Creating a modern work environment that continues to revolutionize the way people work
VIRTUAL REALITY - In 2019, expect to see deeper integration of VR in FSM. Virtual reality is being purported as the next game changer that’ll offer organizations the means to improve business productivity and reduce costs. It’s already had a positive impact on several field work-related functions, restructuring the way they’re carried out. In the field of training, for instance, its ability to place engineers and technicians into the environment they’re learning about is without competition. In addition, its potential as a highly visual training tool is simplifying the trainee’s understanding of complicated tasks.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE - AI has been a hot topic in the FSM domain for a decade. However, the latest developments are allowing field service managers to leverage a mass of data by integrating AI scheduling into their business functions. This form of intelligent planning is allowing them to quickly match the best performing service technician to the issue at hand. It considers the technician’s availability, location and skill set to ensure the right fit shows up for the task. Hence, AI integration will minimize the time wasted shuttling around locations and increasing first-time fixes, leading to increased company revenue and customer satisfaction.
ENTERPRISE ASSET MANAGEMENT (EAM) - EAM allows the workforce to efficiently manage long task cycles such as managing new neighborhood or construction design as well as scheduled maintenance and inspection of assets. FSM systems that are pure play, on the contrary, usually address short work cycles such as customer service related problems or outages, e.g. customer initiated tasks. By merging these types of workloads through a single system and a single workforce, big savings can be realized because work allocation can be optimized based on proximity, skills, priority and availability to attain maximum efficiency.
WEARABLES - The Internet of Things is going to heavily impact the networking of vehicles, buildings, physical devices and other objects containing software and sensors, allowing them to exchange data wirelessly. As a result, IoT-embedded wearables will see greater adoption in 2018, as companies realize the huge benefits of offering hands-free communication for field technicians while on the job and on the road.
FIELD SERVICE AUTOMATION - With the predictive ability of IoT devices, field service companies will not only take a more proactive approach to service, they’ll begin automating field service processes. For instance, a piece of equipment with sensors could trigger a service notification automatically if a specialist is needed or maintenance is due. Connected devices have resulted in the idea of proactive service work (FSM has enough insight to inform customers when a repair is needed before a machine or software fails), automating the process.
3 Comments
Rohini Biswas
The communication needs of a company can include a safety person, a supervisor, sales manager, a service manager. Of course bringing the customer to the job site, it has big advantages as well. -Rohini
Rajesh Kannan
The reason for that is that men and women working in field service are almost always on an island. Meaning… they’re by themselves. If you think about the skilled trades gap, obviously the largest problem there is a disparity of knowledge. And when you have someone alone on a rooftop, that disparity is much stronger than somebody inside of a manufacturing facility, for example. They simply don’t have access to the resources they need. -Rajesh