ThinkTank Reflections: For us to be able to turn to technology to drive field service operations, we must first establish asset data integrity
ThinkTank Reflections: For us to be able to turn to technology to drive field service operations, we must first establish asset data integrity
While there are plentiful options in terms of the technology available to field service organisations that can help us as a sector drive towards more efficient service, the tools leveraging IoT and Artificial Intelligence are fundamentally reliant on good data being fed into the system first.
Therefore, a significant area of focus for many field service organisations needs to establish good data integrity when collected from the field.
This was an important area of discussion in a recent iteration of the Field Service News ThinkTank sessions, which was focused on understanding the changes our industry must look to make if we are to adapt to a post-pandemic world and all the fresh challenges this brings.
“For us, we have two projects on par for next year,” commented Gyner Ozgul, President & COO, Smart Care Equipment Services.
“One is, how do we get the data integrity to improve the work order upstream? How do we make it simpler for the technician to input that data? That potentially solves the governance problem because you’re putting in cleaner data,” he explained.
“The second part is doing surveys to understand why we have adoption problems with technology. We use merged reality tools and varying digital training tools, and there are just adoption challenges with techs – so we have to understand why.
“There’s a lot of ‘I think’ and not a lot of ‘I know’ so we must understand why there’s an adoption challenge and then go after resolving them,” Ozgul added.
It is an ever-present topic of discussion that has been prevalent across several different Field Service News-led discussions this year, as Kris Oldland, Editor-in-Chief of Field Service News, explained.
“That came up on multiple occasions when we had very similar discussions across this project, including at FSN Live, where we had a group of 60 senior service leaders in the room live at Edgbaston Stadium here in the UK.
“It came up so many times that it feels like the technology is almost like the easy part of the puzzle. The adoption is the challenge. It goes back to almost pure play change management for me.”
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"Technology tends to get over-engineered to the point where it becomes difficult, I mean, not only difficult to use, but technicians don't view that is actually forwarding their mission - so they push back," - Tom DeVroy, Senior Advisory Solution Consultant, ServiceNow
It was a point that was echoed in the discussion by Tom DeVroy, Senior Advisory Solution Consultant, ServiceNow – who pointed out that this is not necessarily a new issue either.
“Technology tends to get over-engineered to the point where it becomes difficult, I mean, not only difficult to use, but technicians don’t view that is actually forwarding their mission – so they push back,” DeVroy explained.
“I have seen this change management issue occur many times throughout my career,” he added.
“From my perspective, and things that I’ve done in the past, it becomes cultural,” replied Jason Andrews, Service Director, Baylo.
“It is establishing that understanding that the technicians’ job is not only to fix things and fix the customer, and it’s to document their work because we can’t manage our business without the data.”
“When you put that information in front of the technician and say, ‘this is how we’re using this data, and this is how it helps you on a day-to-day basis’. Then you do it on a cyclical basis so they can see the product of what they’re doing and quite honestly hold those people accountable who can’t adopt it because, at the end of the day, we can’t manage our business without that data at all,” Andrews continued.
“We can’t decide how many people we need; we can’t decide what the performance criteria are other than some manager out there guessing what needs to be the productivity versus the number of customers. We can’t see the problems we might have with a particular piece of equipment or a specific customer, causing everybody pain. We can’t marshal resources where it needs to go without the data, and I drive that home with my technicians very hard and make it very, very clear.
"It's essential that whatever processes you put in place come from the top down." - Izzy Sanchez, Director Service & Systems Support Konica Minolta
“Put the data in front of them and show them that this is what we’re doing with it, and this how it helps your life,” he explained.
“It’s essential that whatever processes you put in place come from the top down. If you don’t get that, if they don’t come from the top down, you’re never going to penetrate; you’re never going to have that adoption,” added Izzy Sanchez, Director of Service & Systems Support Konica Minolta.
“Currently, we have approximately 70% of our assets connected to our DRM platforms, which solves many issues with the documentation. We know the machine problem, and with the integration, we put all that information into a ticket, giving the techs a lot of information in the job ticket. What we’re doing now is beyond that; we are looking at how we can mine that data.
“The goal, ultimately, is to look at everything, look at inventory, what parts were used, what happened, and then, in turn, feed that back to that first contact so they can speak with the customer and outline that we have a part that we have a 98% assurance that will fix your issue – that’s where we’re headed,” Sanchez continued.
“However, in the beginning, reassuring the technicians that we’re not trying to replace you; we’re trying to make you more efficient. Be honest with them and say yes, we want two more extra calls a day from you, but to achieve that, we are trying to help you lower the temperature to make your life easier in the field.
“In taking this approach, our techs started to trust the technology we were rolling out and when they saw that over the last 15 years, the company has been growing, we’ve embraced technology and in that time our technicians workforce has grown, rather than being replaced.”
All members of the Field Service Think Tanks are speaking from their own personal opinions which are not necessarily reflective of the organisations they work for.
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