Your workforce’s process is structured, efficient, and tested, but over the past few years, your workforce’s technology may have become outdated. Change can be terrifying, especially when changing an established process.
You’re probably asking yourself, “Is the upgrade worth it?”
We’d like to help you answer that question. Here are top three reasons why an upgrade to your workforce technology should be your priority for 2018:
1. Intuitiveness. Today’s recruits — your new employees — live on their mobile devices. The outdated user experience of older devices may be a hassle for newer recruits to learn. Providing familiar experiences via mobile solutions may speed up training time and productivity.
2. Mobility. If your supervisors currently only have a desktop solution, it may be time to mobilize them. By converting to a mobile solution, your supervisors will be able to spend more time with their team on the floor and reduce their paper trail by using a mobile digital device. Mobility also includes freeing up the hands of employees who handle products, which may allow minimizing steps in a process’ workflow.
3. Credibility. When showcasing your warehouse or workforce to clients, having up-to-date technology would demonstrate the high-tech baseline of your company. Clients want to know that their product is being handled with the utmost care. Stay competitive by removing chaotic manual processes and motivating the workforce with mobile technology. Apps create a better customer experience, which in turn leads to repeat business and long-term revenue growth.
Shockoe Case Study
In 2015, Shockoe began to develop mobile solutions for one of the countries largest electronics distributors’ Warehouse Management System (WMS). The client’s core mission is to be “five years out”; they strive to incorporate new technologies and electronics to become innovators of the tangible future. They service over 125,000 original equipment manufacturers, contract manufacturers in over 90 countries/465 locations. The client looked to build a strategy to extend its WMS into Mobile Solutions to increase productivity in its distribution centers and beyond.
Technology upgrade driven improvement:
- Intuitiveness. We replaced warehouse operators’ bulky 7-pound RFID Scanners with lightweight, handheld Bluetooth scanners that can be carried throughout the warehouse and kept in constant connection with their devices. In the upcoming phases, we plan to have the operators be completely hands-free via wearable technology. By exercising our knowledge in the latest user experience research, we were able to bring their processes to color and implement a simple color language for operators to more efficiently understand their app. We also translated supervisor data into easily consumable graphics that allow for easy sorting and customization.
- Mobility. Supervisors are no longer tied to their desks; they can now walk along the floor with full access to their data. Within the apps for the supervisor and operator, we implemented a communication tool to allow for easy messaging and scheduling. When an issue arises, operators can easily message their supervisors and supervisors can walk over to resolve issues.
- Credibility. By upgrading to bleeding edge technology, our client is living up to their mission to be five years out. They are setting themselves up as an ideal example for mobile warehouse solutions.
Deciding to upgrade?
Whether it’s your clients or your workforce, people love when you step up their experience. Ensure user satisfaction throughout the process by developing a schedule for introducing the upgrade, creating a training plan, and introducing a system reevaluation process to minimize the need for larger upgrades down the line.
Here at Shockoe, our team has aided multiple clients with mobilizing their workforce’s technology through mobile apps, Bluetooth technology, and hands-free technology. From rough sketches on paper to launching the final product, we maintain an intimate relationship with our clients to guarantee that their workforce is content and comfortable with changes to their processes. Check out our awesome case studies for upgrading technology: ONEOK, A.C. Moore, and J.B. Hunt.
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