joanna.darby@ifs.com, Author at Future of Field Service

In this episode of the Future of Field Service podcast, host Sarah Nicastro draws on recent enlightening conversations to compile a list of six focus areas that leaders should be prioritizing to improve employee engagement and satisfaction in field service.

The six focus areas Sarah’s six focus areas are belonging, connection, clarity, purpose, inclusion, and appreciation. Sarah also dives into how people-first leadership transforms business outcomes.

If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Google Podcasts.

Episode Highlights:

[00:24] - Shifting to a leadership and business ethos that genuinely values employee satisfaction as a cornerstone for customer satisfaction and overall business success is not just ideal but essential. This approach challenges outdated leadership styles by highlighting that a focus on people, through creating a supportive, engaging work environment, directly impacts financial performance positively. This concept, far from being altruistic or "fluffy," underscores the importance of transitioning from a short-term, revenue-centric mindset to one that recognizes the value of employee engagement as a critical driver of long-term business success.
[07:18] - The first three crucial elements of employee satisfaction within field service roles are belonging, connection, and clarity. Drawing inspiration from Marco Hugo Gutierrez's insights on Tetra Pak's approach to enhancing employee well-being through active listening and engagement, Sarah recognizes the unique challenges faced by frontline workers who often operate in isolation. It's essential to foster a sense of belonging by maintaining open communication and building strong relationships, ensuring employees feel an integral part of the company culture and mission. Additionally, facilitating connections with resources, leadership, and peers empowers them to contribute meaningfully and feel supported. Clarifying expectations and career progression paths also play a vital role in employee satisfaction.
[15:26] - Understanding and highlighting purpose is crucial in today's workplace, especially for younger employees who seek to understand the impact of their work on the company, customers, and the greater good, including environmental considerations. Equally important is fostering an inclusive environment where diversity of thought is valued, encouraging input from all levels, and recognizing contributions through various means, including service awards. Lastly, appreciation plays a key role in employee motivation, often surpassing material rewards. Personal gestures of gratitude, celebrating team milestones, and acknowledging individual efforts contribute significantly to a positive work environment.

Watch the full podcast here:

For field service organizations, predictive maintenance is the future, a fact that was highlighted in a recent report from Persistence Market Research. The firm anticipates the predictive maintenance market will reach $34.1 billion by 2030 – comparatively, last year, the firm said market revenue stood at $8.6 billion.

Technology adoption is a major enabler of this growth – the Internet of Things (IoT), big data and analytics, and other solutions have been deployed to meet the need for more operational efficiency as customer demand increases and service deadlines tighten.

Some of these technologies have been in place for quite some time. Even before the term “Internet of Things” was coined, service technicians were leveraging data from connected devices to help improve service responsiveness and visibility. Edge computing in the manufacturing sector continues to improve as processors get more powerful, and cloud-based solutions have helped companies extend maintenance and service data across multiple locations. The Persistence report also mentions predictive analytics platforms, which have integrated predictive maintenance and real-time analytics to help enable this type of highly responsive service.

AI Adds a New Layer

What is new is the rapid evolution and adoption of artificial intelligence and machine learning in the manufacturing and service sectors, which can help further improve predictive capabilities through more granular analysis.

AI algorithms may also help technicians (or customers) on site with troubleshooting, diagnosis, and repair activities. An AI system trained on years of service data on a specific type of equipment (or a specific piece of equipment in use by a customer) can help technicians leverage existing knowledge much faster and take guesswork out of the job. This wouldn’t replace technician expertise but rather compliments it by narrowing down the scope of the problem and helping the technician get to the right solution faster.

While the promise of predictive service is immense, the report does also point to some of the challenges posed by predictive maintenance. Some of the logistical and cultural problems to overcome before we can fully realize the potential of predictive are:

Regulations: As we have seen with recent controversies around the ChatGPT AI platform and plagiarism, the data needed to feed these predictive maintenance systems may be covered by data privacy and security regulations. As a service provider, how much access to machine data at a customer site can you expect? If a manufacturer sets up a predictive maintenance contract with a customer, who owns that data? How can you be sure it won't be compromised in a data breach, and who is liable if it is? Is any consumer data exposed in these systems (as it may be, for example, with point of sales systems at a retail store)? Privacy/security issues are going to vary by industry, but they have to be ironed out for these predictive systems to work as advertised.

Data quality and cost. Predictive analytics require high-quality, uniform data, which can be a tall order for companies running legacy platforms. The upfront work to scrub and categorize data and implement the right tools can be time consuming and costly, a big hurdle for small and medium-sized customers.

Staffing. If you think field service has a problem with staffing shortages, you should take a look at the IT industry. For these systems to work, most companies will need someone on staff with a background in data science and AI, or they will need to work with a software vendor or third-party integrator that can support them.

Customer resistance. This somewhat relates to the data privacy issue, in that connected equipment at a customer site is going to look like one more node on the client network that could potentially be vulnerable to a cyberattack. Or the customer may just not want a vendor to have 24/7 access to their equipment. If the customer is in the retail, legal, defense, or medical sector, they may be prohibited from granting that type of access. In addition, shifting from a break/fix mindset to paying for predictive maintenance can be a challenge both from a change management perspective, and a budgeting perspective. Field service organizations will need to be ambassadors for this approach.

The upside remains significant: reducing downtime for customers and avoiding expensive truck rolls for the service organization, longer equipment life, and new types of service products that can provide reliable revenue streams for manufacturers and service companies. Further downstream, there could also be benefits related to improved visibility of repair/aftermarket parts demand.

For service organizations that want to restructure operations around predictive, the first steps have to be analyzing both customers' and internal needs to figure out where and how this approach can provide the most value. From there, companies will need to determine how open their customers are to that business model and address any regulatory hurdles. Where you plan for an AI component, you must be sure you’ve done the necessary work to organize the data required.

This is all before you select a partner and deploy any technology! Predictive service represents a big change for a lot of companies culturally, economically, and technologically – but there are plenty of good examples of companies that have successfully made that shift. I have written before about several of them – Husky, Makino, and TKElevator come to mind.

If your company has transitioned, or is transitioning, to predictive, I would love to hear about your experience. You can email me here.

Sarah welcomes back Dan McClure, System Innovation Architect and Choreographer, Innovation Ecosystem, and co-author of the soon-to-be released book Do Bigger Things: A Practical Guide for Doing Powerful Innovation in a Changing World to discuss how innovation will change in the next five years and how technologies like AI are impacting the ways organizations innovate.

Sarah Nicastro: Welcome to the Future of Field Service podcast. I'm your host, Sarah Nicastro. I am thrilled to welcome today's guest back to the Future of Field Service podcast. The guest today is Dan McClure, who is a system innovation architect and strategist or choreographer at Innovation Ecosystem. Dan was first on the podcast episode 124, of course I had to look that up, August of 2021 to talk about innovation, which is his whole area of focus and expertise. And Dan is soon to be releasing... He's co-authored a book that will be released on February 13th called Do Bigger Things: A Practical Guide for Doing Powerful Innovation in a Changing World. Dan, welcome back.

Dan McClure: Hey, it's really great to be here. Thanks.

Sarah Nicastro: It's great to have you back. I reference our first conversation to this day. And I didn't realize quite how long it's been because time flies, but there are a lot of things that I think about from that first conversation. And I'm excited to revisit some of those points, but also dig into some different things today. Before we do all of that, why don't you just give everyone a little bit more introduction to yourself? Our listenership has grown quite a bit since you were first on, so tell them anything you'd like to tell them about Dan and Innovation Ecosystem.

