Transforming Field and Service Operations with Automation

Severe cost pressures, attractive new markets and accelerating new product introductions have substantially increased the complexity of transforming service and field operations. Automating service and field operations offer a tremendous opportunity for achieving improvements in efficiency, cost savings and service delivery. At the heart of automating service and field operations is the efficient management of a company’s resources. However, automating the decision-making process of addressing the imbalance between the supply and demand sides of the service provisioning and delivery has been a challenge for field and service operators. In this chapter, we outline a framework for addressing the challenge of transforming service and field organisations with IT. In particular, the framework helps to identify the type of transformation required, particularly the types of IT capabilities appropriate for deployment in an organisation. The framework has been used in BT, and we provide a case study of how we used it in implementing a service production management capability for managing BT’s field force.

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