing angles from a height of 4ft. This durability is largely due to three factors, the tablet is rubberised for shock dampening, features a magnesium-alloy internal frame and a durable Gorilla Glass screen which comes either with a standard screen or the option of upgrading to Motion’s proprietary technology the ViewAnywhere display, which is designed for working in bright light environments. The MIL-STD 801G certification also means the device is also capable of operating in temperatures ranging from -10°C to 55°C and storage temperatures from -51°C to 71°C which should cover most working scenarios! The other certification that the F5m boasts is IP54. The IP rating is defined by two separate criteria each identified by the two numbers. The first number denotes solid particle protection and in this instance the rating five (the second highest rating) means that the F5m is protected to a level where whilst the ingress of dust is not entirely prevented, dust must not enter in satisfactory operation of the device, i.e. the tablet is dust proof. The second number refers to the liquid ingress protection. In this instance the rating of four denotes that the device is resistant to water splashing against the enclosure from any direction so it will have no harmful effect. In effect this means that the device should be able to function in the rain for example but is not suitable for an environment where it could be

fully immersed in water.

The conclusion? In real life terms these certifications mean that the F5m is capable of dealing with all but the most extreme of environments. However, the lack of a dedicated companion keyboard and only one USB port as standard does limit the devices capability to be used in an office environment for tasks such as writing more detailed reports or giving presentations etc. If we go back to Motion’s claim of the F5m offering the ability to go seamlessly go from the office, to the vehicle, to the field then this is a just a touch disappointing as using the F5m as an office tool does seem somewhat reliant on purchasing the additional dock. However whilst the F5m may not be the perfect device for the office, it excels in the other two environments.

The device’s ruggedity brings powerful computing into almost any environment and when it comes to vehicles Motion also offer a very comprehensive range of in-vehicle docking solutions including dedicated vehicle mounting kits for a range of vehicles. Essentially the F5m is a tablet that is designed for the field and when we consider the type of work-flows it will generally be used in it is most certainly a good bit of kit for your field workers. The barcode scanner makes it a perfect rugged device for cataloguing and inventory tasks in a warehouse environment for example. Also the high quality camera, the Snapworks software and digital pen could make life easier for field engineers who are required to include photographic evidence. All in all the F5m is a robust and powerful device, perhaps not the most elegant tablet on the market, but the integrated handle does actually add a lot of practicality and the F5m is both an easy device to carry around and far less likely to suffer accidental drops because of it. The F5m is light enough to be highly portable, it’s durable enough to be put to task in challenging environments, has the computing power to be able to handle most programs expected to be run on it and a battery life that should keep engineers working through even the longest of days. If your engineers need a reliable device, with good processing power, to be mainly put to use out of the office environment, the F5m is definitely worth a closer look.

CMY

elevate your ﬁeld service with servicemax Only ServiceMax can transform your Field Service organisation into a lean, mean profit-driving machine. Arm your field techs with mobile devices that give them the power of the entire organisation behind them. Get amazing insights into all aspects of your service business. And best of all, make every customer a raving fan.

Top European Companies Trust ServiceMax. Read why ServiceMax has been named a Leader in the 2014 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Field Service Management. ACCESS THE GARTNER MAGIC QUADRANT FOR FIELD SERVICE MANAGEMENT REPORT*

Visit www.servicemax.com/magic

www.servicemax.com

@ServiceMax

+44 20 300 48 920

*Gartner “Magic Quadrant for Field Service Management” by William McNeill, Michael Maoz, Jason Wong, December 22, 2014. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner's research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

fieldservicenews.com

Expert View: Tom Oates, Solarvista

Good implementation, starts with excellent planning... Solarvista’s Tom Oates explains why pre-project preparation is perhaps the most important stage of any software implementation...

K so you’ve made the case to your board that your field service operation will be more efficient and cost effective if you can move to a new software system. Finally you get the green light to go ahead select and your software and then before you know it your facing managing a huge change to the way your business operates.

customers dominates absolutley everything.

Getting the implementation of this software right or wrong could be the difference between your company flourishing or floundering and if it was you that put the case together for this software, then same may likely apply to your career as well!

Here it’s all about understanding those nuances and where efficiencies can be made. Understanding where bureaucratic processes have evolved into some monstrous beast and inefficient processes are not questioned simply because they’ve just always been done like that.

So what are the biggest risks and most common pitfalls companies face with enterprise software implementation? Well perhaps one of the biggest risks around the implementation of field service management software, or indeed any enterprise grade software, is simply understanding and managing expectations. What expectations do you have of your software supplier, i.e. are they just to supply the software or is there an element of change management to be undertaken by them as well? As a software provider we can give as little or as much assistance and guidance as you need, but remember we have to know exactly what it is you need before we can agree to do it! It’s absolutely key to discuss with your software provider exactly what your expectations are and through open and honest dialogue you and your provider will be able to agree clear goals and also make sure all expectations are both realistic and easily measured. Often it is the work that goes on in the preproject phase that will define how successfully an implementation is. It may be natural for some companies, especially larger organisations, to be assessing their processes on a semi-ongoing basis. However, for many, especially those companies that are going through a rapid period of growth or expansion, this may not be the case. Often the strategic, forward looking stuff can be tricky simply because the number one focus of satisfying p22

However it is crucial that before even getting a software vendor involved you make the time to identify exactly what your current ‘as-is’ processes are. What do you and your team do at the ground level day in and day out?

“Often it is the work that goes on in the pre-project phase that will define how successfully the implementation runs” Really having a good understanding of your dayto-day business processes is something that any company can do and having this insight is one thing that will massively help further down the line. When it comes to the actual implementation very rarely is software implementation project just a software implementation project. Software is generally implemented to automate manual process, and by automating manual process you’re effectively doing someone’s job for them. Therefore it’s natural if you get a lot of fear at user level during such a project. If your team don’t know what is going on this can be even further exaggerated. There may be whispers around the office of forthcoming job cuts as systems become automated when more often than not the investment in software is a clear indication of the company’s future growth and prosperity. So there is a massive element of change management to be considered as part of the wider

project plan. Again setting expectations is key. It’s vital you outline the reasoning for bringing in the new software, what that means in terms of changing processes and then what that in turn means for the individual end-users - how will the change will benefit them? And whilst the responsibility for managing this process of course ultimately lies with your company, a software provider can certainly offer guidance and expertise in not just implementing software but also in implementing projects. We can help guide you through the transition and help you manage expectations of both the executive board and the user base. At Solarvista we often play a big part in the project management as when implementing software we typically go through the business process analysis stages with our customers. We work alongside our customers to understand their processes so we can outline where automation can improve the workflow. In that sense a software provider becomes absolutely integral to the whole change management process, and again a clear understanding of where you are currently and where you see yourselves postimplementation will make the whole project run much more efficiently Ultimately the key factor is knowing your scope, knowing what you want and understanding your expectations. It’s an often-heard phrase in project management that people don’t know they want it until they’ve not got it. Unless at the start of the process you know exactly what you want, your expectations may well be different from reality. This could then have a serious impact on the success of the project as it could potentially cause delays and additional costs. Understanding the scope of the project at the outset and really getting to the nitty-gritty of that understanding is therefore key.

Research: Mobility tools in field service 2015

sponsored by:

Key Findings.... 46% of field service companies now using a mix of different digital devices for field service

Only 8% of companies have a BYOD policy for field engineers

100% of companies still using pen and paper feel they are at a commercial disadvantage

66% of respondents donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t think Wearables will become part of their field engineers toolkit

Across all form factors 74% of devices are consumer grade vs 21% rugged 81% of field engineers are happy to be using digital devices as part their daily tools

57% of field engineers state that their digital device makes their work-flow easier 39% of companies involve end users in the selection process of new solutions

41% of companies will wait four years or more before upgrading their field service solution

research sponsored by:

fieldservicenews.com

Research: Mobility tools in field service 2015 Our exclusive research project sponsored by Advanced Field Service looks at the types of solutions being used by Field Service companies in 2015 and how those companies select the right solutions to meet their needs...

ield Service News has recently completed a research project, sponsored by Advanced Field Services, into what types of mobility tools are being used by field service companies. What types of hardware are most commonly being selected for our field engineers? What software is being used out in the field? How are companies selecting the right solution for their engineers? What feedback are those engineers giving? And what actual benefits are being delivered through digital mobility solutions? In total 122 field service professionals responded to our survey which ran across February and March with respondents from companies with mobile workforces ranging from less than ten field engineers through to over 801 engineers and with an even number of representatives across the spectrum with no obvious spikes, the research offers insight into trends across field service as a whole.

Types of devices being used in the field It is perhaps no surprise by now that most companies are using some form of digital device. We have been going through a digital revolution across the last decade and no industry has felt the impact of this change as keenly as field service.

p26

market in general. In fact our research indicates that the majority of companies are using a mix of differing digital devices, with 46% stating this is the case. This would make sense as many field service organisations are now in their second, third or even fourth generation of digital device being rolled out to their field engineers. However, when it comes to those companies that have rolled out just one device to their mobile workforce the results revealed some further insight into the trends now appearing amongst field service companies.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;It appears the rumours of the death of the laptop have been greatly exaggeratedâ&#x20AC;? One of the biggest trends that is backed up by the evidence of this research, is the dramatic rise to prominence of smart-phones as a genuine mobile productivity tool being utilised in the workplace.

Indeed out in the wider world of industry the emergence of Enterprise Mobility as a definable, and eminently sizeable industry that will ultimately dwarf the size of the field technology sector considerably, has now firmly taken root.

It is of course not a surprising result given the widespread adoption of smart-phones in both the consumer and business worlds but our research does confirm that smart-phones are the most popular device being used by field service companies when only they opt to provide one device to their engineers.

However, the field service industry, which has more complex needs than itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s younger cousin of Enterprise Mobility, is also a far more mature

Of course every action has a reaction, and the rapid growth of smart phones as a tool for field service engineers has resulted in an equally rapid

decline in the use of PDAs. In fact now just 5% of companies are using these devices - the smallest percentage of any device being used within the field. One myth however that the research helps debunk is that Tablet computing his having a similar impact on the laptop sector as smartphones are having on PDAs. Whilst it seemed at one point that the trend for tablet computing would see the laptop being edged out of both the consumer and rugged markets it appears the rumours of the death of the laptop have been greatly exaggerated. In fact our research outlines that in terms of the devices being used on there own, both tablets and laptops have an equal share of the market at 14%. However, we should also consider the fact that of those companies who provide more than one device to their engineers, a large proportion of companies are likely to offer a laptop as one of those devices, largely due to the fact that having a built in keyboard makes any significant manual input much easier. So whilst it is likely that ultimately the traditional laptop will become replaced by the convertible or even the detachable laptop, the keyboard remains an important part of the field engineers mobile technology kit.

The last few days of pen and paper What the research presents clearly is that the masses in field service have moved towards the new digital dawn. However, there are of course in any industry sector, laggards that remain behind the trend.

Research: Mobility tools in field service 2015

However, when it comes to the application of mobile technology amongst field engineers this group (i.e. those using no digital medium) now stands at just a nominal 3%. Not only the is the group now just a very small minority, but our research also indicates that this group is potentially set to disappear completely within the next twelve months. Of those companies still using pen and paper 100% stated they are considering moving to a digital mobile platform within the next twelve months. The reasons for this are of course clear, as are the benefits of moving to any digital medium, including increasing productivity and streamlining a field engineers work-flow. The fact is that those companies still relying on pen and paper are in danger of falling significantly behind their competition. In fact of those companies still using pen and paper 100% of the respondents admitted that they felt they were at a disadvantage, with 50% stating that they felt that disadvantage was significantly impacting their ability to remain competitive.

