You would be forgiven for assuming that every company now uses technology to track their maintenance operations – because it seems like that is where the world has gone. However, if you start to dig into it, you’ll find that there is still a non-trivial proportion that relies instead on pen and paper systems that are leaving a lot of value on the table.
Research suggests that somewhere between 26% and 49% of companies are still using pen and paper – which is a staggering statistic if you think about it. In this article, we’ll explore why this is happening, and then make a case for why those companies that haven’t made the transition to software are missing a trick.
If It Ain't Broke, Then Don't Fix It
This is often the refrain you’ll hear when you ask someone why they’re still using pen and paper to manage their asset maintenance and the additional context surrounding it. They’ve done it just like this for a long time and see no reason to change a system that has worked for them in the past.
One of the possible reasons that this is so prevalent in the space is the fact that often your asset maintenance is an ongoing task happening over years. The long lifespan means that you don’t get many opportunities to reflect on what you’re doing and assess whether it is still the best way to do it.
What this argument misses is the opportunity cost of using pen and paper. While it might be serving some of your needs, software and technology, in general, open up a whole new realm of opportunities that simply aren’t possible with some paper on a clipboard.
What Does Software Offer?
When you make use of software like FieldOS to manage your asset maintenance, you gain in a number of important ways:
- Automation: Software can automate various regular processes that then frees up your workers to focus on more important tasks while achieving higher accuracy and better consistency.
- Continuous Monitoring: Instead of having to wait for a worker to go and evaluate a particular asset, technology can be monitoring it continuously, giving you alerts when something needs further attention – thus getting you ahead of any particular problems.
- Integration: A software tool can integrate with the other systems in your business and feed data back and forth automatically. This gives you a much more holistic picture of your organization and minimizes the need for manual data capturing.
- Evolving Best Practice: As software evolves, you can continue to update your operational workflow to be on the cutting edge of the industry. This constant improvement ensures that your company is always up to date and is delivering the best it can for your customers.
All of these benefits are simply not possible with a pen and paper solution – and so you should be able to see why a software implementation can transform your asset maintenance and keep you relevant for years to come.
If you’d like to explore what FieldOS can do for your organization, be sure to get in touch today. We’d love to hear from you and see how we can help you move from pen and paper to a sophisticated, mobile-first asset management platform.