Dan McClure: Yeah. I am, as you've said, really an innovator, but maybe a different kind of innovator than a lot of folks think of when they bring up that word. I've never been a particularly good technologist sitting in the garage with my soldering iron trying to duplicate Palmer Lucky's experience, et cetera. I am someone who looks at the world and sees Lego blocks and then imagines how we might put those Lego blocks together in a different way. We call it an ecosystem innovation. And it's really been exciting because even since we've talked, so many of the challenges and so many of the opportunities of the world seems to be flowing this way. And so I feel like after a number of years, I've finally come into a world that really wants and needs the kinds of things that I and people like me do.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. And the book obviously is talking about in a changing world. And even since 2021, the pace just continues to speed and so we have to sort out what ways we can keep up. I think every company and the leaders within those organizations that would be listening to this podcast are trying to innovate in some way. It can look different for different organizations, but no one, at least they shouldn't be in a place of complacency and very satisfied with that. Everyone is aiming to keep pace and to sort out what their role is in this changing world. I love the way you frame that. And can you talk a little bit... I know we talked about this on the first episode you were on, but I loved it. And this is one of the things that I have thought of many times since. Explain why you like the word and use the word choreographer; what that means in your universe.

Dan McClure: Yeah. I think it's helpful maybe if I could do just a quick recap of the types of innovation, like the way organizations have responded to all that change. Because I agree with you, there's almost no organization out there now saying, "Well, I'm good. Nothing's going to happen to me."

Sarah Nicastro: If they are, yeah, it's not for long. You know? Yeah.

Dan McClure: Yes. It's like nature will sort those folks out. But that doesn't mean that everybody's responding to the challenge in the same way. And the tale of the choreographer is really tied in with this shift in how people are responding. If you were mid-20th century, 1950s, '60s, a lot of the innovation was around really technical detailed work. You would sit down, do a detailed design, create a project plan, and you'd go out and build a bridge or build an airplane. And it was the kind of thing that analysts, engineers, project managers, really helped advance the craft. And so when you look at the innovation books from the '70s and '80s, they're talking about that kind of innovation.

Then you had Denning come along. And he said, "It's all well and good that you want to build a new factory, but can't you make that factory work better?" And he came up with the idea that you can incrementally improve the operation and performance of things like factories but also things like products, continually making small tweaks and changes that move them forward and makes it more efficient, it makes them more valuable. And so there was-

Sarah Nicastro: A lot of process-based?

Dan McClure: Well, it's process, but also we've seen a lot of feature-based stuff. Go out and talk to your customer and find out what new feature they want and add the feature to your mobile app or to your physical product. And so that became another layer of innovation. And it didn't invalidate the previous step, but you got this new layer.

And then 2000 comes, the whole digital web. 2007, mobile phones are launched with the iPhone. And you have this entire new digital open field for people to rush into, and so you got the idea of digital product innovation based out of Silicon Valley product managers, user experience designers. Eric Reese is the titular god of this practice where you fail fast, you have minimum viable products. And it's resulted in millions of mobile apps being out there. All of those roles of innovation are tools that leaders are adopting.

But here's the thing: The world is now getting more complex and messier challenges. When we talked about the idea of change happening faster, you said, "Everybody needs to respond to change that's happening faster." It's not just faster, it's oh my God, we're being run over by a truck kind of innovation. And it's not the sort of thing that you're going to incrementally improve yourself, it's not the sort of thing that you're going to be able to launch a mobile app for, you're going to have to really reimagine your entire organization. Or if you're dealing with something like climate change, you're going to have to imagine a big, complex solution. And therefore, you need a kind of innovation that's designed to do complex stuff, which is a really long way to get to the point that choreographers are the innovators who help you do complex stuff.

Sarah Nicastro: Okay. And how would you describe what traits make choreographers uniquely able to do that?

Dan McClure: Yeah. If we imagine what complexity is about, it's about having a lot of different parts, right?

Sarah Nicastro: Mm-hmm.

Dan McClure: And hooking them together in new and original ways. Well, what kind of traits would be helpful there? You're going to be a big picture thinker. You're going to see more than just a narrow challenge. You're going to be a natural generalist. Instead of a jack of all trades and a master of none and you slinking away into the corner because you haven't been able to focus, you say you're very proud of that. I've learned all sorts of different stuff, and I can talk to you about all sorts of different things and bring them together.

And finally, there's a rebel storyteller involved with this. You're in a position where you see the big picture, you know how to bring lots of different pieces together, but a lot of folks can't do that. And therefore, you have to be the powerful storyteller that brings them along. And you've got to be willing to cross the boundaries and barriers of the status quo to help them make that change. Big picture, generalist, rebel, storyteller. You get those four things together and you can go muck about in the world.

Sarah Nicastro: Okay. I think that the reason I love this is I identify with those traits very much, right?

Dan McClure: Yeah, yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: But here's my question then. For folks like me that hear that and think, yes, that's me, what if you are within an organization that is maybe more traditional, maybe more accustomed to some of those earlier phases or variations of innovation you spoke through? How do you position that ability in an organization that isn't already doing it, that doesn't already get it?

Dan McClure: Yeah. Well, this is $64,000 question for choreographers.

Sarah Nicastro: And to the listeners, bless Dan because I'm completely off script, so thank you for going with me.

Dan McClure: Well, did I mention the other thing about choreographers is that we don't stay on script very well? Either as listeners or talkers. Yeah. At the grimace side of this is that you don't, and you get crushed by the jobs. In some organizations we go into and we look at them and we say, "Where are your choreographers?" And they're like, "Well, we don't have any of those. We've got project managers and we've got detailed..." And I say, "I bet you I can find them." And I go look for all the poor performing project managers. And those poor performing project managers are often choreographers in pain. That's what happens with some of them; you just basically get fit into a box that you're miserable in.

There's a second strategy, which is you go rogue. You get a little bit of space. Maybe somebody isn't paying attention to you. This is what I did on my first job is after hours, I was going off and doing choreographer stuff without necessarily any permission to do that. In some cases, you can find a sponsor for somebody to help you go rogue. You just go rogue. The challenge with being rogue is that eventually you get caught, and that means you may get pulled back into line, it may mean you get fired. There's a really cool study that was put out a number of years by Bozalan that basically said the people who are this choreographer profile as executives get fired a lot more than the other types of executives.

But the best scenario is that you actually use your storytelling skills. You use your ability to make people understand complex challenge, and you bring other people along with you. And it would be nice if they were already there, in which case you just revel in the fact that you've got a supportive environment. But oftentimes, because this is new to people, you're going to have to actually help them take the journey along with you.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. I think the rogue piece sounds very lonely.

Dan McClure: But it can be exciting in a rogue sort of lonely way.

Sarah Nicastro: Right. And I think what's interesting to me about this is we're talking... We've talked about how innovation has changed, and I want to talk next about how you think it will continue to change. But I do think for the people out there that are identifying with these choreographer traits, I think one thing I have found myself trying to tap into more is patience. Because I think those organizations that aren't quite there yet will have to get there. And so sometimes, I think it's biding your time while also honing your storytelling skills, right? And so I think-

Dan McClure: Yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: ... I don't know if an innate characteristic of a choreographer is impatience, but at least for me, I have not always been someone that's willing to play the long game, right?

Dan McClure: Yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: But I think to some degree, because of the fact that this isn't slowing down, it's not going to go away, companies are going to have to catch up to this need. I wouldn't suggest anyone stay miserable in a role that they're miserable in by any means, but I think part of it is waiting for the characteristics and the culture to catch up to one another. Does that make sense?

Dan McClure: Yeah, although I must admit I have that same sort of urgency, so if I'm not going to be a hypocrite, I will tell you I've never been very good at that. One thing I would observe though is since we've last talked, I've really seen a sea change in the recognition of the types of problems that organizations face and the need for this type of response. We do a lot of work with humanitarian organizations like the UN and international NGOs and things like that. And the UN was not the place where you saw a lot of pioneering, unstructured thinking, and partly because of the job they're doing; it's hard, difficult; people's lives depend on it.

A couple of months after we last talked, I was part of a UNOCHA meeting. And they had brought half a dozen big organizations from around the world to talk about their latest initiatives. And what was interesting is every one of them was suddenly talking about them as complex systems challenges. And I would've said six months before that, almost none of them would've been. There is this kind of sea change, I think, going on where organizations are realizing they need to act boldly and in big ways, and that you can't do that with the techniques and tools of the past. Yes, maybe we need to be patient, but maybe we don't need to be quite as patient as we would've before.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. No, that makes sense. Okay, if you were to get out your crystal ball and think about... We talked about these iterations of innovation. Where do you think we're going in the next five years? What do you think is going to be the biggest themes?