The next wave of technology – wearables Of course whilst one end of the spectrum is the laggards still using paper based systems at the other end we have the bleeding edge early adopters. With 2014 being predicted to be the year of the wearables have these very personal computers started to become part of the fabric of the field engineers tool-kit? Or have wearables faltered in industry much as they have done in the consumer world? Our research would seem to indicate that the latter is true with two thirds of our respondents stating that they didn’t think Wearables would be a device they would be implementing within the next 12 months. Many of the arguments against such devices becoming part of the field engineers tool-kit were focussed around there simply not being a need for them in the eyes of many. Comments from those who didn’t see Wearables coming to the fore anytime soon included there being “no obvious benefit of wearable technology”, “Too small, not enough visible info, techs have enough gadgets they need tools

that work efficiently – not toys to keep up with technology” and the rather damning “They are a gimmick. No-one takes them seriously” However, even within this group there were those that felt that Wearables would eventually come good with one respondent stating “It will happen, but it will take longer than 12 months. There will be some customer resistance to overcome”. As for those who did see the march of the Wearable happening within the next 12 months almost three quarters (71%) felt this was because Wearables could help “improve the engineers work-flow” over half (56%) saw the advantage of “hands free working” as key to the potential of the devices while just under a third (32%) identified “health and safety” as a reason why Wearables could be important.

“Almost two thirds of companies (74%) were using consumer grade devices compared to the 21% of companies using more rugged devices...” Rugged vs. Consumer Having established the form factors that were prominent in the industry, the next focus of our research moved on to another ongoing debate in field service – is the higher cost of rugged devices worth it in the long term? Or are consumer grade devices fit for the task? Our research highlighted that amongst our sample group of field service companies at least, the vast majority of almostthree quarters of companies (74%) were using consumer grade devices compared to the 21% of companies using more rugged devices. Often one of the most frequent arguments put forward by rugged device manufacturers is the Total-Cost-of-Ownership – i.e. that whilst a consumer grade device may be available at a lower cost, across the space of the devices lifetime the more expensive rugged device will prove to be a better investment as repairs and replacements for the consumer grade device mount up.

It would appear however, that either the numbers don’t stack up or that the argument is falling on deaf ears as almost half (48%) of those companies that selected a consumer device based their decision around cost, while 44% cited the fact that they felt the “improved speed of user adoption” was what drew them to a consumer device.

BYOD The other reason cited for the preference of consumer devices was BYOD. However, despite a large amount of hyperbole surrounding the movement towards implementing a Bring Your Own Device policy this remains a largely unpopular option, with less than a tenth (8%) of those companies opting for consumer devices citing BYOD as the reason for doing so. Amongst this small group the leading reasons for taking this approach were “quicker user adoption” and “employee satisfaction” which were both identified by over half of the respondents. Meanwhile the lower costs associated with the BYOD was acknowledged as a driving factor by a 29% of respondents in this section. However, whilst a small group, those who had implemented a BYOD policy had universally found it to be a successful approach with 86% reporting that it had been a successful strategy and 14% stating it was highly successful. The reasons for the success of BYOD were stated as “increased productivity” (44%), “engineer satisfaction” (43%) and again interestingly the cost factor scored lowest with just 14% stating that the “reduced cost of mobilising their workforce” was a significant factor in why they perceived their adoption of a BYOD policy as a success. From the engineer’s point of view the adoption of a BYOD policy was also mainly positive with 86% of respondents stating their engineers were “generally supportive of the policy”. However, such a policy was not universally accepted by engineers with 14% of respondents admitting they had faced “strong resistance to BYOD” from their engineers.

research sponsored by:

p27

fieldservicenews.com

Engineers reaction to mobile devices in general We asked our respondents “Do you think your your field engineers have appreciated a move to using a mobile device?” The results showed that in the main there is a strong acceptance from field engineers that using a digital device as part of their role is a benefit. In fact over a third of respondents (37%) stated that they had “absolutely taken to mobile” while the largest response to this question was “we have mostly had a positive response from our mobile workers” which was stated by just under half (44%) of respondents. Just under a fifth of companies (17%) stated they had received a mix of positive and negative feedback from their field workers, whilst less than 1% admitted they had “some success but getting widespread adoption is tough”. Delving deeper into the reasons for positive feedback from the engineers we saw that the largest reason for engineers responding to the implementation of a mobile devices was that it “makes their work-flow easier” with 57% of companies stating this to be the case. The second largest reason cited was that a mobile device “enhanced their productivity” which just under a third of companies (31%) cited whilst 13% of companies reported increased first time fix rates as a result of using digital devices. One respondent summarised the dual benefits of the approach for both engineers and company alike stating: “The engineers have appreciated the move from a rugged PDA to an Android device because it offers them more advantages; web, apps, email, etc. From a business perspective we got them access to industry apps (fault code analysis, parts availability, etc.) as well as improving the acceptance of the company solution”

Involving engineers in the selection process Given the importance of quick user adoption, we wanted to see how involved field engineers were in the selecting the devices they would be using. We asked our respondents “Did you have any input from your field engineers in selecting both the devices and apps they use in the field?” Whilst it is an approach recommended by many hardware, software and change management experts to help improve swift user adoption rates, it is not one that is adopted by the majority of p28

companies when selecting the tools their field service engineers will be using.

Meanwhile 20% of companies have procurement involved within the DMU also.

In fact almost two thirds (61%) of companies admitted that they don’t involve their engineers in the decision making process.

Perhaps contradictory to these statistics is how a company will approach the early selection process.

This is a significant finding because of those companies that did involve their field workers in the selection process the overwhelming majority (93%) felt that doing so had aided adoption of the solution they had chosen.

The most common approach for this initial phase of selecting a new field service solution is when the “The field service director/manager identified the need for a mobile solution and made recommendations to the board.” Which was how 35% of companies began their search for a new system.

When we consider that the aim of implementing any new solution, whether it be hardware or software, is generally to improve the efficiency of a field service unit then the sooner the new solution reaches widespread adoption the better. Indeed it would seem that whilst the majority of respondents failed to take advantage of their engineers insight during the selection process, there may actually be a growing groundswell to see this happening more frequently as almost half of those who didn’t take input from their field engineers admitted that in hindsight they think this would have likely helped speed up the adoption of the new solution.

“The engineers have appreciated the move from a rugged PDA to an Android device because it offers them more advantages; web, apps, email, etc.” The decision making unit So engineers input aside, who is involved in the decision making unit when it comes to selecting a new field service mobility solution?

The second most common means of instigating this process is when “the board decides to implement a mobile solution and tasks the IT manager & Field Service Manager together to identify the right solution” which was what was reported by exactly a quarter of companies. Other options that were board driven were for the board to task the “Field Service Manager/ Director to identify the solution” (13%) and the board task the “IT Director to identify the right solution” (8%) whilst amongst 17% of companies it was the ‘IT Director identified the need and advised the board”

Choosing a

solution

When it comes to selecting a solution the most common approach is to view three different solutions which exactly a third of companies opted to do. However, just under a quarter (23%) of companies will leave no stone unturned and look at five or more solutions when making their decision. A similar amount (22%) will look at just two solutions whilst a tenth of companies made their decision based solely on looking at one solution. In terms of the frequency of updating a field service solution the consensus is very much that every three years is the optimal time between updates with just under half (47%) of companies stating they believe this to be the case.

Having put that question to our respondents our research would certainly back the assertion that the single decision maker seems to be somewhat of a myth, or at least a very rare scenario.

The second most common thought is two years (30%) whilst all other options were 10% or below.

The most common role to be involved within the decision making unit (DMU) is IT Director with 64% of companies stating that their IT Director would be involved in the decision making process.

Well, whilst a similar majority (42%) refresh their solutions every three years it would also seem that many companies keep their existing assets longer than they would like.

This was followed by MD/CEO (58%), Field Service Director (53%) and Field Service Manager (45%).

In fact 41% of companies state they will wait four years or more to refresh their field service

But how does compare to the reality?

Research: Mobility tools in field service 2015

solution, whilst 27% admit they will wait five years or more between system upgrades. The research would also indicate that the largest reason for companies taking longer to refresh their solution would be simply down to cost which 50% of companies stated was the biggest challenge in updating their system. Compared to this ‘finding the time’ to arrange an implementation was a minor worry for most with just 12% of companies stating that this is their primary concern. What is interesting is that 34% of companies see worries around integration being their biggest challenge.

it seems that operating systems are at the very least a consideration in the selection of a device, whilst for 41% of companies it is a very important factor.

of time sheets, photo and signature capture and data security were expected as part of a field service app by more than 60% of our respondents.

When we reflect back to the worries identified earlier in this report around integration problems then perhaps this is understandable.

What we want in a field service app – everything!

Keeping HTML5 and web based applications in mind however, is it important for a field service app to be native to any given OS? Again the majority of our respondents suggested that it is.

Aside from these companies however the most popular OS is now Android which alongside the 16% of companies using Apple’s iOS is another clear indication of the rise in prominence of both Tablets and Smart-phones as tools being provided to field service engineers.

“Despite giving away ground to Apple and Android in the mobile market, Window’s still hold onto a relatively strong market share of the OS’s being used in field service with 23% of companies stating that this is their OS of choice”

However, despite giving away ground to Apple and Android in the mobile market, Window’s still hold onto a relatively strong market share of the OS’s being used in field service with 23% of companies stating that this is their OS of choice.

In fact over two-thirds (69%) of companies felt that it was important that a field service app is native to the OS it is running on, whilst 35% felt it was very important. In contrast just 11% felt that it was not important at all.

Also similarly as with the figures around laptops maybe being distorted somewhat by the amount of companies using multiple devices, the same logic would also likely see Window’s market share increase as the majority of laptops would be on a Windows OS of some form.

Of course a native app will not only appear far more polished it can often have far richer functionality as it is designed to work in tandem with both the operating system and the device itself.

Of course the irony here being that the longer you ‘sweat’ an asset the greater the chance of the technology becoming tougher to integrate with the latest emerging tech.

Operating systems Having taken a look at whose making the decisions lets return to the decisions being made. Earlier in this report we looked at the choice between rugged or consumer grade products but what about the software? Given the earlier finding that the over half of companies are using multiple digital devices it makes sense that the around a third (32%) of companies state they have mixed multiple OS’s in use amongst their field engineers.

Going Native But in an age of HTML5 and Cloud based SaaS solutions how important is an OS anyway? Well for a very large majority of companies (86%)

And our research shows that expectations for field service apps is now extremely high.

