The old saying, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” has never flown in the office technology business where service, support, and periodic maintenance are prime revenue generators. Even though digital technology has upped the ante on reliability and connectivity and software solutions have complicated matters to a certain degree, today’s service tech has a lot more on their plate than ever before. They’ve also got a lot more tools at their disposal to make their jobs easier. These new tools are changing the way service and support is managed and delivered.
Paul Schwartz – Copier Careers
While the proper tools are a plus, so too are the right skill sets. It’s not a break-fix world anymore and even though break-fix technicians still have their place, with the emergence of MPS and MNS, techs must have additional skills in order to be successful in the 21st century.
Brad Sorensen – e-automate
“The evolution of MPS in the past four to five years meant technicians were no longer a traditional break-fix tech,” says Paul Schwartz, president of Copier Careers, a staffing agency for the office technology industry. “It’s what we’re calling a hybrid tech, which means they have the break-fix capability, the OEM certification, and equally as important, certification or knowledge for an MPS environment.”
Schwartz acknowledges it’s not easy to find people with these skills whether you’re a placement firm like Copier Careers or a dealer looking to find this talent within his local job market.
One barrier to success is the generational divide. “If you’ve been in the industry a certain period of time, your skill sets are break-fix and if you do not embrace networking technology or you just flat out refuse to be trained on enhancing those skill sets, or your employer does not want to send you, then it could be difficult finding a new opportunity for you.”
It may not be a huge revelation, but Copier Careers still has clients looking for break-fix techs. The hybrid techs, however, are a little more difficult to find for a couple of reasons.
“If [an organization] currently has one, they don’t want to lose them,” maintains Schwartz. “And when the economy did what it did in 2008, the industry didn’t do a great job of sending people who were new to the industry for OEM and networking training [for certifications] because no one knew what was going to happen. That stretched the rubber band tighter and tighter with the techs they had, inherently creating a shortage.”
Even though there isn’t a huge population of highly skilled techs in the pipeline, Schwartz says they’re easy for Copier Careers to find because they aggressively track them.
“It’s not easy to convince them to take a look at a new opportunity,” he adds. “This has always been the case, but especially now because there aren’t enough to go around. If magically tomorrow in our database there appeared 100 network-capable, OEM-certified techs, we could certainly find positions for them right away.”
On the flip side, techs who have acquired these certifications aren’t clamoring to work for dealerships that have not evolved with the technology. After all, what’s the point of having these certifications if you’re going to move to a dealership where those skills aren’t important?
“If they’re looking at dealerships and see that they’re not embracing MPS and MNS, it’s difficult for us to get them to look at a serious opportunity with that dealership because they perceive the dealership as not having a future,” says Schwartz.
Of progressive dealerships who contact Copier Careers, not only are more looking for techs with some networking knowledge, more are looking for true IT networking technicians who will only focus on that end of the service spectrum.
“Many of our clients are either setting up true IT departments or morphing themselves into MNS providers because at some point they’re realizing they can deliver more than one commodity on a network,” states Schwartz.
Mike Stramaglio – MWAi
Does Schwartz have any suggestions for service techs thinking about leaving their current positions?
“Get network certified.”
Network certification is a critical skill to have for the 21st century service tech. Equally important for the dealership and their techs are the latest tools of the trade.
Dan Fink, a performance analyst with BEI Services spent 22 years as a service manager before joining BEI Services. When it comes to tools that help service techs achieve success, BEI Services’ software was an essential tool for ensuring that Fink’s service techs were successful at the dealership he used to work for.
BEI Services offers a variety of software and specializes in digging deeply into each technician’s activity and their performance statistics, enabling service techs and service departments to boost inventory in certain areas and identify what parts should they be carrying so they can close that call on the first visit.
“We can also diagnose if they’re struggling with call backs and if they need more training and what they can do to improve first-call efficiency,” states Fink. “Our tool can identify who’s doing it right, who needs help in what area, and what models they’re struggling with.”
Many dealers or service managers contact BEI Services because they want to provide their technicians with a performance-based bonus program, which in the long run also helps the dealership improve too. The bonus program is based on how many clicks the tech manages, how long the machines run between calls, and the parts used to go along with those calls.
“Once starting the program technicians strive to do one, two, or three more calls a week,” explains Fink. “They’re looking at the parts they’re putting in the machine, making sure it’s the proper part, and [monitoring] the number of parts between service calls while making sure they’re not overusing parts or putting in parts the machine doesn’t need.”
Success in service these days also means embracing MPS, which also poses challenges and opportunities for the average service tech. “They’re now managing a much larger fleet of printers than ever before,” says Fink.
With new technology and new tools come heightened customer expectations when it comes to service. One that techs go up against everyday is the expectation for the quick fix.