Dan McClure: I guess I don't have another revolution in innovation after the one that we've already seen, partly because I think we've been filling in the spaces of different types of innovation challenges. And this ecosystem innovation where you're putting together complex stuff fills in the last block that was missing. I could certainly be wrong about that, but it's still very early days so there's-

Sarah Nicastro: Do you know what I wonder?

Dan McClure: Yeah, shoot.

Sarah Nicastro: And maybe this doesn't fit, or maybe it's a characteristic of but not the next thing. I think a lot of it is going to come down to humanity. I at least see this shift, and I think it's tied in part to what you've said, but we've innovated so fast in these product-related and then-

Dan McClure: Technical function.

Sarah Nicastro: Right. And then the digital. And it's taken us more and more and more away from humanity. And I think that we're not going to be able to undo anything that's happened. And I'm not even saying that we take focus away from it, but I think that you see in the issues companies have around hiring and retaining talent, I see at least this big wave in leadership of sort of a very old-school mentality to a much more people-centric mentality. I think from a customer perspective, you've had such focus on and demand for speed, information, simplicity. And while no one is saying those things aren't important, I think what we're starting to lack is human connection. And I wonder if there might be something to that.

Dan McClure: Yeah. Well, one of the things that's interesting, if you look back on those prior three methodologies, they have humanity in there, humanity in a very narrowly constrained kind of environment. If you're developing a digital product, you're paying attention to the user, but you're paying attention to one user with one need so you're simplifying humanity. The thing, once you start building up an ecosystem that involves people, organizations, technology, resources, and you're mixing all of those together, you're deliberately embracing all the elements of humanity. You're talking about trade-offs, motivations, rewards, ethics. And I think that's what's exciting is this next stage of innovation, it isn't either/or, it's humanity is a necessary component of what we're doing.

Sarah Nicastro: That's a good point. It's how does it all fit? Which is what makes it the ecosystem.

Dan McClure: Yeah, how do you assemble something where everybody wants to participate, everybody's doing the right kind of thing? There's no real bad results out of the whole thing. And those are complex, messy questions which you need a choreographer to help you work through.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. No, I get that for sure. Okay, let's then talk a little bit about how I would say 2023, the biggest buzz was AI, at least in the world that I'm existing in. And it was interesting because for me, it was met with very mixed reactions. I had service and business leaders that were full steam ahead on the possibilities, and I had ones that were saying, "I'm so sick of hearing about this." How do you see continuing advancement in technologies like AI factoring into the innovation equation?

Dan McClure: Imagine AI is a Lego block. Somebody's arrived at our door and they have a case of new Lego blocks that you can use. There's a couple of ways you could do something with that. One, you could go find an existing function, pop out that old function, and put in the new Lego block. Imagine we've got a doctor's office. We could put in an AI to help support scheduling doctor's appointments or we could put in an AI to check prescription that are being made by the doctor. This would be taking your existing ecosystem, popping out the old Lego block and putting a new Lego block. Perfectly valid.

After a while, it begins to be like, so? It's all better. Yes, it's nice, and you've got to be concerned about ethics and issues around doing that. If you're making a movie and the Lego block you're popping out is the live actor and you're putting in an AI version, that's got some more issues maybe more than just scheduling doctor's appointments. But those are pretty straightforward advances, and they don't fundamentally change the ecosystem you're working on. I would put those back in the older versions of what is innovation about?

Where I think it gets exciting for me as a choreographer is saying, "What if I take that piece of AI and I use it to reimagine the entire ecosystem so it unlocks a completely new approach?" Let me do a little imagining around what healthcare might look like. What if the AI became your doctor? The AI was constantly monitoring your Fitbit or your Apple Watch, the AI is constantly watching your environment in your house, the AI is tracking all the health data in your community, and it's also looking at your health history and matching it up to people in Phoenix who have similar health concerns. Now you have an entirely different way of prescribing and monitoring care.

And yes, you might still go to your physical doctor's office for something, but the ecosystem around this is completely different. And when you start doing something like that, then the game changes, then entirely different forms of care are available. For people who might've been left out of the care system before, the barriers of, "I can't get to a healthcare provider, I don't have the money for a healthcare provider. There's no doctors in my area," all of those things are transformed. And that's what you see with some of these big ecosystem shifts. That's where I think it's exciting is when the technology unlocks a new ecosystem.

Sarah Nicastro: Then the role of the choreographer, though, is to keep afoot in both of those worlds, right? Any company has to-

Dan McClure: Yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: You're not leaping from plugging out one Lego block to a whole new ecosystem, you need to be able to take the more incremental approach while looking toward but what does this mean for us in five or 10 years? And then-

Dan McClure: Yes, I'm going to challenge you there because I think, yes, you still probably should be looking at how do I swap AI at specific spots? If I'm a doctor's office, I should be making my prescription practices better, I'd say. But the time to invent a new ecosystem is almost always now. The path to get to that new ecosystem is not step-by-step change. Think about it. When the Ride-sharing concept came up, it wasn't cab companies that made the step-by-step shift up, it was somebody coming up with-

Sarah Nicastro: It was disruption.

Dan McClure: ... a new ecosystem that came in. The question is do you want somebody else to invent that new ecosystem or do you want to?

Sarah Nicastro: Right. Yeah. No, that's really interesting. Okay, let's talk about the book, Do Bigger Things. Tell us a little bit about what it's all about, but also what prompted you guys to put this out into the world?

Dan McClure: As we've already talked, there's a lot of excitement that both Jenny and I have around this idea of doing ecosystem innovations, making these disruptive new ways of doing things in the world and the choreographer roles that come along with that. The challenge we always had was people would say, "Oh, good. Tell me what book I should go read."

And what we found was there were really two problems. One, the ideas and concepts were scattered all over the place. Here's a list of forty-three books that you could go and get little pieces of this. And the other thing is it was still being held hostage by the PhD academics and the systems engineering optimization folks. Even when you did go read it, it was a little bit of modeling theory, et cetera. What we felt like was necessary and what we've seen has been true in the past is new innovation practices get adopted when the idea behind the innovation is laid out clearly, the roles are laid out clearly, and then there is a straightforward understanding of what the practice looks like. And we just didn't see that anywhere so we ate a little bit of our own dog food and did a choreographer bit around how do we present a complete picture of this ecosystem innovation practice?

Sarah Nicastro: Okay. What can people expect to find in the book? Who is it best for? And what will they be able to take away from it?

Dan McClure: We really tried to write it in a very accessible style. The book is based around stories and examples. We tell the story of choreographers doing amazing things with cataract surgeries in India and commercial innovators like Airbnb and community innovators who did amazing things during the pandemic. It's around these ideas of if you're going to understand something as complex as ecosystem innovation, you need to see some ecosystem innovations to see how that fits. That's the structure we've used.

We lay it out really basically three parts. What's the idea? Why do you need to do this? What are the people? And then what's the practice? And if you are somebody who wants to be a choreographer, this should be your handbook is our goal. If you're somebody who owns a gnarly, ugly problem or whose company is about to be run over by a bus, this shows you a path forward, and then you can go out and get your choreographer.

Sarah Nicastro: Okay, very good. When we think about organizations who are today navigating change, trying to sort through what type of innovation they should be focused on, et cetera, what would you suggest they be thinking most about keeping in mind?

