With the human contact crisis evolving on a daily basis, business activities are getting disheveled and struggling with how to continue serving their clientele around the world.
The problem is immensely back-breaking for industries that heavily rely on direct interaction with their customers. While most of the people are able to work from home during these pandemic, field service workers don’t have that benefit. After all most of their work depends on calculated routes between service locations, office premises and locations of inventory.
The major setback behind working from home falls upon the productivity of the field service workers as the following affairs become much trickier:
- Smooth communication between admin and technicians.
- Maintaining customer relationships.
- Assigning multiple fieldworkers to the same task.
In this condition suddenly transforming the office to work from home setup is a major paradigm shift for field service industries. With lots of people at home – whether voluntarily or involuntarily there is a possibility of customers experiencing more issues than usual which leads to the requirement of more assistance. Meanwhile many service providers are going out of business, the need for technicians and workers are increasing. Because of Covid-19 field service industries are facing a whole new reality. Companies are working with limited resources and reduced workforce.
Key aspects that will help industries keep their business running smoothly during the COVID-19 pandemic:
- Remote Visual Assistance:
Remote Assistance allows contact center agent to assist customers. The customer can reach out with an issue and can be directed to an adequate field technician. The field technician can send a link which will allow customers to begin a live video chat and direct them step by step in resolving the issue. This will keep home service to minimum by keeping a Work from home model enable for field workers. Exchange multimedia files with ease using various applications of field service software like EyeOnTask field service mobile app.
- Real Time Scheduling Tools:
Digitize, Digitize and Digitize. Without doubt the largest black hole in the field service industry is continuing to rely on paper based processes. From keeping track of inventory and spare parts on check in/check out sheets to scheduling jobs using notebooks, paperwork has become an obstacle in growth of many companies. A business that wants to excel in uncertain situations will spend time researching on the best scheduling tools to fit their work and requirements. Scheduling, whether simple or fully digitized, can increase field service productivity and employee productivity. Some field software like ServiceMax, Service Fusion, mHelpDesk, EyeOnTask, Field One, Jobber and many others can help field service workers effectively manage and eliminate wasteful actions.
- Proficient Chat Tool:
Remote working involves lots of working in isolation and thus leads to a lack of communication amongst employees. This leaves them with feeling alienated and disconnected. The key ingredient to increased productivity involves investing in a proper chat tool so as to keep employee well-being of top priority. Employees will feel more comfortable sending texts in casual conversations. The problem arises when informal mediums of communication are used to send formal information. For example field workers use WhatsApp to communicate information. This involves risk of divulging private company information to outsiders. In this case the best investments companies can make are in professional chat tools. Professional chat software like Slack, Microsoft Teams, Discord can help employees systemize their work and communicate information securely.
The lessons companies learn and the tools they implement could radically shape up their upcoming reality for many years to come.