“We live in a world where immediacy is the normal expectation,” states Brad Sorensen, product manager at e-automate. “Customers expect when they place a call, the tech will fix that problem and they’re going to be up and running by the time he leaves, and that’s going to be in a quick turnaround time.”
Chip Miceli – DPOE
That’s the kind of thing that makes a tech’s job more intense. Again, that’s where having the right tools can help reduce the pressure and make a tech more successful by getting things right the first time. e-automate has some key tech-specific software partners such as TechAnywhere, a spinoff of Digital Gateway. Their product, Remote Tech, is software that runs on a mobile device and ties the tech back into the dealership’s ERP.
“The fact that the tech has a device that he can access information on isn’t enough for the tech today to be successful,” explains Sorensen. “I’d be surprised if there were techs out there that didn’t have a smart phone, but what that smart phone has to do is give him the information that’s going to make him successful. Not just data, but information.”
Obviously, that information can help the tech accurately identify and resolve the problem. These are some of the things that tools from companies like e-automate allow through its integrations with partners like Remote Tech.
“One of the key things is real-time inventory availability,” states Sorensen. “If the tech is going out on a call, he needs to know what the problem is and if he has the parts on his truck or not, because it does him no good to go out on that call and realize he doesn’t have the parts he needs to fix this issue.”
e-automate provides real-time inventory management as far as the stock the tech carries in his car so he knows whether or not he needs to pick up parts or if he can drive directly to the customer site because he has what he needs in his car.
Rick Bastinelli – Centric Business Systems
Being proactive is another quality of a successful 21st century service tech. That too takes the right tools. “Where things are going is dealers want to avoid that call and get into a proactive preventative maintenance mode where by using remote monitoring tools like FMAudit and other technologies that alert the dealer about problems before the customer even realizes they have a problem,” says Sorensen.
Today’s successful service tech doesn’t always need to make a service call to fix a problem.
According to Mike Stramaglio, CEO of MWAi, 50 percent of the things service techs can fix and repair today can be done remotely.
“That’s huge,” he says. “Five to ten years ago maybe 10 to 15 percent of machines were being serviced remotely.”
In his view, the methodology for servicing and devices being serviced has changed dramatically over the last 18 months.
“You have a cornucopia of opportunity,” states Stramaglio. “You have the break-fix people still requiring visitations and doing things on site for copiers and printers, then this migration where you are taking people who are technologically inclined out of a service organization and giving them the tools to manage and do things remotely. So you’re seeing fewer trucks or cars being rolled, and if they are being rolled, the big data analytics or the capability to put actionable data in their hands is enormous, so now we’re moving that needle a little further and everyone is a little deeper into the whole networked services capability.”
We’re only scratching the surface on the tools that can help service techs be successful, but what about out in the field?
Chip Miceli, president of DPOE in Des Plaines, IL has found that the ability to communicate with customers is one of those once overlooked skills that techs need today. He contends that his techs need some of the same communication skills that his sales people possess.
“The customer today not only wants you to fix the machine, but acknowledge that they are a human being,” he says. “A lot of techs don’t have that capability.”
The ability to work on more than one brand of device is also essential, particularly in the MPS arena. “We’re a Sharp dealer, but with our MPS program we take on a lot of HP printers, Dell printers, and Brother printers,” says Miceli.
For Jim Oricchio, president of Coordinated Business Systems in Burnsville, MN, as long as his techs have a basic understanding of the network and scanning as well as PC communication skills, they’re well on their way to success. “They also need to be able to talk to our IT staff on issues that are beyond their skills,” emphasizes Oricchio.
Rick Bastinelli, president of Centric Business Systems in Owings Mills, MD, affirms the importance of technology in making today’s techs successful. “We combine MWAi with Microsoft Mapping, and GPS to track where our calls are, where our manpower is, the certifications the techs in that area possess, and the most efficient and effective way to dispatch our technician for the right call in the right marketplace. The key today is to focus on manpower productivity and first-call effectiveness by using technology so that we’re better able to accomplish those objectives.”
As far as skills, Bastinelli says that when Centric hires a service tech they are first and foremost looking to hire the right people who care about the customer and who are focused on doing the right thing while also working hard and to the best of their ability.
“Obviously having someone with the technical background is important, the rest we accomplish through our own internal training programs and training programs from our vendors,” explains Bastinelli. “We’re more interested in hiring the right person and developing him or her than we are in looking for someone with the experience and skill set who can just walk in the door. Having said that, when hiring technicians for our Help Desk we look for someone with the network certifications so they can properly support our customers when they contact our Call Center.”
Ultimately, the success secrets for the 21st century service tech aren’t that big of a secret after all. It comes down to acquiring new skills and certifications, the ability to leverage the latest technology, and a skill that has always been essential—the ability to communicate.