Dan McClure: I think all of this is rooted in understanding just how big a change you need to thrive in the years ahead. This is true whether you're trying to run a business and Amazon's going to come in and just completely disrupt your marketplace, or it's true if you're an activist and you want to do something like make a real progress on climate change or want to make real progress on inequities in the world. You need to understand that little haphazard steps forward is not going to be enough for you. I think that's the beginning part. And as a leader or somebody who's actually driving their own actions, just embracing I need to be aspiring to make a bigger impact than simply the next mobile app or a little bit better change in this or that.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. I'm wondering, though, one of the challenge has to be for organizations particularly that have a long history to figure out how to have the objectivity they need to determine how big that change needs to be. I think when you are the one that's been a part of what's always worked for so long, is it possible to be objective? Or is there a practice of involving the right people to really assess what the innovation need is?

Dan McClure: Yeah, I think you need to invite some choreographers into the conversation. You're right, if your entire world has been focused on making the status quo work really well, you're going to be the kind of person who that's an important question for. And it's also you're going to have an investment deep into the status quo. One thing I think, though, that can help is changing the question, not asking, "Looking back, how much do I need to change what I've got?" But rather looking forward and asking, "What's the big new possibility here? And then how do I get there from what I've got?" And I think that makes it maybe not less scary, but certainly more exciting.

Sarah Nicastro: To me, this is the point where this conversation ties in with some of the leadership conversations that I've had recently on the podcast, because I mentioned earlier that I see this shift in more traditional approaches being replaced by a more modern approach. And there's layers to that, but I think we have leadership that has been rooted a lot in command and control, right?

Dan McClure: Absolutely.

Sarah Nicastro: And those leaders have historically felt the responsibility of knowing what's right and knowing what needs to come next; a personal responsibility. I think this is where a modern view of leadership is important because I think more modern leaders are humbled in knowing they don't know it all, they don't need to know it all, but they need to surround themselves with diversity of thought, right?

Dan McClure: Yep.

Sarah Nicastro: Because when you can do that and when you actually can genuinely ask... You may have choreographers, like we talked about earlier, within your business that are miserable because they're just trying to do the job that you've told them to do that have a lot of these ideas, so I think part of it is just becoming more open to the idea of welcoming creativity and brainstorming and listening to what people think and not subscribing to that very outdated mentality of, "Well, if I lead this organization or this function, I should have all of the answers." I think that puts people in a position of weakness.

Dan McClure: Yeah. And I think there's kind of three steps here. If there's the top-down control, "You're going to do what I say," then the next step up, as you inferred, was you have permission to talk to me. You have permission to bring ideas, etc. For me, the most exciting organizations are the ones where we see where the organization leader is saying, "I demand that you bring big, bold ideas." And this is what we're about is big, bold ideas. And you can just feel the energy change in those organizations because when the leader stops saying, "I'm grudgingly going to let you pitch things to me," and more saying, "The future is threatening to us if we don't act boldly," and just keeps reiterating that message in everything they do, you just get a different kind of energy.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah, yeah. We're talking about the organizational view. In terms of individuals, how do you recommend leaders that want to help drive innovation, how do they stay energized? How do they ensure they're effective? What advice do you have for those people? And obviously reading the book is one step, but just if you were to share a couple of those things.

Dan McClure: Well, of course the answer is read the book no matter.

Sarah Nicastro: Yes, of course.

Dan McClure: Do you need to make tomato sauce? Read the book. No. I think it's really three parts here. First, it's understand the challenge and get excited about the future. I find, and I think this is true of most choreographers but I also think it's true about most leaders, being excited about what's ahead just makes all the rest of the stuff better. And if you're not living in dread but instead thinking, this is a world of huge change, and that empowers me to do something great, that just pushes you along.

The second bit, though, is you've got to make it easier to actually follow through on that vision. Now imagine if you wanted to rebuild your house and completely new floor plan. If you wanted to rebuild my house, which is this 100 year old house that I'm sitting in, you'd have to raise the whole thing, flatten it, and then build it up again. That would be traumatic. And I think that's the way a lot of folks see organizational change is we're having to take a bulldozer and just smash everything and then put the pieces back up. No wonder everybody finds that an awful experience to go through.

On the other hand, if you had a Lego house, what you could say is, "Here's the new future. We need to readjust it." Pull the Lego parts together and put them together in new ways. That becomes less painful, and it allows you to more quickly and effectively adapt to new opportunities. And so this is, I think, the organizational design part that comes along with the leadership. It's one thing to tell people you've got to change and you've got to embrace these new opportunities, but you've got to build an organization that's designed for change. And making it more like Lego blocks, for lack of a better metaphor, I think it's a big part of that.

Sarah Nicastro: What do you think makes an organization more able to change? The idea of the foundation of the house versus the Lego blocks, is it communication? What are the elements that allow that agility?

Dan McClure: I think there's just some how do you build out the pieces of the organization so that there's lines between them? Ironically, modular things have stronger lines so that you can hook them up in different ways. It might seem intuitively like you want to have infinite communication, but you really want to have ways to know how people interact and communicate with each other.

Technology can make a huge difference. I think one of the most underestimated management decisions that Amazon made was that every piece of technology they built would be able to be deployed separately in the cloud. And as a result, they built an organization whose technology was designed to do new things. And you see them doing radically new things. They enter healthcare, they enter publishing. They've entered all these new fields, and partly it's because they've got Lego blocks that allow them to do that. I think you can use your technology, you can use your organizational design, and then you've got to get managers who are on board with the idea.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. You talked about the mindset of, I guess I'm paraphrasing, but not looking at what lies ahead as overwhelming dread, but more so excitement around the possibilities. And we talked about some different aspects. Any other advice you can share on mindset or tools or practices that you think help move toward impactful change?

Dan McClure: Yeah. One of the things that came out of the last generation of innovation practices, the digital product innovation, was the useful concept that failure wasn't a catastrophe, that risk is okay. And in fact, we should be failing fast. And I think there's a lot of context where that makes sense. If you're trying out a lot of little ideas and you want to find out which one sticks, failing fast is cool because then you don't invest too much in an idea that didn't work.

If you're going to be building ecosystems, you don't get that opportunity. You don't get the chance to say, "I built out an entirely new ecosystem. Ooh, I've failed. I'm going to throw that all away." And in fact, every move you make, because now we're involving people and we're involving organizations and we're involving real decisions and choices by folks, you don't even get to test it a whole bunch of different times. You've got to test it, understand what's going on, and then adapt.

I think one of the biggest shifts that you're going to see with innovation is moving away from the idea of failing fast and just throwing out the losers to how do I learn and adapt quickly and well? And it's a different skill. Learning is still important, getting fast feedback still important, but now your response is, "How do I take this big, ungainly, messy thing that I'm building and adapt it based on that part?"

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. Not throw it away, but figure out how... Yeah.

Dan McClure: Yeah, continue to morph it.

Sarah Nicastro: Yep. Yeah, that makes sense.

Dan McClure: It's more like a marriage with the future than a first date.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. No, that's great. All right, I love this. This has been a great conversation. The book comes out February 13th, right?

Dan McClure: Yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: And where will everyone be able to find that and you? Let them know how they can connect if they want, et cetera.

Dan McClure: Yeah. The most obvious place... And we're trying to make this available as much as possible around the world because the work we're doing and the choreographers we engage with are really global. That's part of what makes it so exciting. Amazons and all your different Amazons around the world, we should have that available. There will be availability in bookstores, but that will be dependent on which market you're in and to what extent there's printing. I would say Amazon and those other online channels are the best place to grab things. We'll have it in digital audiobook. We've got a really cool Aussie speaking narrator for our audiobook. It's fun.

And then, yeah, if you want to reach out to us, innovationecosystem.com is the place. And just to let you know, as a preview, we're setting up a community for choreographers, which will be hosted on LinkedIn. And so that's another place you'll be able to hook up with not only us but our peers in the choreographer community.

Sarah Nicastro: Awesome. And when will that be happening?

Dan McClure: I don't know. We're still building the ecosystem. We're hoping in weeks kind of thing as opposed to months and months. But it's work in progress.

Sarah Nicastro: Follow Innovation Ecosystem on LinkedIn, I would imagine-

Dan McClure: Yep.