However, when it came to the functionality that was required in a field service app the most important element by far was “Access work schedule and complete jobs on site” which almost two thirds of companies (63%) placed amongst the most important functions they require in an app. Aside from this though almost all other functions had a similar level of responses with “access to technical documents” being the second most popular requirement with 42% of companies identifying this as important to them followed by “delivery of automatic status updates”(41%), “access to account information”(39%), “Photo/ signature capture” (35%),“recording of time sheets” (35%), “visibility into parts availability” (27%), and “data security” (23%). Finally lets look at why companies invest in field service solutions. What is definitely encouraging is that the most common reason for companies upgrading their existing systems is to improve the service they are delivering to their customers. I am a firm believer in putting the customers at the heart of all we do in field service and it appears I am not alone in this ethos. However the good news is that often by doing so we can see other benefits. One of these is improving productivity which was the second most commonly cited reason for investing in a new field service management solution. This was followed by the “reduction of paperwork” and “cost savings” being the third and fourth most popular reasons for a new system while “Automation of routine tasks” was the fifth most popular reason cited. Finally despite the often painted Big Brother impact of a field service solution, visibility into workers was actually the least common of the reasons given for introducing a new field service management solution. research sponsored by:

Access to account information, access to technical documents, visibility into parts availability, delivery of automatic status updates, recording p29

fieldservicenews.com

Expert View: Nick Frank

Want to bring bold ideas to reality: Try ‘ecosystem thinking’ Nick Frank looks at how forward looking companies can become more than the sum of their parts when they explore collaboration opportunities...

ave you ever had a great business idea, and found yourself saying ‘Oh that’s just a bit beyond our capability’. Shame, as you have already talked yourself out of it before you have even started! But if a project seems a little too big for your business, perhaps give it a second chance by exploring partners that can make up for your capabilities gap. Many businesses utilise local partners or agents to sell and service their products in regions outside their organisations reach. This arms length type relationship is OK until you start wanting to develop more advanced service offerings, which may require a far deeper integration between the product side of your company and the customer facing service operations. Value propositions such as uptime guarantees, vendor managed inventory or outcome based services require far more inter-action between the manufacturer the agent and potentially multiple partners. But this ‘intra-dependency’ also makes the relationship between the partners more complex. Take the fastener manufacturing company that was asked by a major Automotive OEM to supply every single nut, bolt, rivet, screw and clip for a particular car platform. Rather than supplying 10 part numbers, they now had to supply 450 most of which they now had to buy-in! How do you go from manufacturer to a ‘just-in-time’ delivery partner with a global supply base in just 3 months? Their solution was to use a 3rd party logistics provider to move parts from all over Europe to a point of fit in the factory, while they focussed on Application Engineering Services, Purchasing and Programme Management. They challenged their mind-set and built a supplier ecosystem that included many of their competitors. As the business developed some competitors even became key customers and suddenly relationships were not quite as simple as before.

It shows that with a bit of creativity, an advanced service offering can be delivered that goes beyond the initial core capabilities. So how can an organisation provide solutions for complex customer business problems that at first sight appear to be beyond their capability? Recently I worked with a small UK SME who embarked on creating an ecosystem to deliver an IoT technology platform that enables smaller equipment suppliers to deliver remote services such as diagnostics and upgrades. MAC Solutions (www.mac-solutions.co.uk) is a £2M+ UK supplier of industrial router solutions.

A clear plan of how to execute and develop the solution: For example develop a detailed business plan to drive the allocation of resources and actions. How will you use pilot projects to develop your solution? Develop the Value Delivery Model that defines the commercial interactions within the ecosystem. This would cover the sales model, delivery model, people and competencies, customer experience, organisation, partnerships and contracts, pricing, revenue sharing schemes and procurement

Test for Resilience: Develop mechanisms for ensuring that the business plan is resilient in terms of business risk and partner/customer fit

Together with one of its  key supplier eWON (www. ewon.biz), the company identified an opportunity to provide a remote service solution to SME equipment manufacturers. This went beyond the router and cloud technologies it currently supplied and involved the integration of Historians, Alarm Management Analytics and other new data technologies. MAC Solutions realised they did not have all the capabilities in house and that they would need to develop an ecosystem of up to eight expert partners to deliver their vision.   As they brought the partners together, it became clear that inter-relationships became more complex and could not be managed as a traditional customer/supplier discussion. They developed a framework that helped them think clearly through the process of developing their service solution. It essentially linked together standard business tools that enabled clearer business thinking through 4 key steps: 1.

2. p30

the ecosystem solution: in other words the basic building blocks of the solution, so that a clear vision, mission and strategy can be articulated and actioned. This involves clearly defining the Business Opportunity, Value Proposition, Product Service Solution and the Roles & Responsibilities within the partner ecosystem.

Understand the Value Chain and the market: The basic business analysis that should be in gaining a deep insight into the markets, customer value and the current business context. This understanding becomes very important when it comes to agreeing pricing mechanisms with different partners Define the complex problem to be solved and

The framework they developed, undoubtedly helped them move through the complex process of developing a network of partners that can deliver results. The result has been that MAC-Solutions were able to pilot their proposition with a supplier of washing systems for rail networks. Their story shows how it is possible for even small organisations to develop service propositions that appear to be beyond their capability by developing an ecosystem of partners. MAC-Solutions will be telling the story in more detail at the Spring Servitisation Conference to be held at Aston Business School in May 2015.

Field Service

0844 815 5504 www.advancedfieldservice.com

Can’t provide the information your clients need? Inundated with mountains of paperwork? Need to increase efficiency without increasing headcount? Can’t see where you’re losing money?...

Service Management Made Easy Advanced’s leading range of service management software, including Siclops and Service Director, makes managing your field service business simple. • • • • • •

Call management Contract management Sales & prospecting Stock management Management reporting Mobile solutions

• • • • •

Field Service

Accounting & finance Hosted solutions Document management Analytics And many more…

For an unmatched level of service capability that your business, field team and customers will love, speak to Advanced today. 0844 815 5504 | fieldservice@advancedcomputersoftware.com | www.advancedfieldservice.com

fieldservicenews.com

The personal touch... It was the first big UK event of the field service calender and it set the bar high for the rest of the year writes Kris Oldland... Deep in the heart of the English countrtside lies the St George’s complex, home to aspiring dreams of the English football association, and given the fervour that surrounds the English national team every time a major footballing tournament comes around, such dreams of aspiration and success are reflective of an entire nation’s subconscious. Such auspicious surroundings then were an ideal location for an event that had aspirational themes of its own. Namely the continuing evolution and improvement of how we operate our field service divisions, how we streamline our efficiency and establish ever greater levels of excellence in our service delivery. And as with modern sport, including the beautiful game, the alignment of technology with forwardlooking strategy is a core part of how we take these steps forward. And technology was of course at the heart of the Enterprise Mobile Technology conference (admittedly the clue was in the name!) With a number of new advances being revealed both by host Panasonic and a number of their key partners including the likes of Brother, NetMotion and Microsoft, the day certainly met its objectives. Namely introducing those in attendance to the technologies shaping our industry today, and also identifying the direction in which the next stages of technological advancement, those that are waiting just around the corner, may lie. The day began with a brief introduction from Kevin Tristram, General Manager, UK & Ireland Panasonic Computer Product Solutions before we moved to an excellent look at ‘smarter technologies for a connected mobile workforce” presented by Russell Younghusband, Sales Director Panasonic Computer Product Solutions, which nicely set the tone of the day, giving us insight into the technology our hosts were p32

developing and how it can improve our workflows, without ever feeling like a hard sales pitch. Given the backdrop, and the many reminders of great moments in English Footballing history that adorned the walls throughout the impressive complex, there was perhaps a definite hint of fate’s irony in the fact that the closing session of the morning was presented by Welshman Jon Tucker, European Product Marketing Manager, Panasonic Computer Product Solutions. However, obligatory rugby jokes aside, the day was about collaboration not rivalries and this very much came to the fore in what proved to be a highly interactive opening session, cleverly enabled by some of the mobile technology being showcased later on throughout the day. Tucker posed a series of questions to the audience based around some strong industry research from a number of sources and with each table having a FZ-G1 quick polls were taken from the audience to see if the consensus in the room matched the wider research findings.

“There was the requisite buzz amongst the delegates that can so often signify how an event will pan out..” What was particularly interesting was that throughout the session we kept seeing the audience responses matching quite closely with the wider research adding validity to the trends being highlighted in a very tangible way. It was a good start to what would prove to be an excellent day. In the first break of the day there was the

requisite buzz amongst the delegates that can so often signify how an event will pan out. The sound of the dreaded muted and strained polite discussions that any business event organiser must dread was thankfully absent, and instead there was a positive energetic buzz in the long, narrow hall where refreshments were held. Yet this was not down to chance. For a start this was not Panasonic’s first rodeo when it comes to putting such an event together, but this isn’t only evident in the slick presentations and great execution, it is at events like this that real relationships can be formed and much of the conversation was of people reconnecting. There were clearly many such relationships both between Panasonic and their customers, but also between the delegates themselves, who despite coming from wide and disparate disciplines, face similar challenges in managing their relative mobile workforces. With opportunities for such peer-to-peer networking somewhat more restricted in field service compared to other business sectors (largely due to the horizontal nature of the sector itself) the chance to resume conversations and compare notes at such events is often taken up with gusto when presented. Indeed the conversations continued right through the break and back into the next session, which featured David Rodger, Commercial Lead, Windows Business Group, Microsoft UK Unfortunately, we are unable to tell you much about this session as there was a no media policy in place so what we can say is that it was possibly interesting and probably was about holograms and that Microsoft 10 is hopefully going to be more of an XP than a Vista.

Event Review: Enterprise Mobile Technology

It is an ironic fact of how business works, that often the people we would most like to here from as leaders in there field are often simply too busy doing what it is they do (and what it is that we want to here about) to find the time to write a presentation about it for our benefit. The panel debate format allows us to benefit from hearing from such folks and the panel here certainly didn’t disappoint. The conversation was open, honest and insightful with a number of key learning’s being presented from the panel and as with any session of this format we left with not only a number of answers, but also with a number of new questions, plus the seeds of a few embryonic new ideas of how we can apply some of these learning’s in our working lives. Indeed again the conversations across lunch were vibrant fuelled by the morning sessions, with ideas generated from the panel were being bounced around and exchanged. A short hour later, the delegates were separated into four groups as we moved into the smaller breakout sessions. I mentioned earlier the dreaded death by Power-point scenario and often it is at such a point in a day that the risk of this raises its head. I always find that an early start, some intensive early sessions and a full stomach are natural enemies of attention when it comes to sitting through presentation after presentation. Thankfully, the event organisers were of the same mind-set and so put together a great mix of approaches to the afternoon sessions.

The first of which was a look at some of the latest technology to come from Panasonic. Whilst this session could of potentially have strayed worryingly into sales pitch territory, thankfully the hands on approach delivered Tom Szwed, Customer Relationship Manager, Panasonic Computer Product Solutions didn’t ever have the feel of a straight marketing push, instead the underlying vibe of the session was more akin to earnest excitement, and genuine pride in the technology on show.

