There are probably a few different definitions of “field project management software”. In the system integration industry, part of project management is the ability to deliver efficiently and accurately what was promised to the customer with the the resources at their disposal. The project manager is the next step in line to provide an excellent customer experience and their job is to deliver while maintaining strong profit margins.
Let’s take a step back to see where this fits in. At the first point in the customer journey, a sales rep and potentially a sales engineer walk a site with a customer to gather details and requirements, pictures, and information. The more accurate and visual this information is, the better for the project management team to implement it. These are the heroes who implement what the customer wants and who ideally use project management software to close the loop with their own visuals of what was completed.
While part of field project management software is about scheduling, another vital part is the accessible details that should ideally exist all in one place. This is where System Surveyor comes in. As a system design and management platform, the same application used for selling can be used for field project management. In fact, it can be more secure than the traditional method of emailing PDFs of plans and using spreadsheets. What their team completes becomes a very powerful digital as-built of the customer’s current implementation.
Let’s walk through an example:
Acme Integration Services engaged a new corporate customer and planned for a new video surveillance and access control system. They loved the experience with the sales team because of the digital mapping of their system and visual plan. In fact, they bought from Acme even though it was a premium price. Now, it is time for the field project management piece of the puzzle.
Acme invites in a project manager to the System Surveyor final site and survey and does a hand-off. This acts as field project management software (or an element of it) enabling the team to send a Guest Invite to a subcontractor or an internal technician. That person can see exactly what the proposal called for and a type of “work order” but in a digital, dynamic way (as opposed to a print-out).
Here’s where things get really cool for project management. The folks in the field can take pictures after the install, use InfoMask™ to encrypt important device details such as passwords and IP addresses, and schedule inspection and maintenance dates. All of this synchronizes to the cloud for that customer’s site and surveys.
So, this brings up a few thoughts as you consider your field project management software:
- Are you able to effectively connect the dots from the sales process to project management and securely provide details to technicians and others in the delivery process?
- Is there a way to take a picture of the install and directly associate it to the survey and devices?
- Do you have a place to encrypt information about the devices to protect from internal or external threats and make it permissions based?
- Do you have a way to track inspections and maintenance needs that also provides the greater context of the entire “system?”
- Do your customers often seem frustrated that your contractors don’t have a handle on where devices are located?
- Do you have feet on the street everywhere you want to serve customers?
- Do you spend a lot of money on printing and manual inputs of details?
These are some considerations that may warrant a look at a different approach to field project management software and how System Surveyor could help. Being a purpose built application for IoT and physical security system integration, it can be an out of the box approach that could help you streamline and improve the customer experience…improving customer LTV.
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