Sarah Nicastro: ... to hear more about the community. And we'll do our best to link everything in the show notes as well so people know where to go to find everything we've talked about. But thank you so much, Dan, for the wonderful insights. I appreciate it.

Dan McClure: Yeah, this is such exciting stuff and such exciting times. I really appreciate the chance to get on and ramble on about it.

Sarah Nicastro: No, it is exciting. And I think one of the things that's important and what I like about the idea of what you're doing with the community is the more you can surround yourself in content, in interactions with people who are excited about the possibility instead of nervous or threatened, it helps you feed off of that energy. And so I think the idea of the community is great, and I'm personally very excited to read the book.

Dan McClure: All right. Well, thank you very much. Have a great weekend.

Sarah Nicastro: All right. Thanks, you too. You can find more by visiting us at futureoffieldservice.com. While you're there, be sure to sign up for the Future of Field Service Insider, which is our monthly newsletter, to make sure that you don't miss any of our articles or podcasts. The Future of Field Service podcast is published in partnership with IFS. You can learn more at ifs.com. And as always, thank you for listening. Okay.

I’m so excited for you all to hear this week’s podcast with Dan McClure, System Innovation Architect and Choreographer at Innovation Ecosystem. This is Dan’s second appearance on the Future of Field Service podcast; he was first a guest on episode 124 back in August of 2021. We all know how much has changed in the world of innovation since then, and Dan’s soon to release a book called Do Bigger Things: A Practical Guide for Doing Powerful Innovation in a Changing World (available February 13^th).

So, I knew going in there was a lot to discuss, but we quickly strayed from my agenda – real shock, right? We’d set our sights on discussing things like:

How has innovation changed in the last ten years, and how will it change in the next five?
How are technologies like AI impacting innovation? Do you see this as an opportunity or a challenge for organizations?
What’s key for organizations in navigating change/innovation well in today’s complex landscape?

While we did dig into all of these areas and more, what I want to share with you today is a piece of our conversation that’s had me thinking ever since about what innovation looks like in the service landscape and how ready companies may (or may not) be for more disruptive change.

You’ll notice in Dan’s title he refers to himself as “Choreographer” – we spend some time in the beginning of the podcast talking about what exactly this means and the hallmark characteristics. I think in some ways you can put it into a similar categorization of challengers and change catalysts – people who are excited by opportunity, who see the big picture, and who aren’t afraid of asking hard questions or sharing bold ideas.

These are my words, not Dan’s, and listening to him explain the choreographer role is well worth your time. Personally, it’s something I can really identify with – I’ve worked hard in my professional career to harness my choreographer-like traits for good, because often early on my excitement and passion was viewed more as “difficult” than creative. As an aside, and I wish I’d have thought to ask Dan about this, I have to wonder if women who have choreographer traits tend to be perceived differently than men with those same traits. I found myself early in my career being told I was “too emotional” when I’d speak up on an issue where I’d seen men in very similar situations received far differently.

Anyway, here I am getting off track! While I do resonate personally with a lot of what Dan shared about the choreographer’s role in innovation, what it had me thinking about that is relevant to you all is – how ready is service for this type of role? You hear every company speaking about how they are working to innovate, but how are they defining innovation? Are they introducing incremental improvement, or really redefining their value proposition or delivery models?

Walking the Talk

I’ve talked to many service leaders who are likely choreographers who see so much potential for innovation within their company but are stifled in not only action but even sharing those ideas because their executive leadership may lay claims to innovation but is quite comfortable with the status quo. I do believe this is changing, quickly, and that companies need to really consider how open they are to those who see the potential for change are willing to drive it.

I shared in my 2024 predictions that I believe “old-school” leaders will be ousted, and I think topic ties in. Cultures who operate in a manner where an elite few make all decisions based only on their very limited context won’t survive in the rapidly changing world Dan speaks about. Companies who recognize that innovation comes from diversity of thought and requires an environment where different perspectives and new ideas are welcomed will without a doubt take the competitive lead.

It seems many companies and leaders are following a script of what they know they should say – they are people-first, employee-centric, innovative – and so on. But is it true – is it genuine? It’s genuine when they say these things backed by a true recognition that it’s the only path to success; not in an obligatory manner.

If you identify with the choreographer description you’ll hear this week, Dan gives three options for how you can navigate a situation where you feel your ideas aren’t truly welcomed.

What does an organization who is ready for – or already supportive of – choreographers look like? A few things come to mind:

Leaders are truly open minded
Employees are empowered to share their feedback, input and ideas
Employee feedback is acted upon and communicated back
Diversity is not only deemed important but prioritized at all levels of the business
Those who show promise as the choreographer type are given opportunities to hone their skills

What would you add to this list? I’d love to hear from you!

Sarah shares her thoughts on what will take focus in 2024 for organizations focused on field service.

Sarah Nicastro: Welcome to the Future of Field Service podcast. I'm your host, Sarah Nicastro. Here we are in January of 2024, and I am once again being asked to predict what will come in the world of field service this year. I've shared before that the idea of predictions, I find a little challenging because I just know that none of us can really predict the future, but I'm always asked my thoughts and happy to share. So we'll say with that caveat, well, certainly I can't predict what's to come. I'm going to talk about some themes here, four themes that I think will really be key to the service landscape in 2024.

I'm going to do these at a high level, but I am hosting a webinar next Thursday, February 1st at 10:00 AM Eastern Time, with some wonderful guest speakers. I have Roy Dockery of Flock Safety, Tom Mills of Field Solutions Group, and Bob De Caux, who is the resident AI expert at IFS. And they're joining me for a very informal open forum conversation where I'm going to ask them what they think of these predictions and have them give their thoughts on what they see to come as well. So we'll put the link in the show notes, but be sure to join us for that. I think it'll be a nice dynamic chat more so than just me talking to myself.

So the first thing, obviously I would be remiss to not mention is the AI buzz. And I think what we're going to see in 2024 is that buzz turning into action. It was interesting to me to be attending events with service leaders throughout 2023, the mixed emotions around the topic of AI. Some of them were really genuinely excited about it and had some strong opinions on the role it will play for their organizations. And others I think were honestly sick of hearing about it and feeling that there were more important topics to be discussed in the content they're reading, the sessions they're attending, et cetera. So a mixed bag, but the buzz was there nonetheless, and it remains and with good reason.

I shared in a conversation a couple of times last year that to me, this wave of AI and what's possible is the next really foundational shift in the way we work. So digital transformation was the first, and I would say maybe getting a handle on data the second, although some still haven't done that. And putting that data to use and really looking at what's possible with AI and automation today, I think is what the focus will be going forward. So the thing about AI is it's a pretty vague term. There are a lot of AI based technologies, some of which have actually been in use for a very long time. And I think it's important when we think about the AI buzz and the AI action we need to take, grounding that in what will be and what can be valuable to the business. Anytime you see a technology that takes over the headlines like this, you have a lot of people that feel they need to jump on the bandwagon, and they do that in a very rushed way that ultimately can hinder their success rather than contribute to it.

So I think yes, the buzz in my opinion is warranted, but really leading with what are you trying to accomplish? What are the areas of opportunity and the biggest challenges for your business and how does this fit into that is more important than rushing out and doing X, Y, or Z just because it's trending and it's cool. So I think it'll be really interesting to see how companies really dig into what has been buzz and they look for the opportunities to take action with technologies that truly are ready for primetime. I think it's more so a matter of business readiness. So is the business ready for it? Is your workforce ready for that amount of change? Is your data infrastructure ready to be leveraged in the way that it can, et cetera? So again, next week during the webinar, Bob De Caux will be on and he's going to be talking a little bit about some of those readiness indicators. Also, how to assess what the best fits are, et cetera.

So the second theme I think is around leadership. And I see that this year and moving forward, I think a lot of old school leaders are going to be ousted. And I want to be clear, when I say old school, I do not necessarily mean age. I mean more so mindset. If you've seen any of the content that we have published recently with Carolyn from Vattenfall, that type of thinking that people first mentality, leadership and action, I think is really the wave of the future. Obviously, some organizations are already there and have been there, a lot aren't. A lot have really leaders in place that have quite outdated opinions and methods and practices and beliefs. And I just don't think that with the talent landscape being what it is, with the customer expectations that we're facing, that we can afford to allow that type of old school leadership to persist.