“We left with not only a number of answers, but also with a number of new questions” With the announcement of Panasonic’s latest rugged laptop the CF-54 having been made just a few weeks earlier this took pride of place within the session although much of the thinking of the new launch seems to apply to Panasonic’s approach to product development moving forward. The CF-54 boasts a wide range of customisable options which makes it an interesting proposition for a number of industry verticals, but it’s thinner, sleeker profile has much of the look of a consumer device despite the device being certified as ‘semi-rugged’. Powered by a fifth generation Intel Core i5 vPro processor and running Windows 8.1 Pro or

Windows 7, with the option of an upgrade to Windows 10 upon availability, the CF-54 delivers an impressive computing power compared to similar products yet has also been put through vigorous test, which Swzed guided us through to achieve its semi-rugged certification. As well as being able to survive a fair share of drops and bumps, the CF-54 is also capable of operating between temperatures as low as -10C to 50C, is dust and water resistant plus boasts additional spill protection, which now covers both the screen and the keyboard. However, if the CF-54 was the central product in this session, it was the yet to be released and as yet unnamed prototype device that generated the most buzz. This device was what could potentially be the world’s first rugged detachable, and straight-away its potential application within the field was being discussed. As those attending the session got their hands on this initial prototype, which at first glance looked like a standard rugged notebook but whose screen could be detached to be a fully operational tablet in its own right the application of such a device was clear. “They [the engineer] would just take the tablet into the customers, but then could slot it into the keyboard as soon as they are writing up their reports” commented one fellow attendee. Indeed, the idea of a rugged detachable makes a huge amount of sense. Detachables are not anything particularly new and surely we will see a p33

fieldservicenews.com

number of similar devices appear on the market in the not too distant future. However, there is a definite advantage in being the first to deliver such a device, and on the evidence available here it would seem Panasonic, with a working prototype that is close to a final iteration, may well be able to gain that advantage and further grow what is an impressive market share within the rugged space. Having had an opportunity to get our hands on some of the latest hardware from the Toughbook stable, the next session was one which was certainly a memorable one. We were led into a room that was dominated by a huge snakes and ladders-esque board. Split into teams our challenge was to navigate our way from start to finish with challenges such as dropped devices, drained batteries or working in the rain barring the way. With half of the teams being allocated a Toughpad and the other half being allocated a ‘consumer device’ Perhaps unsurprisingly (and despite strenuous denial of any underhand rigging) the game was comfortably won by a team brandishing a Toughpad. However, whilst there may have been a less than subtle message around the benefit of rugged vs. consumer when it comes to total cost of ownership it was delivered what was a genuinely enjoyable manner. p34

The next session we returned towards convention with a presentation from event partner NetMotion Wireless. Again the session had the potential to stray into dangerous territory. There is only one thing worse than death by Power Point, that is death by Power Point whilst being sold at. I’ll admit to having some trepidation as energetic American Erik Helms, VP Strategic Partners & International Sales, NetMotion Wireless, began his presentation. Being a reserved Brit, with an upper lip so stiff it may have passed away without me noticing, my natural defences tend to get raised when confronted by American presenters. They are just so excitable, so enthusiastic and so damn friendly that I can’t help but think ‘what’s the catch’. So admittedly Helms already had a significant hurdle to overcome. Yet he not only managed to win me over, he did it with style and panache. The NetMotion product whilst having a number of functionalities and layers is relatively straightforward. It just makes online stuff better, much better in fact. Okay that may not be the exact way that Helms would have described it but essentially that’s the layman’s explanation. Through clever algorithms and coding the NetMotion app increases the speed of your connection, it increases the power of your connection and it makes the way your computer

understands your connection more intelligent. All of this was outlined by Helms, with the assistance of his two colleagues Lee Johnson, Global Field and Channel Marketing Director, NetMotion Wireless and Chris McKie VP Regional Sales EMEA, NetMotion Wireless, through one of the best 30-minute presentations I’ve sat through in a long time. Helms based his presentation around one user comment that the system ‘just worked like magic’ and played on this with a magician theme that quoted some of the great classic magicians, bringing an excellent sense of theatre to the session – with a great use of props including some beautifully lo-Fi home made Faraday cages made of aluminium foil. It was also the first time I’ve ever seen someone use a machete as part of their presentation, well in field service at least. However, Helms didn’t just rely on gimmicks to promote his product. What was truly impressive was the technology he was showcasing which sat at the heart of each section of his presentation. Similarly, Helms himself was by no means just there for his admittedly very good presentation skills. As the session came to an end a number of questions were fielded and Helms was able to give knowledgeable answers throughout. For the second time in an hour I found myself leaving a presentation I had expected to be a straight sales pitch, genuinely interested in what I had seen, and with the way it had been delivered.

Event Review: Enterprise Mobile Technology

It was in the final break-out session however, run by John Harris, General Manager- Engineering, Panasonic Computer Product Solutions, which had not only peaked my interest but was also perhaps the most effective in communicating why field service companies should seriously consider spending their money with Panasonic – yet there was no sales pitch here. In fact it was a forward look at products in development with Harris providing some insight into some hands on testing he himself had undertaken. We were given a detailed overview of smart watches Harris had trialled including the Intel and Samsung offerings and a fascinating glimpse of a wearable vest that Harris was actually wearing during the presentation which monitored heart rate. One simple application of which Harris outlined could be linking the sensors to the engine of commercial vehicles – the implication of this of course having added resonance in the wake of a recent tragedy in Scotland where a bus driver suffered a heart attack at the wheel causing an accident with multiple fatalities. As well as also showcasing some impressive technology around digital signature capture and processing the potential benefits of such applications there was the show stopping demonstration of a 3D camera, which was able to measure the full dimensions of a real-life box accurate to within a few millimetres. The technology on display was certainly impressive and Harris was an assured and clearly knowledgeable

speaker, however what was perhaps the most impressive aspect of this session was the two-way dialogue. Harris opened the session explaining that much of the developments we would be looking at had come from customer feedback and requests, and customisation of devices had been clearly evident in the earlier sessions, but it was here that we saw actual evidence of this. There were a number of requests and suggestions made throughout the session, which largely due to Harris’ relaxed style felt more like an open forum than presentation, including one attendee pointing out that the Panasonic cameras his organisation (a broadcast company) required standard SD cards for storage, yet the Toughbook’s they used had no option for incorporating this format. It was an obvious issue which whilst certainly not insurmountable would impede and slowdown the work-flow for their remote operators. However, as the explanation was outlined to Harris, he not only quickly grasped the issue but also promised to look into the issue and see how this could be fixed in future product iterations. Admittedly, many presenters in most organisations would say something similar, at least paying lip service to the request. However, there seemed an earnestness about Harris which when aligned with his role and seniority made me genuinely believe that he will actually look into each of the requests made.

Observant readers may have noticed that this is the second time I have used the word earnest and this was perhaps the biggest surprise and also the most powerful argument for why a company should opt to work with IT giant. Very simply I was genuinely and pleasantly surprised by just how accessible the senior management at Panasonic were. There was a true willingness to engage with and listen to their customers throughout the day, and this was exemplified by Harris’ session. After one final coffee break it was time for my own keynote presentation. Which was of course excellent but modesty prevents me from saying much more other than we covered a lot of the topics regular field service news readers will be familiar with as we looked at what tools the field engineer of 2020 may be using, including NFC, 3D Printing, IoT and Wearables. However, whilst it was a privilege and a pleasure to share my thoughts with the audience, and I really enjoyed the opportunity to have a number of really great conversations around my presentation over a beer or two in the drinks reception that followed, today was Panasonic’s day, and they had delivered an excellent event, with an excellent mix of thought-provoking content, delivered in a clever and engaging mix of sessions. As the first main event of the year in field service, the bar has been set nice and high. Let’s hope the rest of the calendar meets the same standards. p35

fieldservicenews.com

Expert View: Professor Tim Baines, Aston University

Welcome to the new age... The world is changing and advanced services are driving forward the new industrial revolution. Professor Tim Baines explains how and why...

he world once seemed simple; manufacturers made things and services companies did things for us. Today, increasing numbers of manufacturers compete through a portfolio of integrated products and services. This is a services-led competitive strategy, and the process through which it is achieved is commonly referred to as servitization. Celebrated exponents of such strategies include Rolls-Royce, Xerox and Alstom; all offer extended maintenance, repair and overhaul contracts where revenue generation is linked directly to asset availability, reliability and performance. Servitization is much more than simply adding services to existing products within a few large multi-national companies. It’s about viewing the manufacturer as a service provider that sets out to improve the processes of its customers through a business model, rather than productbased, innovation. The manufacturer exploits its design and production competencies to deliver improvements in efficiency and effectiveness to the customer. Manufacturers have traditionally focused their efforts on product innovation and cost reduction. Companies such as Porsche and Ferrari are celebrated for bringing new and exciting designs into the market, while companies such as Toyota are held in awe for their work with Lean production systems. These successes foster a perception that the only way for manufacturing to underpin competitiveness is through new materials and technologies, faster and more reliable automation, machining with more precision, waste reduction programmes, smoother flow of parts etc. Competition through services Services offer a third way to compete. This is not an ‘instead of’ or ‘easy option’ for companies that are struggling to succeed. Indeed, delivering advanced services can require technologies and practices that are every bit as demanding as those in production. Neither do they require the manufacturer to abandon its technology strengths; instead it can build on these to help to ensure long term and sustained benefits. Consequently, there is a growing realisation that such services hold high value potential.

p36

Conventional manufacturers can struggle to appreciate the value of services, seeking such simple explanations of servitization that they fail to appreciate potential benefits. This is often the case with organisational rather than technological innovations. In the early 1980s it was difficult to imagine that ‘Just-in-time’ would endure, and yet today it’s hard to identify a single manufacturing company that has not been touched by Lean techniques in one way or another. Servitization is a similar paradigm shift. The word ‘service’ can be used in different ways. It can refer to how well an action is performed – “that was good service” – or to an activity, like maintenance, spare parts provision and so on. Servitization relates to this second interpretation; activities that a manufacturer can perform to complement its products. All manufacturers offer services to some extent, but some establish market differentiation through these, following services-led competitive strategies. Servitization is a term given to a transformation. It is about manufacturers increasingly offering services integrated with their products. Of these, some manufacturers choose to servitize by offering an extensive portfolio of relatively conventional services, while some move almost entirely into services, largely independent of their products, by providing offerings like general consulting. Others move to deliver advanced services. Advanced services are core to servitization. Xerox’s ‘Managed Print Services’ is one example; rather than simply selling equipment, the company offers ‘document solutions’ to customers. For a typical customer, such as BA, Xerox provides project management, implementation of new technology, and management of third parties. There are various types of advanced services, and a variety of terms is used across industry to describe these (e.g. availability contracting, performance contracting, managed services, solutions). However the outcome of these contracts is, invariably, a capability for a customer to perform a business function or process. This is distinct from conventional services where the outcome is product ownership and maintenance of an asset’s

condition. Particular contracting features are often coupled to advanced services. There are four key features; the first three of which are relatively widespread: Pay-for-use revenue payment: pay-per click, pay-as-you-go, powerby-the-hour etc. are all terms used to refer to advanced services. For instance, in its contract with Xerox, Islington Borough Council receives a ‘click charge’ each time a document goes through a machine. Long-term contracts: Contracts of fewer than two years are rare. The Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust has a ten year contract for its pathology laboratory facility, while in power generation, GDF Suez enters into contracts of 20 to 25 years. Risk management: The provider is responsible for ensuring asset availability, condition and performance. If an Alstom train is late, penalties of £600 per minute of delay are incurred if the fault is with the OEM. Commitment to on-going process improvement and cost saving: this features increasingly in advanced services contracts. When these features are coupled with the principle of delivering a capability, contracts become sophisticated and demanding. Many existing contracts are relatively large, which is perhaps part of their appeal to OEMs. MAN Truck and Bus UK has 10,000 vehicles under contract, and expects this to grow by 50% over the next three to five years, to represent £200million of business. The Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust’s fiveyear contract in its pathology laboratory is valued at £20M per year. Advanced services are however not only for large organisations. They can hold high-value for manufacturers big and small. They can help strengthen relationships, lockout competitors, and grow revenues and profits and this is why servitization can be a sustainable business model for manufacturers of all sizes.

