In a recent blog, we discussed the value and pitfalls of tribal knowledge. Tribal knowledge is just about everything your technicians learn and accumulate, but don’t necessarily write down or share with everyone on your team. Because this knowledge and content isn’t documented or known companywide, it can be easily lost. Thus, implementing a method for capturing and sharing this knowledge and expertise is a worthwhile endeavor.
Building a Centralized Knowledge Base
As automation and digitization become commonplace across all industries, field service providers have begun incorporating modern technology into more and more aspects of their service. With increased demand, a growing labor shortage, and a focus on implementing social distancing safety precautions, it’s becoming increasingly more important for service professionals to identify a means to easily document and share important equipment and job information virtually.
That’s where XOi comes in. The XOi Vision app is an all-in-one communication tool and the ideal method to accumulate and build a readily accessible knowledge base for your technicians. Your techs can utilize the app to not only streamline and visually document their work, but also manage and share important job information both internally and externally via web link. As a result, this increased level of transparency and making everything a matter of record builds trust between clients, techs, companies, and partners.
But other technicians can also benefit from the knowledge that techs acquire while repairing or installing a unit onsite. In XOi, you have the ability to build Knowledge Base that:
- Creates a centralized location to document, manage, and access job history from each technician in the organization
- Easily tag each job, making it easy for techs to search the work history of a specific unit or search other jobs on the same type of unit
- Preserve work documentation for future troubleshooting and training
Over time, this allows the Vision app to become your most up-to-date and robust repository of HVAC-related knowledge. This allows you to trust that your technicians have access to the resources and information they need to answer any questions that may arise while working in the field.
More Than Just a Documentation Tool
But XOi Vision isn’t just a documentation tool. Sure, the job isn’t complete until the paperwork is done, but the value of the digital “paperwork” processed by Vision is more than the sum of its parts.
The parts in the XOi Vision platform are the synergy of its ability to:
- Capture and document the actual job site with photos and video
- Coach your onsite techs with all that captured tribal knowledge now residing in training manuals right on their smartphones
- Connect your expert techs to the less experienced techs through live and interactive video calls that work even in cramped spaces
In almost every technician workforce, the level of experience amongst techs often varies, as does the level of experience needed on each service call. Service providers may send greener techs out on routine repairs or maintenance calls in the beginning, but what happens when complications arise on what should be a routine job? By enabling real-time remote communication, the XOi platform gives techs access to the collaboration and coaching to help you avoid rolling a second truck to the site. This helps your tech resolve the issue faster, helping to keep your customers satisfied and preserving your reputation in the field.
Customers Buy What They Can See
Another piece of the XOi Vision app is something we covered in another previous blog, but bears repeating: customers buy what they can see. Show them where your tech has been, what he or she has done and how faithfully the work was recorded and documented, and you have overcome an essential customer retention challenge. Keeping customers you already have is far less time-consuming and less expensive than finding new ones.