So Roy, who's speaking on the webinar next week, actually is publishing his very first book, and I'm excited. My copy is in the mail. It should be here before next week. So we'll be able to talk a little bit about that. But this concept of leadership is something that is incredibly important to him. So I'm really interested to get his take on just how quickly will this evolution shift. Just because I think that we're going to see progress in this area, it doesn't mean that I think every old school leader will be eradicated by the end of 2024. And also there's a lot of complexity to that. Carolyn shared in the session we did in Stockholm, she had the no policy, but how hard that was to actually put action behind because it's something that people support in theory until it becomes a reality that is more layered and complex to make those decisions. So I'm interested in that topic and that conversation.

The next theme is around how customer experience will demand service silos dissipate. So this is something that we've seen happening. Mark Hessinger from 3D Systems was on the podcast a while back. He was talking about his shift even in title from customer service to customer success and what that represents for their business. We had Bob Feiner from Dell on a while back talking about think rings, not trophies. So we've seen this start.

I think that the way service is evolving, it's going to become more and more prominent because one, I think customers are going to tolerate even less, the disconnectedness that does still exist in a lot of organizations. And two, we talk about the world of outcomes. Ultimately, I think they're going to look for more and more integration of those things and more and more of a really landscape view of how service providers can assist them in their business objectives, which I think is just again, going to really reinforce and expand the need for companies to break down those silos.

Electrolux is another example. We've done quite a bit of content with Electrolux because their service transformation is something that is based on them deploying IFS technology. But that service transformation is just one piece of a bigger company objective around customer centricity. So I think things like that, that really fundamentally change some of the organization of processes within and technology used by organizations, we're going to see more of that.

And finally, the role of the field technician will begin to be redefined. We've seen this coming, but it's one of those things where because there are short-term talent challenges, it's really easy to say, "Yeah. Definitely it's changing, but let's just worry about right now." I think we're going to start to see some of those changes really take shape, and we're going to see some of the organizations that are leading that charge having to figure out what this means and what this looks like. When we talk about AI and automation, there is just no way that we don't end up having to really dig in and take a look at what the service function means, what its core value proposition is, how it's delivered, and what that means in terms of how it changes the makeup of our talent.

So there's again, plenty of examples of this. Tony Black of Husky, he was on the podcast this past year or last year I suppose, and he talked about their move to Predictive, ultimately a change in service delivery model. And I think it's a really good example to go have a listen to, but it is just one piece. There's a lot of things driving this evolution around what is a field technician? What do they do? Does that role become multiple roles? How much of that role is replaced by AI? How much automation will customers tolerate? What aspects of human centricity are imperative to maintain? And is it the field technician that does that or is it someone else? Is it more of a sales role? Is it more of a customer success role. So there's a lot of interesting things to talk about here.

And Tom, who will be joining is his firm, the Field Solutions Group specializes in talent acquisition, and they do a lot of primary research. So they have a lot of things that we can dig into to talk about that topic a little bit more. So those are the four, if not predictions, areas that I think are going to be top of mind for everyone in 2024. Obviously, you will see those things represented in the content that we create here at Future of Field Service, and you can stay tuned for conversations around these things and taking a real world look at how companies are changing or where they're struggling to change, et cetera.

And as I mentioned, if you have an opportunity to join us next Thursday, February 1st, I think it will be really a good opportunity to test my theories with some people that I respect a lot, their insight and ability to bring some interesting things to the conversation. So stay tuned for more here. Join us at the webinar if you can, and I will look forward to seeing you next week. So we'll put the link to the webinar in the notes. You can find all of our podcasts and other content at futureoffieldservice.com. The Future of Field Service podcast is published in partnership with IFS. You can learn more at ifs.com. As always, thank you for listening.

During the Future of Field Service Live Tour in Stockholm last October, I had a chance to sit down with the team from Electrolux for a deep dive into their ongoing service transformation as part of the company’s overall customer centricity initiative. The service transformation a significant global project to replace a 40-year-old service management platform – sound pretty daunting, eh?

As you can imagine, updating such an entrenched system required a lot more than just ripping and replacing software. The Electrolux service team did not want to miss an opportunity to take a top-to-bottom look at service processes so they could really reap all the benefits of using new technology. Good on them for recognizing the reality that layering new tech on old processes won’t do much to improve operations overall.

To make an already major undertaking even more daunting, the first phase of their initiative did not go well. In 2018, the company rolled out a pilot solution in Belgium and not only did the solution not really work, but the vendor also went through an acquisition during deployment, which would have led to another major upgrade not too far along in the future.

Fortunately, Electrolux had the foresight to change paths before getting in too deep. The company decided not only to implement a new tool, but also to take a different approach.

"[T]his time we thought, ‘Let's do something different. Let's involve the actual end users and all the countries that would ever use this tool. They should be part of even selecting the vendor, selecting the tool,’” said Kristoffer Brun, Services & Repair Transformation Manager.

Electrolux also met with each potential new vendor to find out what their product roadmap would look like. With input from customers and internal stakeholders, and a future vision from the tech vendors, they slowly built a set of business requirements based on what they wanted their service operation to look like in the near-term and in the future. They also visited vendor references in person to see how potential software solutions were working.

After selecting IFS Service Management and successfully rolling it out in Belgium, Electrolux next turned its attention to Denmark. There are a lot of lessons to take from their experience there regarding change management, because as they described it, their Danish organization was very stable – with the highest average age of technicians in Europe.

That can be a huge hurdle, because long-time technicians can be resistant to process and technology changes. Electrolux took an interesting approach – they brought in an outsider to help lead the transition and serve as a change ambassador. The Danish team also met with the Belgium team in person to see the solution in action.

“We got to talk with the technicians, with the resource planners, the parts planners, the back-office team, and ask any questions we wanted,” said Peter Sandkvist, Transformation Manager. “They presented to us. And this specifically built confidence in the Danish team.”

How Storytelling Aids Change Management

Anna Mezzanotte, Service Operations Product Domain Expert at Electrolux, brought up another key strategy that Electrolux emphasized – the role of storytelling in change management.

“Because we really need to make sure to explain to all our business users why we're doing this change, of course, but also the consequence of not embracing this change. What's the opportunity cost at stake?” she said.

Just as important was explaining to the technicians what they could gain from the new system. “Make sure that you explain to all these agents that will work with the solution what's in there for them,” Anna said. “[H]ow will these new tools make their life easier and better?”

The other benefit of really understanding the “Why?” of the project and explaining it to employees affected by it, is that it also helps the implementation team better understand the project scope and its limitations.

Peter said that careful, detailed planning was another key part of their success. Not just planning who would complete what task, but also planning out communication and training in advance, and planning to establish some resilience in the project and in the team for when things did not go well. In other words, have a Plan B (and maybe a Plan C), so everyone knows what to do if something fails.

The Electrolux team also mentioned something that other field service leaders have brought up in our discussions before – the importance of having some fun and celebrating successes throughout the project timeline, not just at the end. Without those celebrations, change simply becomes exhausting.

What Electrolux did (through research, having a future vision, careful planning, and good communication) also helped build some future capabilities into the workforce and the management team. When the next project comes along that might create changes (even small ones) in the organization or the technology set, the team is better prepared to manage that process and accept those changes because a foundation of trust has been built.

As Anna noted, “If I have to pick up one of the most important lessons learned, I would say that – and again, I'm referring a lot to my IT colleagues here – remember that, [in the] end, it's not an IT project. It's a people project.”

I had a great, wide-ranging discussion with the Electrolux team. You can listen to the whole thing here.

In a session from the Stockholm Live Tour, Sarah talks with Ann Sørensen, Global Competence Development Manager at Alfa Laval about how to build competence in service for today’s needs but also with an eye to the future. This conversation touches on training of the front line workforce and career pathing to leadership development and employer branding, and a variety of other topics that factor into an effective talent strategy.