Intelligent Service Management Software FIRST RAMP ICONS

SERVICE DESK MANAGEMENT

FIRST BAG ICONS

RESOURCE & PLANNING MANAGEMENT

“ I’m Smart because I can transform data into meaningful and useful business intelligence”FIRST RAMP FIRST ICONS RAMP ICONS QUOTE MANAGEMENT

INVENTORY & STOCK MANAGEMENT

FIRST RAMP FIRST ICONS RAMP ICONS RAMP ICONS

CUSTOMER WEB PORTAL

CONTRACT & ASSET MANAGEMENT

Baggage Management

CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT

SERVICE DESK Baggage Reconciliation MANAGEMENT

Passenger App

FIRST RAMP ICONS

AutoRESOURCE Reflighting & PLANNING MANAGEMENT

FIRST RAMP ICONS ICONS FIRST RAMP ICONS FIRST RAMP

FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT

CONTRACT &Permanent ASSET WEB CONTRACT & ASSET CONTRACT & ASSET SERVICE DESK & PLANNING QUOTE MANAGEMENT CUSTOMER SERVICE DESK SERVICE DESK RESOURCE RESOURCE & PLANNING RESOURCE & PLANNING FIELD WORKFORCE Transfer RFID Tags MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT PORTAL MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT Optimisation

FIRST BAG FIRSTICONS BAG ICONS

Baggage Baggage Passenger App Passenge CONTRACT & ASSET CONTRACT & ASSET CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP SERVICE DESK RESOURCE RESOURCE & PLANNING SERVICE DESK & PLANNING QUOTE MANAGEMENT WEB QUOTE MANAGEMENT QUOTE MANAGEMENT CUSTOMER WEB CUSTOMER INVENTORY &WEB STOCK CUSTOMER FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT ManagementManagement SERVICEMANAGEMENT SYSTEM MANAGEMENT BUSINESSMANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT PORTAL MANAGEMENT PORTAL PORTAL CAPTURE MANAGEMENT INTELLIGENCE

FIRSTICONS BAG FIRSTICONS BAG ICONS FIRST BAG

FIDS Baggage Baggage Passenger App Baggage Messaging Gateway Passenger App CONTRACT & ASSET Messaging Gateway Passenger App AIRCRAFT FLEET WARRANTY CONTRACT & ASSET CUSTOMER Messaging Gateway CONTRACT & ASSET SERVICE DESK & PLANNING SERVICE DESK & PLANNING Quote Warranty ESK RESOURCE RESOURCE & Resource PLANNINGRESOURCE CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP Baggage Reconciliation Auto Reflighting Baggage Auto Ref Service Contracts, Assets Customer Inventory Financial Business Field FIELDReconciliation WORKFORCE QUOTE MANAGEMENT WEB QUOTE MANAGEMENT CUSTOMER WEB FIELD WORKFORCE FIELD WORKFORCE INVENTORY &CUSTOMER STOCK FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT INVENTORY & STOCK INVENTORY FINANCIAL &RELATIONSHIP STOCK MANAGEMENT FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT Management ManagementManagement SYSTEM BUSINESS TURNAROUND MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT ENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT PORTAL PORTAL MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT Management Management DeskMANAGEMENT & Planning & BillingMANAGEMENT Web Portal & Stock Management Intelligence Workforce MANAGEMENT INTELLIGENCE

Automate business rules to manage complex contracts and improve billing accuracy Enhance field service operations with proactive alerts and task management

AIRCRAFT FLEET RFID Permanent CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP Workforce Transfer Baggage Reconciliation Auto Reflighting Workforce Baggage Auto Reflighting QUOTE MANAGEMENT WEB CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP Workforce Baggage Reconciliation Auto FIELD Reflighting QUOTE MANAGEMENT CUSTOMER WEB NAGEMENT CUSTOMERCUSTOMER WEB FIELDReconciliation WORKFORCE Transfer WORKFORCE RFIDTag Pe INVENTORY &CUSTOMER STOCK &RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT INVENTORY STOCK FINANCIAL FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT SERVICE SERVICE SERVICE SYSTEM SYSTEM SYSTEM BUSINESS BUSINESS BUSINESS TURNAROUND MANAGEMENT Mobilisation MANAGEMENT Mobilisation PORTAL Mobilisation PORTAL MANAGEMENT PORTAL MANAGEMENT Optimisation MANAGEMENT Optimisation MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT INTELLIGENCE MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT INTELLIGENCE INTELLIGENCECAPTURE CAPTURE CAPTURE

Increase workforce efficiency with comprehensive resource optimisation and planning tools Maximise asset performance with tracking, remote monitoring and M2M capabilities

AIRCRAFT FLEET AIRCRAFT AIRCRAFT FLEET FLEET FIELD WORKFORCE Transfer RFID Permanent Tags FIELD WORKFORCE Transfer RFID Permanent Tags & STOCK FINANCIAL FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT WORKFORCE Transfer RFID Permanent Tags & STOCK MANAGEMENT FINANCIAL FIELD MANAGEMENT YINVENTORY & STOCK INVENTORY SERVICE SERVICE SYSTEM MANAGEMENT BUSINESS SYSTEM BUSINESS TURNAROUND TURNAROUND TURNAROUND MANAGEMENT Optimisation Optimisation MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT Optimisation MANAGEMENT ENT CAPTURE CAPTURE MANAGEMENT INTELLIGENCE MANAGEMENT INTELLIGENCE

WARRANTYWARRANTY WARRANTY

Total cost control of assets with lifecycle management and Predictive Preventative Maintenance (PPM)

AIRCRAFT AIRCRAFT SERVICE SERVICE SYSTEM SYSTEM BUSINESS BUSINESS BUSINESS SERVICE M TURNAROUND TURNAROUND MANAGEMENT INTELLIGENCE MANAGEMENT INTELLIGENCECAPTURE CAPTURE CAPTURE ENT INTELLIGENCE

Be Smart. Contact the Zafire team today: FLEET

FLEET

WARRANTY WARRANTY

FIDS

FIDS T +44 (0) 1295 701 810 smart@zafire.com

www.zafire.com/smart

fieldservicenews.com

The big debate: Should we be turning our engineers into salemen?

It’s a debate that divides opinion, should we take advantage of our engineers trusted advisor status when it comes to increasing sales? We put the question to the members of our LinkedIn group to see where opinions lay...

e’ve heard so often that we should be turning our field service operations into profit centres rather than cost centres. A concept that goes hand in hand with this is leveraging the trusted advisor status of the field service engineer to increase sales. However, how far is too far?

The question therefore should not be how do we make more money from our techs, but rather, how do we use the experience, knowledge and expertise of our field service teams to provide a higher level of service that our customers will pay for.”

One company that have fully embraced the concept is Abbot Diagnostics as Stephen Hodson, Commercial Service Director, Area Europe, Abbott Diagnostics at the medical device manufacturer explained recently at the Field Service Medical Conference held in Dublin.(see page 47) However, are Abbott leading a path that many will follow or is it a step to far away from the orthodoxy to become a mainstream approach?

As the discussion unfolded Baston further outlined what he felt was important in harnessing the revenue streams of the field engineer.

We put the question of whether we should convert our field engineers into salesman to those in the Field Service News LinkedIn discussion group. Here are some of those responses… Jim Baston, President, BBA Consulting Group Inc.opened the conversation stating that in his experience having consulted with a number of service companies, and training their technicians in this actual area, that he felt the answer lay in ‘positioning’. “When a technician has a discussion with a customer about a product or service which the tech truly believes will help the customer be better off, the activity should be positioned as part of the service and not as a sale.” Wrote Baston adding that such activity was “a very valuable service that is every bit as important as the technician’s ability to fix things.” Baston then expanded further“I think we should ensure that the tech understands that looking for and discussing opportunities is a important part of their job and should only be carried out when they feel it is in the interests of the customer. p38

“If the technician is expected to provide the quote from the field, then we need to provide the tools to enable them to do that efficiently” “I think success requires a number of areas of focus.” He wrote, “Infrastructure is certainly one. If the field service engineer/technician makes a recommendation, their needs to be a sure fire process to ensure that it will be followed up in a timely manner and that the tech is kept in the loop for example” “If the technician is expected to provide the quote from the field, then we need to provide the tools to enable them to do that efficiently. But that is only part of the challenge. Culturally, there needs to be a shift as well for some technicians. Making recommendations that we truly believe is in the best interest of the customer is a service and not a sale. Not every technician sees it that way.” “In terms of compensating technicians for sales,

I think it would be wise to tread very carefully. A straight commission or a flat rate payment for leads and/or sales may encourage the wrong kind of behaviour - making the recommendation because it is in the self-interest of the tech and not necessarily in the best interest of the customer. Besides, how does the tech respond when the customer asks if they are getting paid for making the recommendation?” This last point is one that perhaps lies at the heart of the service-to-salesman debate. Amongst those who feel that sales and service need to remain distinctly separate was Sebastian Westman, Product Service Leader - Computed Tomography & Molecular Imaging at GE Healthcare Finland who pulled no punches commenting “The bond between client and field engineer is easily broken if you “throw the bone to the pit and offer a little carrot” for extra sales. The bond that shapes between client and the engineer throughout the years is very trusty, neutral, consultant type of relationship.” Nick Frank, regular Field Service News Columnist and Founding Member of the Steering Committee at Manufacturing Services Thought Leadership Network echoed this sentiment writing “The profile of a Field Service Engineer and a Sales person is fundamentally different. For this reason I believe it is a mistake to see the Field Service Engineer as a sales person.” However, there were others in the group who felt companies not making the most of a their engineers bond with their customers were overlooking an advantage. Nathan Brown, Field Service Engineer at Lam Research commented, “I feel that FSEs are the best person to sell the products to existing customer product lines (i.e. upgrades and new

The big debate: Should we be turning our engineers into salesmen?

technology) due to knowing the reliability of older products versus new products.” One commentator who has a seven year pedigree of combining the roles sales representative and service technician with Patterson Dental was Jamie Heuberger who commented “Like it or not I feel the field service techs are salesmen. Its up to the company to make them effective. If the company doesn’t give the reps the tools to be good then they wont be.” Clearly it is a broad yet sensitive subject and one, which often divides opinion. Another factor that of course needs to be considered is that no two companies are the same and there are many numerous elements to be given serious thought when a company considers which path to take. Lee Towning. A service manager for Australian frim Great Southern Motorcycles outlined this very point in his comment writing “I believe it is all dependent upon the regularity in which the service tech has visited the customer and the strength of the trust in the relationship built up. It does not have to be the hard sell either, most techs are intelligent people, and all they have to do really is make the suggestion that it would be a good thing for the customer. They don’t have to sell; the trust does it for them. I found that most of the customers that I visited on a regular basis used to ask me for my advice.” For those that do decide to encourage their field engineers to actively sell there remain still further decisions to be made. Not least around how to structure any commission or reimbursement structures. Jim Blume, a service professional with a background both as a field engineer and a field service manager currently with Anton Paar USA offered some

to how can you compensate a service person for his contribution to sales depends on several factors. Let’s start with how you pay the person, hourly or salary. Next what is the utilization rate compared to a 40 hr. week? I have worked in both situations and most of the time, did far more than 40 hrs. / Week on a consistent basis. Is the company over working its staff? Many times management thinks of service as a necessary evil.” “Let’s assume that a company is treating their service people well. What motivates service people to do what they do? In general, besides pay, they enjoy having the knowledge and skills too not only fix an instrument problem but also to make the customer happy and be acknowledged for being able to do so. Now let’s compare them to your sales staff. I have seen sales people being paid 2-3 times what the service people get. Let’s add in things like sales prizes, trips and other bonuses. Yes, they are different jobs but consider how well sales will go without service. So to conclude, money is nice, profit sharing, or consider things like a points based awards catalogue a dinner out, a day off. There are so many ways to show them they are appreciated. How about a simple pat on the back?”

