Top 3 Use Cases for Enterprise Wearables

Yes, they may make you look like an extra in some sci-fi flick, but enterprise wearables are becoming more common sights across industries worldwide. Many companies now put out their customized lines of wearable headsets – Realwear, ODG, Vuzix M300s, and perhaps the most well-known, Microsoft HoloLens. They usually price out between $500-$3,000, which isn’t that steep, considering that the tech involved is cutting-edge, and come with remote IT support.

Slip a headset on, and you’ve landed in a world of augmented reality (AR) or virtual reality (VR). What's the difference between the two? Think of AR as a digitized modification of your field of vision.

The Army, for instance, has created “Tactical Augmented Reality” (TAR), an eyepiece that allows soldiers to pinpoint a target and, if necessary, aim more precisely. Their perspective changes to resemble that of a video game screen, whereas a VR headset encapsulates the wearer’s eyes and projects up-close images that make it seem like he is inside a video game.

Enterprise wearables can be a mix of both AR and VR, but they’re often designed for practical AR functions in the real world. Read on for some examples of these wearables with remote assistance software.

Aerospace

At Boeing, if mechanics wanted to replace an engine, they once had to wait for manuals to arrive and then pore over the design sheets. Now many technicians wear AR-enhanced Microsoft HoloLens headsets, where instructions hover in their field of vision and even let them communicate with other engineers in different plants who may know the repair process better. Boeing employees reported a 30% decrease in the time it took them to complete pertinent tasks.

Routine Inspections

Imagine you’re a field inspector checking the equipment of a plant or a warehouse, or even making sure that a gas line servicing a neighborhood is at a safe calibration. Using smart glasses, remote IT support can take snapshots of the meters and develop a report that can be texted back to the headquarters and logged in its system. Also, novice inspectors can go into the field and communicate with their seniors back at the office, who can guide them through basic steps without having to be in multiple places at once.

Healthcare

Technicians use headgear all the time, but the field of wearable technology extends beyond headgear, too. Watches, headphones, and centralized tools can all help people monitor their health, for instance. Doctors can use wearable sensors to transmit data such as charts, lab reports, and body scans into a smartphone app where they can make a diagnosis and send it to their patients.

The purpose of enterprise wearables is to heighten worker efficiency and to make the jobs of those workers easier with live remote assistance. But perhaps the most humane use of wearable has measures like installing smart bands inside the safety helmets of workers. While this feature may seem like a Big Brother ploy to monitor a worker’s every move, it can help determine when people are tired and need a break, or when they’re in high-risk situations that may cause them harm (such as moving items in a warehouse or fixing an apparatus at the top of a satellite tower).

Wearables are becoming extremely popular in providing remote IT support.

5 Benefits of Using Video Chat for Field Service

Are you often frustrated by wasted time and money in your field service department? Whether it's sending employees out to jobs which could have been solved remotely, missing out on knowledge sharing opportunities, or failing to hit first-time fix targets, field service management software is here to help.

Having a powerful remote assistance software at your disposal, it empowers your team to make the best use of their time and skills -- meaning that problems are solved more efficiently.

1. New Employees Will Be Less Likely to Make Costly Mistakes

When new team members are out on their first solo jobs, the risk of mistakes is high. If an inexperienced field service technician makes a problem worse due to lack of experience, you're looking at tons of extra time and money to fix it -- as well as a disappointed customer.

Field service solutions help the new technicians connect quickly and easily with more experienced team members, reducing errors. While a technician probably wouldn't want to call in physical backup for a simple question, they'll have no problem using video chat to ask for advice. It means they'll learn faster, feel more confident, and be much less likely to make mistakes.

2. Experienced Team Members Can Help Without Incurring Travel Costs

What if one of your team members faces a problem that can only be solved by someone more senior, but they're a couple of hours away from your head office? Asking another team member to travel to their location is a massive waste of time and money, but linking up via video chat is fast, simple, and cost effective.

Using augmented reality glasses, they'll see exactly what the field technician is seeing, so it's as good as if they were there. Research shows that 65% of field service technicians consider live video support one of their most useful tools.

3. Customer Issues Will Be Solved More Quickly

If an issue can't be fixed over the phone, customers have to wait for a technician to arrive, which is frustrating and inconvenient. However, if the problem is simple enough for them to fix themselves via video chat, the wait time could be as short as a few minutes, with no need to wait for a technician to arrive. It means a massive boost to customer satisfaction.

When issues are so complex that the first field technician who visits can't figure them out, customers are looking at an even longer wait time for a second technician. With video chat, the second technician can be there virtually in seconds. It cuts down on customer inconvenience and makes even complex problem solving quick and easy.

4. Common Problems Can Be Recorded and Used in Training

Got an issue that keeps recurring, but only one team member who fully understands how to solve it? When your technicians use video chat, all their solutions can be recorded and distributed to the rest of the team.

This tribal knowledge sharing means you won't have multiple employees wasting time and energy trying to solve problems that have already been figured out. It means greater employee satisfaction and less frustration while on the job -- leading to a lower technician turnover.

5. Employee Safety Will Increase

When field service technicians are reluctant to ask for help because they know it will incur high costs, they're more likely to take risks that compromise their safety. However, when a more experienced technician can be contacted by video chat at the touch of a button, there's nothing to stop them asking for advice as often as they need to. That means increased safety compliance, which is better for everyone.

A field service management software makes life easier for your field service technicians, improves safety and efficiency, and boosts customer satisfaction. If you want to stay ahead of the competition, now is the time to invest in a video and chat platform for field service.

Blitzz's software provides custom integrations for your workflows and can be integrated even into your existing FSM and CRM tools. By using our software, you'll be able to get insightful analytics and can make us your "collaborative system of record."