The fragmented business landscape makes customization a necessity rather than a choice. Enterprises that stick on to rigid processes, and deliver one-size-fits-all services, become obsolete.
The shift from Process Orientation to Customer Orientation
Today’s business ecosystem moves at a fast pace. Customer sentiments and demands are fickle and shift fast. Businesses innovate to offer differentiated services and cope with such changes. Such differentiation often necessitates customized stacks.
Inflexible business processes make field agents fall into a routine. They become accustomed to a rigid process and incapable of change. Large service companies design flexible business models, to make changes based on the demands of each customer. The overhaul their processes to focus on customer needs. Process efficiency becomes subservient to customer preferences.
A customer-focused system captures specific customer demands and preferences and generates a workflow. The work order captures the unique demands made by the customer. The work order syncs with the inventory management suite, to check for parts availability. An automated ordering system orders for any missing parts, and keeps the customer informed of availability. Once the parts and a competent technician fall in place, the system dispatches a field agent to do the work. The field agent app contains all relevant details, including the best route to reach the worksite, copy of work order, and service history. Field service agents may change the work order, based on the on-site situation.
Artificial Intelligence enabled scheduling and dispatching lends dynamism to these key processes. AI-powered algorithms factor in the special needs of the customer. It matches customer needs to workforce availability, and schedules effectively. When dispatching, the system generates the best routes in real-time. If a customer cancels or rescheduled the appointment, the system finds a new slot. The technician on the way to the job gets a replacement job.
Greater Focus on Preventive Maintenance
Maintenance is becoming increasingly preventive. More businesses prefer annual contracts, with routine inspections, to pre-empt downtime and disruption. Advances in IoT enable connecting sensors to equipment and get real-time alerts. Sensors alert the command center when the fuel runs low, or when vital operating parameters deviate outside the normal range. Such alerts enable field service personnel to make prompt, preventive maintenance. Pre-empting issues are much cheaper and less disruptive, compared to reactive fixes.
Successful preventive maintenance needs a change in approach from the field service. The field service supporting the business has to become more customer-oriented. They have to tailor their services to suit the needs of different customers. Offering generic packages and expecting customers to adapt is untenable.
The Need for Flexibility and Resilience
Today’s customers demand fast service and transparency. They have a high level of awareness and expect the service representative to match their awareness. They also expect engagement on their terms, at the time of their choosing, and through the channel they choose. They go elsewhere if confronted with delay or poor service
Field service businesses segment users to enable customization. Creating user profiles makes it easy to tailor the experience for each customer. For instance, a profile for premium customers, who pays for a superior experience, makes it easy to offer priority in dispatching. Enabling such profile-based customization requires a change in approach. Field services have to integrate customization as part of the normal workflow. Regarding customization as a premium add-on, or as a favor to the customer, will not work.
Today’s customers also change their minds frequently. At times, they demand changes due to changes in upstream or downstream workflow, or due to changing business conditions. Schedulers and dispatchers of large enterprises manage a large field workforce. These field agents, positioned at different places, have varying skills. Relying on human judgment and manual interventions to shuffle work assignments based on customer requests leads to mix-ups. Such mix-ups retard productivity and compromise field agent safety. It also degrades the customer experience. Processing such requests through the field service software makes customization seamless.
Delighting the Internal Customer
Many enterprises make serious mistakes in defining the customer. The external customer brings in revenue, and should always be the prime focus. But field services have another set of internal customers–the field agent or technicians. Field agents are the direct, and often the only interface between the end customer and the business. Satisfying the internal customers improves their morale and productivity. Happy internal customers serve end customers better.
Any field service software worth its byte offers some basic customization options. For instance, users may adjust the font, or sort the list views. Such options improve the UX. Better UX leads to happier field agents and improved productivity.
Tech endowed field service enterprises allow field users to tweak the mobile app interface to their liking. Each user may design their interface in the way most comfortable to them. They may create a replica of their accustomed-to offline forms in the digital mode, and continue their work without disruption. Disruption to the set and accustomed to patterns is a major drawback of digitizing field service.
Profile-based customization also caters to the needs of internal customers. Each group of users gets a dedicated app, with the full set of resources needed to do their work well. The field agent gets a list of open work orders and the CRM details of the customers.
Customization makes the enterprise resilient, flexible, and adaptable to change. A robust field service software drives customization in the field service industry. A good suite ensures the right field agent reaches the right customer at the right time. It also enables the enterprise to generate custom workflows attuned to the needs and preferences of each customer . The lack of such an infrastructure risks a disconnected and missing experience for the customer.
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