Latin America and Caribbean at General Electric meanwhile believes that it is a case of allowing the field service engineers to take responsibility for the smaller day-to-day sales, but that more intricate sales should be kept separate. He explained “What I have done is given our technicians a commission program on accessories only. The customer trusts the technician as they called them for a repair. Accessory sales are to help the customer get more from the product. I am very concerned of incentives for other things as the technicians become salesman and are selling parts or labour which may not be needed. Service must generate revenue and be self sufficient but it must not be to the detriment of the customer or to the relationship with the customer.” A similar view was offered by John W. Brisbin Jr.Service Director at American Duplicating Products, Inc. who wrote “Service Techs should be much more involved in sales than they are. Many techs are not

Lee Mathieson, Service Manager

excellent and honest advice to motivating field workers to undertake sales responsibilities by highlighting the often large discrepancies in remuneration between our field engineers and there dedicated sales counterparts. Blume commented, “The answers p39

fieldservicenews.com

truly motivated by a $25 lead fee for a segment 1, $50 for a segment 2,lead, etc I don’t want my techs to have the ability to sell directly as I feel it could destroy the trust that naturally exists between a tech and his customer. I do however want the techs to have more sales training from a service angle. I also want the reward for a good lead to be a percentage of the profit of the deal and not just a low set fee based on segment. Technicians who are well trained to both fix the customer as well as the equipment can be a sales reps best friend! However, the reverse is also true! If the techs can fix the equipment but have poor people skills, coupled with a poor sales lead commission program. Don’t expect them to accomplish much! It’s a shame that many if not most in our industry do not take full advantage of what could be the greatest assets in our sales departments, our Service Technicians!” Robert Jones, Technical Service Manager at Al Thika also ensures that his field technicians are not selling directly, believing that there is far more power in there ability to softly impact revenue by becoming ingrained within their customers operations. “I have always believed that sales sell the first machine to a customer while service sell any future machines...although not directly but through customer trust of the support he receives.” He commented, “From experience, I have found the best approach is to encourage the field service guys to become a “partner” to the customer. This means not only repairing or servicing equipment as required, but also doing that little bit extra while on site. Looking at additional machines to ensure they are running to spec. Talking to operators and offering advise on improvements in the way the machine is run. There is quite a list of little things that the tech can do to build the relationship. Direct selling is definitely not one of them though. Through this approach, we have often found that when a customer is interested in additional equipment, he will automatically turn to the tech for advice and thus a sales lead is created. Even though the tech doesn’t direct sell, he/she will still recommend upgrades, service contracts or replacement of equipment if they feel it is in the best interest of the customer. When a machine has broken down and the tech has got it p40

The big debate: Should we be turning our engineers into salesmen?

back in production again, the period just after the restart of the machine is usually the best time for making recommendations and discussing business in general. Future expansion of the customer has regularly been discovered at these times.

“If you add to the equations a very busy business year with undermanned service team, most likely the end result is going to be really ugly. I’m not saying it is impossible equation, but it’s more or less like gambling.”

What does the tech gain from this approach? A number of things. They appreciate the fact that a large majority of the sites visited are “tech friendly” and not hostile. On-site technical personnel are cooperative and helpful. In short their visits have become more affable. A lot of techs will tell you that this makes a big difference with regards to their job satisfaction.

Indeed it is a finely balanced equation, one that could be debated ad infinitum and one where there are clearly many opinions but very few definite truths. A sentiment that was perhaps best summed up by Matt Stater, Imaging Service Director at ARAMARK Healthcare

Commissions are not paid but on-site attitude and the success of developing good relationships is looked at when annual bonuses are decided.”

“Not every great athlete makes a great coach, and not every great service rep has the drive and/ or communications skills required to sell successfully” In an additional comment Baston also echoed the dangers of crossing the line between trusted advisor and commission-based salesman adding, “If the customer senses a shift to the “deliberate, calculated sale”, then the relationship (built on trust) can be broken. I call it the “Salesperson Paradox” - the harder the technician tries to “sell”, the less successful the technician is. Technicians also do not necessarily have a positive view of all salespeople and some may resent being asked to be one.” This also leads us to yet another question. Whilst it is a given that each company is different, what about the fact that each and every field engineer is also different? Sebastian Westman, Product Service Leader Computed Tomography & Molecular Imaging at GE Healthcare Finland highlighted the challenges this can play in opting to bring field engineers into the sales process commenting “Some can handle the sales on the side and still stay professional with the customer, but sadly the most common transformation is to boost extra sales and the quality of service starts to downgrade.

Stater commented “I will say that I have not yet been a part of an organization that has gotten the equation correct when it comes to asking service personnel to sell. There are a few common mistakes that I have witnessed: Assuming all service personnel can sell. Not every great athlete makes a great coach, and not every great service rep has the drive and/ or communications skills required to sell successfully. Incentive plans typically drive the wrong behaviours. Those that are excited by the opportunity start to focus far too much on getting a sale from their customers. Those that are turned off by the initiative start to talk to their customers about how “my company is now paying us to sell you stuff.” Making sales a part of goals and objectives (whether compensating for it or not) also drives the same problematic behaviours mentioned above. This practice also further disenfranchises the service people that do not want to sell. ‘I became a service engineer to fix things, not sell’ Lead generation initiatives (incentives to hand-off from service to sales) often require a significant amount of manpower to run efficiently. The moment the service reps feel as though their leads are not being recognized, you lose their interest. I don’t have the answers (yet) on how to create a successful service sales program, but I am certain about one thing; nothing comes close to the consultative, trusting relationship our service people build with our customers. That relationship is what makes them so effective at selling to customers, but that relationship can also be broken very easily when a customer senses a shift from a neutral, consultative opinion to a deliberate, calculated sale. In my experience, any successful service sales program needs to be designed in such a manner as to maintain the “service” relationship with customers.”

RUGGED TABLETS REDEFINED

Purpose-Built Tablets for Demanding Mobile Workflows Motion® understands that true mobility extends far beyond portability. Our industry-leading rugged tablets, tailored accessories and services are purpose-built to support the unique and often-changing business workflows of mobile workers as they transition from the office, to their vehicles and into the field. Motion’s rugged tablet platforms enable mobile workers to securely capture and share critical data at the point-of-service, delivering real-time decision making capabilities necessary for improved productivity, operational efficiency and customer satisfaction. Visit us at www.MotionComputing.co.uk to see how our rugged mobile computing solutions can work for you. RUGGED TABLETS

INTEGRATED ACCESSORIES

IN-VEHICLE SOLUTIONS

Motion Tablet PCs are powered by Intel® Core™ Processor Technology and Microsoft® Windows® www.MotionComputing.co.uk | Sales@MotionComputing.co.uk

| +44 (0) 1926 356 560

© 2015 Motion Computing, Inc. All rights reserved. Motion Computing and Motion are registered trademarks of Motion Computing, Inc. Microsoft, Windows 8, Windows 7 and the Windows logo are trademarks of the Microsoft group of companies. Intel, the Intel logo, Centrino, Intel Core, Core inside and Atom are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Industry leaders, Kyle Samani, PristineIO

fieldservicenews.com

Getting smart... The future of field service is going to be very different when the Smart Glasses revolution finally arrives says Pristine IO CEO Kyle Samani...

hen Google announced the retirement of their Glass Explorer program some corners of the worldwide media denounced this as an admission of failure. Despite huge early attention surrounding the smart glasses, the product had never quite lived up to the hyperbole and a growing number of less than sympathetic reports featuring Glass (not least to mention the widespread adoption of the newly coined term Glasshole) had meant that a shadow was being cast across Google’s latest centre piece. For the naysayers the closing of the public beta Explorer program was a final nail in the coffin for Glass. In fact the truth remains very different. In fact taking Glass out of the famous Google X research and development facility and moving the division into the main Google HQ was anything but an admission of failure. Actually it was a statement of intent – as was putting Tony Fadell (the creator of the original iPod and the Nest smart thermostat) at the helm. What Google have done however, is take a step back from the world of the consumer and the increasingly blurred lines of fashion and technology and turned far more of it’s attention to the world of business. An obvious, yet intelligent move given that a) the potential application of Smart Glasse is massive within industry – especially in field service and b) no one product has truly been able to meet the needs of and exploit the massive potential of wearables in field service. Of course having the hardware is great, but to unleash the real power of such a device we need dedicated apps. For that we need developers that truly understand the audience they are working for.

p42

So Google established the Glass at Work program. A program where they selected the brightest and the best development companies working on Glass and gave them the support needed to help them flourish. It’s a select group with only ten certified Glass at Work partners listed by Google currently. One of those companies is Austin based Pristine.io and to find out more about what the next chapter holds for Glass (and other similar products) in field service, we caught up with their CEO Kyle Samani.

“Pretty much the moment Google announced Glass that’s when I had my Eureka moment – I thought that’s what I’m going to go and do.” The company is young, but they have a strong vision and are also clearly ambitious. “We started Pristine a little under two years ago” Samani begins “I started Pristine in May 2013 because Google announced Glass in February 2013. I just got really excited about the potential of a hands free computer in the workplace and I’ve been doing this full time ever since and having a blast” he adds. Indeed Samani has the credentials to do well. As mentioned in the introduction, an understanding of the end-users that Pristine’s product is designed for is a large factor in their potential success and Samani whose background prior to launching Pristine was in the design and development of EMR systems for healthcare organisations was certainly well placed to step up to the plate. “I studied finance at NYU and I’ve been

programming ever since I was a kid. I’ve always been at the cross section of business and technology” Samani explains. So what led him to launching Pristine? Is it a case of being the right guy at the right time in the right place? “Pretty much the moment Google announced Glass that’s when I had my Eureka moment – I thought that’s what I’m going to go and do.” He admits “Someone was going to go out there and make the software to make this thing useful for the enterprise and I was dead set from the moment I saw it that it was going to be me.” And it certainly seems that Samani has getting things right so far as his fledgling company has rapidly grown in the two years since inception. Pristine now has over 20 employees and perhaps more importantly over 30 customers. Also whilst a background in medical systems provided a natural opening for Pristine, their customers are not confined to this space. In a way that somewhat mirror’s Rugged Tablet manufacturer Motion Computing ,whilst they exploited a niche within the healthcare sector, it was soon apparent that within the horizontal sector of field service there lay a far greater prize and this is now a core segment. As Samani explains “Our customer base is pretty broad, it does include healthcare but it also includes a lot of other companies outside of healthcare as well.” “For example right now we are working with a large manufacturing company that produces conveyor belts, so big heavy industrial machinery, and those guys are seeing a huge amount of potential in the platform. We’re also working with companies now in the auditing space within food production for example.”

fieldservicenews.com

He continues outlining the variety of companies that could benefit from adopting Smart Glasses into their work-flow. “Basically we’re seeing adoption of our technology in any environment where you have heavy equipment that if it’s not functioning, it’s going to effect the profit of the business operation. From lab diagnostics in a hospital to packaging equipment in a factory.” “We even have one company we are working with in construction and for them a big bottleneck in terms of getting their work done is just getting an architect out on site.” “So they are using our technology to replace the six hour flight and five hour drive. That’s essentially wasted time and expense for them but now they can have a guy on-site with a pair of smart glasses and an architect dialling in remotely avoiding the wastage” Indeed the early statistics from Pristine make a very compelling case for adoption. Something Samani is clearly keen to get across in our conversation. His business is built on offering significant savings to their client base. “I think the ROI of implementing smart glasses actually delivers far more than a smart phone or tablets did when they first appeared.” He begins “Our data is still young but looking at our primary customers these companies are going to save millions of dollars by using our technology.” What is particularly compelling about the smart glass argument, and Pristine’s approach is that such savings are far more tangible than those discussed when we talk about other devices such as smart phones, laptops, tablets etc. As Samani puts it “It’s not all theoretical efficiency gains, this is money going right back on the bottom line. This is cash.”

of improving the work/life balance of existing engineers.

