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IoT drives field activity


For this discussion let's think about work in two buckets, scheduled and unscheduled. Scheduled covers things like preventative maintenance, project work, essentially anything that is scheduled or preplanned.  Unscheduled work; also known as a service call or any ad hoc request for work. In context of remote monitoring, which has been around for many years, a significant impact in the coming years will materialize for both scheduled and unscheduled field activity.



The idea is not really that novel; however, the world is changing significantly with regards to sensors and monitoring. For the most part the costs per point and the availability of data, it's mash up, and the analytics to make it relevant and actionable, are all becoming more accessible with this new wave often referred to as the "Internet of things". These points of input, when digested by folks that actually understand what they mean, can influence who we send to an unscheduled activity or when we are actually going to the field to perform scheduled routines.



"Transactional work order management systems in five years may not even exist, with the exception of very sophisticated plant operations requiring component and subcomponent monitoring and reporting". Instead the arduous process that currently takes place today to set up either rounds for patients, activities through a care plan, or PM visits for piece of equipment or building will all shift from a calendar based or subjective important point of reference to condition generated activities. The patients or equipment will reach out when maintenance needs to be performed.  We will see the outcomes driving the need for service activity.



Next post:  blending internal and external labor
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