Sarah Nicastro: So Anne's role is, global competence manager at Alfa Laval, and the reason I wanted to have this conversation, after the others is because I think, uh, it will tie into each of them, right? So there's so much about the change that's taking place that then affects what we're looking for in talent when we bring them in, what we need from the talent that we have, what will.

You know, get people to be able to do these next versions of the roles we're asking them to do and what will keep them engaged and empowered as employees. So I thought it would be a nice way to sort of reference back some of, uh, the points that have come up throughout the day and, talk about it from that, uh, lens of, of talent and competence.

So, before we do that, tell everyone, uh, a little bit more about yourself and Alfa Laval. Super,

Ann Sørensen: yeah. I am, I'm from Denmark. Wow. You heard about something in Denmark. So working in central and learning in, uh, in global service operations, as I said, my background is in banking, marketing, and then over as a trainer and the pedagogical approach.

I, uh, one of the key elements in my career has been developing people. , and then I added a lot to the organization later on. Privacy. I am a horseback rider. I used to compete in show jumping. , it, this time it's a little bit, you know, a smaller one, Icelandic horse. When I'm, when I'm at home, I'm living in the countryside.

I'm living on a farm, but I commute and I travel a lot. 26 different sales companies around the world with service operations. A lot of stakeholders to take care of. I am, , I am sitting in the matrix between three big divisions, marine, food and water, and energy. And on the same hand side, I then sit with these 26, uh, different sales companies.

So, it's quite a bit

Sarah Nicastro: of complexity.

Ann Sørensen: It, it is, it is. Yes. But also with the great challenges. And great people. Yeah. Yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: All right. So all of the things that we've talked about today. Okay. , the changes that are taking place in service. , you know, the different ways customer expectations are evolving in different industries ahead.

We talked about people first. We've talked about technology. , we've talked about leadership, you know, all of these different things. , all of those realities, of what today's landscape looks like, and how is that shaping competence strategy?

Ann Sørensen: So if we look at, into the Alfa, I mean, the strategy, uh, within the competence is of course connected to our service strategy and the transformation that we launched back in, uh, 2020, because.

We were very much vision-driven, which is a benefit, uh, for, for, uh, for having this, you could say drive, going on. So if we look at the competence landscape, what happened in that transformation was that we, built it up around some cornerstones, which of course the competence is needed, to click into, right?

So first of all, we said to attract and retain people. A very clear career path that we knew was needed. Otherwise, it was, it would be really difficult. Then the service advisor, that was what we called them, not trusted advisor. We had a lot of discussion about this. The advisor, what does it now take, to educate, uh, and, and give those kinds of competencies standing there just in front of the customer and bring back more business, not being a salesperson?

Then, of course, we also have what we call, you could see the digitized way of working, uh, the more, uh, connected, we call it the connected field service. Now, what does that mean? Is it about being remote? Is it about, you know, being able to crunch the data that connected equipment can kind of gather? Or, or how do we go about this?

And then, the last one was more the presence building. But what we, what you call that, what we always pay attention to is safety. So we had that as a core and it's still, of course, safety, safety, safety, that is, that is, you know, so building the strategy about this, of course, paying attention to what is happening around us with the new generation coming in.

It's, it's, it's, it's fun. It's challenging. We have. We have, uh, some kind of, you could say, uh, inbuilt, dialects, maybe also internally. , we, uh, like to act as one. Uh, so we bring down the silos between sales and service. , We know that that is, uh, a key element because when you're out there in front of the customers, you need to act as one.

You need to have a joint effort. And that's a journey, uh, as well. Yeah?

Sarah Nicastro: Yes. A lot. I think, you know, this area of, you know, how do we attract, uh, hire and retain talent? How do we give them the skills they need in today's environment? It's an area that is so challenging. I think a lot of companies, have kind of, uh, not admitted that they've given up, but it's, it's something where it's very easy to just focus on the aspects you can't change that makes it hard instead of doing what you can to change, okay?

Do you know what I mean? Like, it's very easy to point to things that, you know, you don't have control over as the cause. And not separate out reflecting on how it is that you do as an organization need to evolve. and so, you know, we talked about, why I spoke about diversity this morning in the workshop that we were in, you know, we talked about some of the ways that services evolving.

and I think we'll continue to in the next few years. I think will allow us to bring, people into the service realm that haven't been a part of that workforce before or haven't, you know, for a variety of reasons. And I know one of the things that we spoke about, uh, that is important for Alpha LaValle and I think, also something others should consider is, Uh, the importance of considering what is your employer brand, right, and, and how well known or not, uh, and how well received or not is that in your potential talent pool.

And I think an important distinction is not just your historical potential talent pool, but the, the broader, you know, communities that could become a part of that talent pool. So can you. Talk a little bit about, you know, how you view the importance of the company brand, and some of the things you do to position Alfa Laval as an appealing place for people to work.

Ann Sørensen: Yeah. Employer branding is extremely important. If I go, just to have that headline, uh, and look into the 26 different sales companies. I mean, we don't say one size fits all. Of course, the brand, uh, the way that we go about our culture is extremely important. , we have a lot of, you could say, we are struggling in getting our field service on board, right?

We have positions that have not been filled. We hear, you know, we cannot keep up with the compensations and benefits. But if you ask me, yes, if it's a dime or two, or, I mean, of course, we should not negotiate. We should always be listening. For me, I mean, the culture and what we do for our people to grow, I think should be the brand of Alfa Laval.

And, what I hear when I try to investigate this is that, well, you don't. Only say that you do it, but you are doing it. And so I think that is, you know, confirming a little bit that, well, we, we, we, we walk the talk. So doing this branding is, very much up to the local sales companies. I try to encourage them and be creative in how they go about this.

What we did. And that is something that I normally share with them. I, uh, used to work in Alfa Laval, but in a business unit. We, uh, we met, uh, how can we do this in employer branding? Because I didn't know about Alfa Laval before I was there, kind of by coincidence. So I said, how can we do this? So we mapped who has this kind of, you could say, uh, connections to the universities, to the schools, who are sitting in that kind of environments, what part of those communities and how can we, with a joint effort, kind of put Al Farawal on the map.

So we, we were, we were sharing a lot of, you could say, different positions. in, in the local society, but also reaching out to the different universities and colleges, to put our brand there.

Sarah Nicastro: I think, you know, Hanela, we spoke about, you know, recognition of, of the Kone brand and, and, you know, you mentioned, you don't necessarily think about it until you're knowing to look for it.

Right. And, and I think in service and field service, there's so many brands like that, that. You know, you don't realize everything that goes into, you know, getting the products and goods that you have every day or keeping the world running unless you're looking. And I think, you know, as a whole set of industries, thinking together about how we bring more awareness to the fact that there's almost this whole other world of career potential for folks, that you don't think, you know, when you're a child, Oh, I want to grow up and be a nurse.

I want to be a teacher. You know, people don't say, Oh, I want to be in field service, or I want to be, you know, in, in one of these particular industries. So how do we, how do we think about creating that broader awareness, you know, obviously within individual companies, but also overall? Now you mentioned you in the matrix, you are, are in a central role.

Working with the local HR teams and local business leaders to execute strategy. sounds like a recipe for some friction. Yes. So, uh, how do you, you sort of navigate that and, and stay aligned on, you know, what the objectives are and, and how to go about it?

Ann Sørensen: A very good question and not so simple to answer just, uh, you know, in, uh, yeah.

So, uh, going about this, from the beginning, uh, when we, when we have this launch of the strategy, of course, we have to buy in from the MD from the, from the management. I am not part of HR. I'm a competent manager. I sit outside HR, but of course, the ones that I'm collaborating with closely are HR. It took a while to get the buy-in, uh, from the HR because we, we don't understand this, technical stuff and know.