Basically the app in combination with a pair of smart glasses will provide a true “see what I see” experience which will in turn enable people to collaborate remotely, whilst the engineer (or even customer) on site are able to keep their hands completely free.

“If field service companies can centralise their workforce somewhat then their field workers can get a better quality of life and their customers are getting better customer support in every case.” Samani asserts

In Samani’s own words “Rather than actually sending a technician to a site now customers can put on the Glass and walk through what the problem is whilst being is remotely connected to a service centre.”

“They [the field engineers] used to fly around 50 weeks a year now they fly around 20 weeks a year - it’s a totally different lifestyle for these guys and they spend more time with their kids and their families.” A noble, if exceptionally forward thinking sentiment of course. However, there are certainly the seeds of not just change but revolution being sowed as smart glass manufacturers, empowered by companies such as Pristine turn their focus onto field service. This is a good point to bring up the fact that whilst Google are the most prominent manufacturer of smart glasses they are certainly not alone. In fact both Epson and Vuzix sit proudly on the Pristine website front page alongside Glass. Pristine already work with pretty much every manufacturer of Smart Glasses available – a market Samani believes will continue to expand.

“The goal here is to save field service trips, so to save cost and also to help companies deliver a better customer experience.”

“Just Like there are 100 different mobile phone makers there will be 100 different manufacturers of Smart-glasses.” He explains

One immediate thought around such a proposition is that this could literally change the way field service operations are structured.

“We’re going to be rolling out lots of different hardware to our customers. Our customers are going to get cost benefits from there being more choice and competition and they are also going to be able to choose the device that is right for them and right for their needs”

“Our general line in the sand we’ve drawn is if the cost of downtime is above $2,000/hour then we get really excited because we know we can deliver you an awful lot of value.” He surmises.

With such remote access tools becoming readily available, this could genuinely open the doors to many companies centralising their operation, bringing their most experienced engineers into a central hub, and outsourcing a large amount of work to less skilled (and therefore less expensive) local workers, or even getting the customer to take on the work themselves.

Perhaps we are putting the cart before the horse here though.

This is certainly something that Pristine are seeing within their growing customer base.

Of course such talk of tangible cost saving is attractive to any company, but what exactly does the Pristine product do and how can it be used to offer such significant rewards?

“We’re seeing our customers equip both their existing customers and their existing field engineers with the technology. The goal is to deliver a player to every single case.” Samani explains.

Samani describes the Pristine app as the only pure solution to stream live audio and video from Google Glass (or any other smart glasses) to any p44

other device within the world in a secure capacity so it can be deployed in an enterprise setting.”

However, the benefits of such a move aren’t solely financial there is also the soft benefit

Of course developing a product to sit across a number of devices has it’s own challenge and as our recent research outlined (see page 26) there is a preference amongst field service companies for native applications (i.e. applications that are developed specifically for the device it is to be used on rather than device agnostic apps). Is this a potential issue for a developer working in a fledgling market that is, by it’s definition, going to be fragmented as a number of companies release their own products? Well it would seem that here smart glasses have been able to take advantage of the evolutionary path of the smart phones that went before them.

Industry leaders, Kyle Samani, PristineIO

In short for Samani and his team at Pristine the variety of devices doesn’t raise too many issues. Outlining their working process in greater detail Samani commented “Whilst we are not using HTML5 we are using some web technologies, however we are using primarily Android type platforms. Basically we are now starting to see the types of decisions the device manufacturers are likely to make and are able to design for that.” “Generally we find that our platform will work out of the box with most devices but if it doesn’t it’ll take one business day of tweaking to get it right.. We’ve encountered most of the variables of change and we don’t expect there to be that many more as the market evolves” He adds It all sounds rather exciting. (Something that is also clearly detectable in Samani’s voice is not just the passion he has for his product but the general excitement that smart glasses will change the world in the not too distant future) But let’s not forget the huge amount of excitement when Glass was first announced. As anyone who managed to get their hands on a Beta edition will testify that excitement soon turned to frustration as you realised that even with moderate use the battery life just wasn’t enough to last you more than a few hours, five or six if you were lucky. Surely this is an issue that must be rectified if Smart Glasses are to have a place in field service? Well for Samani – it’s just not that big an issue. “Our system today gets two to three times the battery life that you’d get if you were using a consumer product straight out of the box.” He begins when probed on this issue, pretty much shooting down the criticism there and then. “That’s mainly down to optimisations being made at the operating system level as well as our own app doing a number of different things to help out.” He clarifies. However, he doesn’t stop there. He continues to point out that even without such optimisation fears around battery life really aren’t that valid anyway. “In terms of practical use” he continues “well we aggregate our customer data and the average call length is between eight and twelve minutes, very few of our calls exceed that time-line and the reality is that nobody needs to watch video for that long. They may call back twenty minutes later but it’s pretty rare that someone needs to call for fortyfive minutes straight. It’s just not very useful and that just doesn’t happen. So battery life isn’t by and large proven to be an issue.”

He has a point, a very good one at that.

easy to use.”

Something that many of us are guilty of is trying to align wearable devices with existing mobile computing options such as tablets, smart phones and so on.

So with all of the potential gains and very assured responses to potential pitfalls it seems Samani really is the right man , in the right place at the right time and Pristine’s already healthy initial growth is surely set to continue. The only question remains when will we start to see further widespread adoption of smart glasses?

However, the simple fact is that the use case is very different. We need to think of what the smart glasses would, and would not, be used for. If we do this then the reality is that as Samani asserts battery life really needn’t become a significant issue.

“I don’t think that smart watches and smart glasses are that comparable. Yes there both wearables but the use cases for both are really far apart.” Even in those rare outlier cases where a field engineer does need to stream video excessively Samani has a solution. “ In the off chance that you do need to exceed multiple hours of video streaming in any given day, on our platform you can charge the device whilst you where it.” He concludes “We supply our customers with a battery pack if they need it and with that they could go for 10 hours of consecutive video streaming.” He explains Actually the biggest issue Samani and his team are challenged with is how complex such a device is to use. “The biggest push-back we get is ‘will my field service techs be able to use it effectively?’ For them it’s a legitimate concern, they haven’t used smart glasses in the wild.” He states. “What I say in that conversation is we have definitively proven, with our customers, that this works and our platform is incredibly easy to use.” In fairness he certainly isn’t exaggerating when he says it’s easy to use. Describing the user experience Samani explains “Literally all you need to do is put on the glasses and say ‘OK Glass request support.’” “After that everything else becomes automated. And the person wearing the glass can focus on the job at hand whether they are turning a wrench, opening a panel, soldering wires... it doesn’t really matter what that person is doing the system becomes completley automated and is incredibly

“I think in 2016 it’ll become a reasonably discussed topic, people will accept this is happening people are already doing it and it’ll really start to grow from there.” Samani says. “You look at IoT in the field service world or workforce management, these are technologies widely discussed in the field service industry and it’s pretty commonly expected that if your not already doing it, you’re going to do it in the next few years. I think in 2016 that type of conversation will happen around smart glasses.” It is interesting that for Samani, the conversation is focussed very much on Smart Glasses not the wider conversation around wearables. In fact he (quite rightly) sees a significant gap between the application of Smart Watches and Smart Glasses. “I don’t think that smart watches and smart glasses are that comparable. Yes there both wearables but the use cases for both are really far apart. For me watches are for consumers and glasses are for enterprise.” He asserts “Our belief is that glasses will be the ones that really deliver the value for enterprise. Watches can’t really impact how your tech works too much, glasses could change the way we structure our workforce entirely.” Again with such ambitious rhetoric accuations could be aimed at Samani of over egging the custard. However, whilst he certainly has a tangible excitement to his tone as mentioned above, it is also countered by a measured authroity. He truly believes that smart glasses will change the way we work and he is systematically building his case piece by piece. “When the data becomes more robust and proven we will publicise it and expect a lot more people to follow suit.” He concludes “There will be definetly some variability in differing industries, who adopts first and why the more expensive the problem the more likely a company will be to adopt our solution sooner, but we are witnessing a lot of interest and we expect to see a big change in how global field service teams, and even regional ones, deliver customer service in the not so distant future” p45

fieldservicenews.com

Latest resources

Are you up to date with the latest trends in field service? A selection of the latest resrouces to help you stay ahead of the trends in Field Service. You can find these and more at fieldservicenews.com/category/resources ...

Podcast: Software implementation In this edition of the exclusive FIeld Service News Podcast we focus on the important topic of software implementation as we are joined by Tom Oates, Senior Project Manager with service management software provider Solarvista. We discuss the importance of getting the implementation of any software right if you are to see the expected efficiency and productivity improvements you are expecting. http://bit.ly/FSN_SVPOD

White Paper: The metrics that matter in field service The top strategic action for two-thirds of service organisations is to develop or improve the metrics or KPIs used to measure field service performance. This white paper aims to disentangle the vast quantity of data in the field service management industry, highlighting metrics that matter and demonstrating how analytics can be used to improve performance. http://bit.ly/FSN_Met

Video: Professor Tim Baines on Servitization Servitization (also refferred to as Advanced Services) is a key trend in that is rapidly on the rise in manufacturing realm and itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s impact on Field Service could be game changing. But what exactly is servitization, how can it change the way we work and will it live up to the hype? http://bit.ly/FSN_SVZ

White Paper: Emerging workforce in field service: Tech Savvy to Technician ritten by leading field service analyst, Aly Pinder, this paper takes a closer look at how technology is affecting and driving the next generation of field service workers. Are millennials that different from their predecessors? What are their weaknesses and strengths? And most importantly how do they fit within the evolution of the field service industry itself? http://bit.ly/FSN_GNY

Video: John Pritchard of M.A.C Solutions on IoT The internet of things has massive potential to change the way companies operate and remote diagnostics can change the way field service organisations operate â&#x20AC;&#x201C; benefits of cost reduction and improved customer service are the key promises of the technology but what about the security issues. http://bit.ly/FSN_IOT

White Paper: Self-service technologies in field service industries This white paper will explore the transitioning role of the customer in field service and how the proliferation and popularity of smartphone devices has created a demand for self-service technology in both B2B and B2C markets. It discusses the different selfservice technologies available and how to implement these solutions. http://bit.ly/FSN_SLF

Tip: to get the latest resources sent to your inbox as soon as they are published register for free @fieldservicenews.com/subscribe p46

fieldservicenews.com

Seeds of success... Yorkshire based company Service2 show that smaller companies don’t need to wait until they grow before adopting a field service software platform...

ne of the biggest changes to field service companies in recent times has been the advent of the Cloud and the Software as a Service (SaaS) model and perhaps the biggest shift that the introduction of SaaS has brought is that for the first time ever field service software is no longer the domain of large enterprise companies only.

taking as much work of any form that they could to build up the business and establish contacts and clients on the way, they quickly established a successful niche for themselves as they moved away from domestic jobs and began establishing a strong reputation for contract based commercial work.

