Telecom, utility, and other industry sectors increasingly see the benefit of having teams in the field and remote sites using location-enabled devices to enable the simple and accurate collection of important network data.
We invited Lynne Schneider, Research Director, Data as a Service & Marketplaces, Location and Geospatial Intelligence at IDC and John Tarleton, Sales Director from IQGeo to share tips on successful adoption of mobility software for field crews.
“What is your advice on getting location-enabled technology into the hands of more people and how best to ensure successful adoption?”
"One of the best ways to ensure successful adoption of location-enabled technology is to create a virtuous circle of inputs and outputs that help that field worker access the information they need to do their job more effectively.
My advice is to firstly get them the applications that support the processes that they are already working on, and the second is matching the form factor of those applications for what makes sense for their world, whether that’s a system that supports mobile or desktop working.
Always consider why the technology would be useful to the end-user. They care about how it makes them more successful, how it makes them more knowledgeable, faster, and more accurate.
The end result will be successful adoption that meets the needs of the end-user, but also benefits the business as people are more productive, their inputs are more accurate, and there is less rework, because you’re able to collect into the system right at the point of interaction."
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“Successful technology adoption is always critical, but it’s particularly crucial with crews and contractors using geospatial mobility software in the field. These crews are focused on complex physical activities and need mobility software built for their special requirements.
We’ve seen some mobile approaches that take software designed for geospatial office applications that are simply presented on tablets and phones. These complex applications frustrate field workers and are almost guaranteed to fail. They need intuitive, easy-to-use applications that are designed specifically for the essential tasks field engineers perform.
The overriding reason that the IQGeo mobility software has been so successfully adopted at network operators worldwide is because the user interface was designed together with field crews. Our software engineers and customer success teams routinely go into the field with our telecom and utility customers to understand how they do their jobs, the environmental conditions they face, and the network model information they collect. It’s vitally important to know the people and capture the field processes so we can build our award-winning software.
Mobility software must be seen as a tool to make the lives of the field crews easier and more rewarding. If it’s seen as a burden, it simply won’t be adopted. We talk a lot about “empowering” field engineering crews and while this may sound like one of those suspicious marketing terms, it truly is at the heart of excellent field mobility software. We’ve seen how people working in the field care passionately about what they do and they will embrace new technology if it empowers them to make a difference.”
Read more insights from John Tarleton - conquering the rural broadband challenge with Alncom.
IQGeo’s Network IQ series shares insights from experts on important telecom and utility industry conversations. You can enjoy the series through short written options and video interviews.
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