Technology Solutions
Seen in Reception Located in Office 2 4 Tasks . On Track
How To Instantly See Where Your FM Teams Are (And What They’re Working On)
When a client calls to ask why a contractor hasn’t turned up, do you always have an instant answer?
One of the challenges FM providers face is knowing where their people are at any given moment. Not where they should be. Not where they were when they first clocked in. And not even where GPS thinks they might be. But exactly where they are right this second.
If you don’t have that information, then as soon as a client questions something, your operations become reactive very quickly. You start playing for time while your supervisors make phone calls. Staff get interrupted whilst working. Radios and WhatsApp groups become overloaded with questions. And after all of that, you still don’t always have an answer. This visibility issue is not new. And there have been many attempts to solve it.
For as long as FM teams have been visiting client sites, they have used everything from physical signatures, to QR codes, to GPS tracking devices. All of this just to try and prove attendance on-site. But the problem with these methods is that they are very easy to manipulate. And even when they’re accurate, they only tell part of the story.
A sign-in sheet confirms that somebody arrived earlier that day, for example. But it does not tell you whether they are still on-site, what area they are working in, or whether they are currently available.
GPS goes part way to solving this, but it has its own problems. A person can easily appear “at the building”, but that could mean anything. They might be in another building nearby, they might still be in the car park, or they might even be trapped inside the cleaning cupboard knocking for help!
The FM providers I’m working with are solving this problem using a system called Sense.
By Parj Sangha
Staff carry a Sense Tag or Sense Badge whilst they work, and their managers can see exactly where they are within a building or site, in real-time. And not just which building they entered, either – but which floor, zone, or station they’re currently operating in. Those with a Sense Badge can even mark which tasks they’re working on, to help supervisors understand their progress and manage their workloads.
This means that when a client calls to ask where the cleaner is today, you can actually say which part of the building they’re in. “Oh, they’re currently cleaning the bathroom on the 4th floor”, for example. Or, when a client claims that a security guard did not complete their full patrol, you can point to evidence that shows the actual route they travelled through a building, and how many times they completed it.
FM providers are using Sense to report back to clients with answers like: “Our team completed the scheduled maintenance in the 3rd floor tech hub at 10:15 AM, and the operative is currently doing a cleaning task in the main lobby.”
But FM providers are using Sense for more than just finding staff and proving that they showed up. They’re using it to enhance their ability to deliver dynamic workloads.
For example, when a reactive clean comes in, supervisors can instantly check which cleaner is closest to the area and send an instruction to attend. Or, when a meeting room needs resetting, a button can be pushed that alerts the nearest available member of your team.
And because managers can see live movement across sites, they also know when areas are understaffed, when teams are overloaded, or when somebody may need support.
There’s more to this, too. Because you can also use this location data to learn who works best in which environments, or how long different jobs take to complete. This lets you structure your teams more effectively, and helps you quote for jobs more competitively with the data-backed knowledge that they will be profitable.
If you’d like to learn how to locate staff quickly and accurately, even at busy client sites, then drop me a line via WhatsApp, on 07828602522. Or you can email me at
parj@sense.tech.
Or, to explore this at your own pace, take a look online at:
https://sense.tech/sam/
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