Due to the subscription based nature of SaaS offerings smaller companies are now able to access the types of software that only a few years ago would have been cost-prohibitive to them.

Big name clients such as NG Bailey, Norland, and the Marriott group soon came along and with them so did more engineers, more office staff and 200% year on year growth.

As such they are able to offer their customers similar levels of service as the big boys whilst at the same time being able to reap the benefits of enhanced productivity and efficiency such systems yield. The playing field has been well and truly levelled – or at least so the theory goes.

However, the flip side of such success is the growing logistical headache of how to manage the business.

However how does this filter down in reality? Is there truth in such assertions or is it just a case of clever marketing spin form the software providers? To find out how field service management software can help a small company we spoke exclusively to Kate Lovery at Service2, a Yorkshire based Gas appliance installation and maintenance provider who have implemented the ServiceMax platform. The business originally came into being when founders James and Chris, who both have background in engineering themselves, (Chris was predominantly working with catering equipment and boilers whilst James was more focussed on heating and ventilation) found themselves being approached with promises of Directorships for a new start-up. However, as is sadly often the case, the promises didn’t meet reality, but the seeds of a successful business had been sown between the two, so in November 2011 they decided to set up by themselves. Having started like most young businesses do p48

As Lovery explains “We’ve got a really nice spread of clients but my focus over the last year has been look how can we manage this? I can’t manage ten engineers and how ever many clients on an Excel spreadsheet so what are we going to do?” “I needed to stop and ask how can we take this forward and be more dynamic? How can we be faster, quicker, more streamlined.” She adds.

back, to focus on the forest rather than the one tree ahead of her as it were and realised if Service2 was to continue to grow they would be better off acting sooner rather than later. “We thought you know what we really need to do this now.” She concedes “Our plan is to be twice the size, three times the size year on year and I thought I don’t want to be implementing a system for 50 people when I can implement it now for 15.” “I also wanted to make it an integral part of our DNA. How we go through our processes, how we perform.” She adds Such an approach is of course extremely forward looking and one that many companies only realise they should have taken when it’s too late. However for Lovery it was simple common sense. “Coming from a clients service/account management background for me it is absolutely vital that we can manage our accounts properly, we just simply wouldn’t be able to grow unless we do” she explains

With the need to find a solution Lovery began opening the conversation up to the team and in fact it was one of their engineers who suggested ServiceMax.

“With our previous system I just couldn’t see how we could manage that. It’s just too many plates spinning, For us it’s like we’ve employed the system instead of employing another person to some degree.”

At the same time she also had a recommendation from one of their commercial partners for the SaaS based field service software provider.

And it’s not just the task of managing the engineers that is proving useful to Lovery. It is also the ability to keep a much closer eye on the P&L.

Contact details were swapped and soon they were reviewing the ServiceMax system.

“Before we didn’t have such huge visibility we didn’t really have much transparency to be honest. Not because it’s wasn’t there I just didn’t have time to go and find the information I needed.” She explains

“They came to see us and gave us a presentation and we looked at it and thought about it and then initially put it on the back burner.” Admits Lovery. Something that many companies in Service2’s position will do as the day to day tasks of keeping your business growing take over your To Do list. However, Lovery was wise enough to take a step

“Unless I’ve got a system like ServiceMax how can I track every nut and bolt that is purchased against a job? I can do some costing and put some rough numbers around what our profit and loss is but without a system like this in truth I really won’t ever know exactly.”

Case Study: Service2

“ To me that’ visibility is really, really vital. It’s about being able to see both where we can maximise profitability but also where we can make cost savings etc.” Of course the Field Service Software market is a highly competitive one and despite the recommendations Lovery looked at some of the other providers available before opting for ServiceMax. So what was it that made them the preferred option? “I found ServiceMax to be a to be a lot more dynamic.” She starts “I also liked the fact that it was Cloud based not something that was built on our system.” “At times you think well we’re only a small company of 15 people, how is that going to work for us - but surely principles that the business is built on, the foundations, they are the same regardless of size.” “For me best practice isn’t what the engineers on the other side of town are doing, I look to Cannon and GE and those types of brands and ask what are they doing? So I love the fact that ServiceMax has small family owned businesses as much as multi-nationals as part of their client list.” It is here that we perhaps begin to see why ServiceMax have gained such a glowing reputation from this particular customer. For whilst Lovery is clearly very happy with the software, her endorsement of the software provider runs far deeper than product alone. “I really like the networking opportunities and the different people it would bring you into contact with that other providers couldn’t offer.” She continues referring to the many client focussed seminars , workshops and conferences ServiceMax run each year.

“I’ve really enjoyed the seminars at their usergroup and for me just being able to take part in that type of event, listen to other peoples issues – what they love about the platform what they don’t, is just so helpful.” “You don’t know what you don’t know so, just listening to others who have been with the platform longer or have experience managing bigger teams than ours, such sessions are really useful.” She adds. It is through such activities that ServiceMax are able to encourage their customers to grow with the platform. An approach that generates more than enough brand loyalty to make these events worthwhile. “The last thing I would want to do is change a system at some point in the future, It may seem cheaper or easier at the time to have taken another platform but we really like the direction of ServiceMax as a company and it seems that they are someone we can grow with. It seems that they don’t stand still at all. There approach is very much ‘how can we make this package work for you” Enthuses Lovery. In addition to the networking opportunities that ServiceMax offer to their user base it is also their commitment to delivering excellent customer service that has Lovery so impressed. “Our account manager has been really excellent I have to say” she comments “he has been really supportive, helping us make the right connections, just offering support and advice when we need it, on that level the client

service is fantastic and that’s the case with the whole team so far.” And with a dedicated project manager available Lovery is confident that she will be able to be fully adapt the software to their needs as the company continues to grow and evolve. “Because I’m implementing it myself my project manager, who I speak to two three times a week is teaching me the tricks and tools that I might not have been aware of and that has given me a certain amount of independence to run with it.” She explains “If in six months time I want to make a few changes I’ll be able to do that myself” Indeed in the often ruthless world of corporate software it is refreshing to note Lovery’s enthusiasm for her provider. Yet by giving Lovery and Service2 the freedom to make such changes, and empowering them to be able to manage their system as their business grows, supporting them with excellent service, and helping them establish a wider network of contacts, ServiceMax are likely to secure the business of this fast growing company for many years to come.

fieldservicenews.com

Expert View: Aly Pinder, Aberdeen Group

Social: a Field Service Connector, Not Distraction Aberdeen’s Aly PInder takes a look at the growing importance of social tools in the modern field engineer’s toolkit...

as the social world changed service delivery? Or is field service still all about a schedule, a technician, a truck, and a tool box? The short answer is both are correct. Field service is still all about getting a service person to solve a customer problem. Granted, sometimes this can be done remotely, without a technician at all. But for the most part, technicians still help resolve issues.

opportunity to connect technicians with the intelligence to solve these problems in real-time. In order to achieve these types of gains, a few trends below should be adopted •

However, social is beginning to play a larger role in the execution of service. Social collaborative tools often have the perception of being a consumer medium which has little to no value in business. Much of this perception is driven by our knowledge of social coming from the games we play on our personal mobile devices or by seeing young adults wasting their day away on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook. This mindset is slowly changing, and the top performers are leading the way. Aberdeen’s Social Field Service: Collaboration on the Fly (March 2015) report highlights that half of the Best-in-Class provide technicians with access to social media and collaborative tools; as compared to only 35% of peers.

•

These top performers aren’t necessarily given technicians Facebook apps on their work phones, but they are empowering technicians with the ability to access information and communication tools to deliver faster resolution or collaborate with peers. The future of field service demands that technicians have real-time access to data to ensure they are able to resolve issues on extremely complex equipment. Challenges like a retiring workforce, more aggressive competition, and increased customer expectations mean technicians and service teams don’t have an unlimited amount of time to find the answers to service issues. For this reason, the use of social has the p50

•

Do not miss out on hearing the voice of the customer. If you haven’t heard about the empowered customer, then you haven’t been listening. Customers today have more influence and information than ever before. Consequently, it is imperative that service organizations listen to their customers, whether through channels like surveys or through social. But more importantly, organizations need to turn the voice of the customer into new products and services based on this intelligence. Just listening is a starting point, but action to improve is the true test of successful interaction between customers and the service organization. Escape the costs and loss of productivity incurred from all-day training sessions for the field team. Service doesn’t stop. Equipment, parts, and machines fail. And these assets don’t care that a service organization has scheduled an all-day offsite meeting to train the service team on the latest service techniques. Social tools allow a service organization the ability to share best practices and new techniques via a mobile device so technicians don’t need to leave the field. This dynamic learning model also means that procedural changes can be communicated in real-time and not at oneoff meetings. Avoid the tendency to neglect investment in technology infrastructure. Technology tools are changing all the time. The days of paper work orders and receipts are coming to an end. Unfortunately, as seen in Aberdeen’s recent State of Service Management 2015: Connect to Your Customers research (March 2015), nearly half of organizations (40%) still find that they are challenged by insufficient technology infrastructure. Despite this lack of investment for many organizations,

the technology available for businesses is immense. The next generation of tools has been able to turn the volume of data flowing into the business into intelligence. For this reason, organizations need to evaluate, identify, and invest in technology tools which connect service to improved resolution. •

Don’t wall off the field team from your customer. Technicians have a strong partnership with customers. Often times, the field service technician is a trusted advisor for the customer, as they help solve problems for the customer in a very difficult time. Social doesn’t have to mean that technicians are creating blogs, but there is the opportunity that they can inform customers as to the status of a work order or their arrival on site.

Social collaborative tools can seem daunting in business – no one wants their brand sullied because a rogue employee posts something inappropriate. But despite the horror stories and PR blunders, the value of social collaboration should outweigh the potential landmines. It is important for field service organizations to avoid the fear of social, as it is more than just a consumer trend. Social tools have the opportunity to connect the field service team with customers, the back office, and each other. Service in 2015 moves at the speed of a tweet or a post, and organizations must take advantage of this increased access to information and insight. Don’t get left in the past, leverage the tools of the present to build the type of service which will excel in the future.

Demand more from your field service software

Kironaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s software automates and streamlines the processes in your service chain, enabling you to realise significant productivity improvements and a compelling ROI, whether your workforce is tens or thousands strong. Our agile software platform is customised for your organisation and integrated with your existing systems and processes. Trusted by over 350 organisations including:

To find out more visit www.kirona.com Email: info@kirona.com Call: 01625 585511 Dynamic Scheduling, Mobile Applications, Performance Dashboards

ServicePower Your Field Service Management Software Solution

Automated Scheduling with M2M Capabilities

Mobile Dispatch and GPS Workforce Tracking

www.servicepower.com

Petersgate House, St Petersgate, Stockport, SK1 1HE Phone: + 44 (0)161 476 2277

Advanced Business Intelligence and Predictive Simulations

Dispatch and Claims with 3rd Party Management