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The Pressures of Field Service Modernization

Author: Jeremy Telycenas

Keeping Up With the Perpetual Change, Part 1

The advent of the Information Age has impacted us all, every individual, and every organization. It has changed the way we do business and has started reshaping and reinventing standards for all industries, Field Service (FS) being no exception. While this is an exciting time to be involved in Field Service Management (FSM) the rate of technological change also makes it a stressful one.

How is a company supposed to cope if technology is always evolving and customer expectations are changing along with it? The good news is that there is a lot of help out there. This particular blog series is aimed at outlining current FSM trends, narrowing down information to that which is relevant to your particular organization, and focusing on what works for your business.

Common Field Service Challenges You May Face

Let’s start by taking a look at some common challenges that drive Field Service firms toward modernization.

  1. Customers are expecting more.
  • Customers expect a certain level of modernized technological support, and having providers and technicians that can offer more for them both quickly and reliably means customer retention and client referrals.

2. Needing to do more with less.

  • Less face-to-face interaction and less money spent, but more productivity and higher expectations are now standard.

3. Retaining skilled employees.

  • Customers aren’t the only ones who expect more, having easy-to-use and up-to-date technology keeps talented employees on board. This is especially relevant when it comes to technicians, as they have the most face-to-face interactions with customers, and therefore can be a major asset in customer satisfaction rates and sales.

4. Keeping up with industry standards.

  • Competition with other organizations and new regulations, such as environmental and worker safety policies, can be major concerns.

Every company faces these obstacles. The first step towards finding a solution is to take a moment to think about or write down your business challenges, either from those listed above or more individualized examples.

What’s New in Field Service Management

Although the FSM industry is also constantly changing, it’s doing so to meet those previously mentioned challenges. Some of the trends that have become the new standards in FSM technological modernization are:

  • Visualization – providing transparency for customers and employees, and capturing data in a meaningful way.
  • Automation – automating processes to reduce error and increase efficiency.
  • Optimization – refining and improving processes and operations to meet an organization’s individualized needs.
  • Innovation – creative use of technology to maximize its value.

We’ll go more into these in the next few blogs, but for now, take a minute to revisit the previous section. If you review those challenges we spoke about and could design your company’s own technological solution for them, what would it do? Does that ideal solution reflect these new standards?

Moving Toward Field Service Modernization

One of the biggest things to happen in FSM recently is, of course, the acquisition of ClickSoftware by Salesforce:

“Delivering exceptional field service is an increasingly important priority for companies across industries with more than 70 percent of customer service leaders making significant investments to transform their mobile workforce.” said Bill Patterson, EVP, and GM of Salesforce Service Cloud. “Our acquisition of ClickSoftware will not only accelerate the growth of Service Cloud but drive further innovation with Field Service to better meet the needs of our customers. We are thrilled to welcome the ClickSoftware team to Salesforce.”

In order to give you a more realistic reference point for what is possible as far as Field Service modernization and technological solutions, we’ll be using Field Service as our example for solutions throughout this blog series.

In the next four blogs, we will break down visualization, automation, optimization, and innovation; take you through finding what those things could mean for your organization, highlight KPIs, and go more in-depth with industry challenges and their solutions. There will be prompt questions in every blog to help you narrow down finding possible solutions that work for you or can serve as talking points for your leadership team.

We realize keeping up with the pace of change in this industry can be daunting. So this series is aimed at providing clarity and guidance to help you move through your field service modernization.

Quote Source: For more information on the Salesforce acquisition of ClickSoftware, please visit: https://www.salesforce.com/company/news-press/press-releases.