But you understand people and you understand people's development. You sit locally as, as people, you could say, you are taking care of the workforce locally. , but they had a hard time because I could not answer questions about the cancers or high-speed separators. I'm not a technician. So they were, they would, they, they have, they, they were not the, and it's back to communication.

I need to hold up the mirror. Of course, I do. And then, but there was, it took some time for the buy-in. Now, these days, we see that HR is hiring business partners for service. So we see that we are on a journey and they are paying attention, but because they can see how we are, you know, how do we get the talents?

How do we onboard them in a good way? How do we make sure that we retain them? They are part of making that happen locally. I mean, from central. We can always ask, uh, we can also answer, you know, the why, we can also say what, but the how, it needs to be there out locally. That's very, very important. And that's how we work decentralized in Alfa Romeo.

But now they also start asking for the how. Yeah. It's a journey. And, um, one, one transformation creates a lot of spinoffs. Now we are looking into different ways to put up academies. How can we capture newly educated, bring them on board, and train them? Maybe we train a bit too many. We know that field service is a great place to start, a career in at least Alfa Laval.

Can we, can we push them into sales? Can we go, can we open the doors for repair or projects? That is something that we're working with. And again, one size does not fit all. Yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: So let's talk about frontline talent. Okay. Okay. So. Um, when, when you're bringing frontline talent into Alpha Label, uh, what is the competence focus and strategy?

Ann Sørensen: The competence focus is that we, we normally, is also a shift that has happened. I mean, we, um, are focusing much more on the attitude and behavior that we have ever done. Of course, there needs to be a kind of a basic understanding, uh, for, for, for mechanical stuff, depending on, uh, which layers of field service we, uh, we, we are, we are in a need for.

We have four layers, uh, in the career path. Um, when we look at it, it's also for them to, to be, you know, uh, flexible, you know, adaptable and agile, but they also need to have this kind of, you could say, um, continuously learning approach. And I think that the, the, normally the ones that we go about is very curious about, you know, investigating in their career, investigating in, in what can happen.

And we know. They will be shifting very, very fast. So we also are looking into, and that is maybe performance. I was smiling when you said that maybe performance, uh, not over people, but how can we break the learning curve faster? How can we make them up and running in a faster way? Maybe bringing in these modern tools, maybe, uh, you know, embrace them and figure out how can we simulate?

How can we? You know, train them, uh, in a, in a good and a fast pace. That is, that is where we are. And we, we, we fail sometimes we stumble and we, we get up and we learn. Yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: Is soft skills, is part of, the training?

Ann Sørensen: It's very much part of the training. And, uh, we haven't launched it yet. We are launching an onboarding program very soon.

We have put some of the behavior training that we normally do a little bit later, we put them up from the beginning. Because, you know, how do you go about listening to the customer? How do you go about asking, asking questions? Do, uh, have that, you could say, awareness that we are perceiving differently. So when we speak about a scope and stand there in front of a frustrated customer, how do we go about it?

How do we communicate? So we are bringing some of that behavior training. We try to not make soft training. We like to call it behavior training. Um, the more in the early stage for their onboarding, that is, that is what we are doing now. And now let's see what is happening. Um, because we, we train, we also see we have our field force.

We have invented what we call a sales lead app because we like them to identify potential out there. They should identify. They should not be salesperson. And we have had this, and you're not going to turn me into a salesperson. No, I have never had the intention. That is for other people. But you have an app.

If you see something potential, push it forward. We have some salespeople capturing on the other hand. They are advisors. And they, that is very, very important. They are, they are there to advise, not to sell.

Sarah Nicastro: You mentioned the career path. So what does that look like for a new technician coming in?

Ann Sørensen: A new technician coming in, if he starts on the basic level, he would, uh, have a very transparent, uh, learning plans.

We work with that. And we normally go about, if you are a separation specialist or a thermal specialist, then there are several paths that you need to kind of, you could say, master. Mm hmm. If you want to grow. This is a conversation you have with your manager. So the onboarding is also where the manager, so we are taking the manager, uh, there as well.

So that conversation is not necessarily only for the PD talk or, uh, development talk or what we call it. That is something that is going on constantly. So if you have a wish, to go into a business, of course, there needs to be a need. Uh, but then, uh, we would like to encourage our people to grow in that sense.

So there needs to be a promotion going from one step to another because the compensation and benefits are there and embedded as well because there needs also to be this what's in it for me. Why? Why should I develop? Um, now we can also see in some areas of our business, um, maybe we have, um, uh, a market that is, you know, flattening out a little bit.

Okay. So how do we then reskill our people? That's also part of it because we want, to retain our people. And we want to, uh, because they, they know, you know, I'm not being booked for anything. What is happening? I like to choose myself. I'd rather go out than, than, you know, they give me a, a note that I'm not here anymore.

I, so, we need to start those kinds of conversation, uh, quite early. Yeah. Yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. We, we spoke in, the breakout earlier about the importance of, you know, when it comes to retention, uh, younger talent wants to feel that they have opportunity to progress. So having this progression, having it be clear from the beginning, uh, making sure they know that there's an opportunity with that for them within the business.

Um, but we also talked about the fact that, as you mentioned, you know, um, can be better. We can't expect that field technicians are going to come into the role and stay there for 20 or 30 years like they did before, right? And so We need to be preparing for that and, and figuring that out. Um, but also we spoke about, uh, the reality that it can be better to retain them within the company, even if it isn't within service, right?

So if, if they're a talented individual and, you know, they, they have an interest or an aptitude to go into sales or to go into product or something else, right. Making sure that you have, uh, measures in place, um, to be able to. to do that.

Ann Sørensen: can I add a comment to that one? Because of what we do normally, we have a policy that we say we have open recruitment.

So if we have kind of internal posts, you know, people can go and look if they are curious about, you know, maybe I would need to fulfill a career within Um, Maybe being a manager or maybe being in sales or something else. Um, and then if you apply for an internal position, you will always get some kind of conversation with the hiring manager or with the HR.

So, and that is also bringing things to the surface, right? So you have a person who is now in the mood to look for something different. And if that person does not dare to supposed to or give that opportunity, you at least know that that person has put down an application or a wish to do something different.

So that is also for me a local responsibility from HR to then support, okay, we know that you are in this situation. How can we support you in, being the best candidate, if that's what you want to fulfill? To get an open and honest conversation with. With the employees. Yeah, that's not always happening. I know, but that is what we are aiming for.

Sarah Nicastro:. Yeah. So we also talked about, um, you know, I think a lot of, uh, folks, uh, at the moment in service think of, um, you know, competence and, and training and development, uh, about the frontline workforce, new employees come in, what do we do to get them up to speed?

Right. Um, but yeah. We also need to be thinking about how crucial it is, um, not to overlook competence and ongoing development, uh, from a leadership perspective. Um, so, can you talk, uh, a bit about, you know, what you're doing to make sure leaders, as well, are having the opportunity to develop and learn and grow, um, Because that has a huge impact on retention.

Ann Sørensen: It has a huge, huge impact. Um, I need to step one step back into history and I probably said this already to some of you. Uh, when we launched the transformation, we could see that the enablers for having that change happening were of course the leadership or the managers. So we, um, we, we initiated a transformational leadership because we were looking for that entrepreneurship.

We were looking for the vision-driven, we were looking for people having to buy in, and at the same time, we added to that training that people need to work strategically. Um, before we kind of put that program, uh, in, in action, we said, well, this is a personal journey, your manager. So we would like to offer you a 360-degree leadership evaluation.

Maybe you want a position because you are a fantastic engineer and maybe you are still working hands-on because in smaller sales companies. The manager might be out there working himself, right? Or he loves to do that, so he goes. Um, so in, in some occasion, we, we also by that could see that, okay, we have a layer of, of, of, of managers, uh, they get these kinds of scoring, they get the insights themselves because this is, I mean, you are a bit vulnerable when you are on a journey like this. After all, it's very much personal development.

Uh, and what was it you called this policy? What was it? No assholes. No assholes. So, from Central, um, when we looked into that, we could see if there were some assholes, uh, further up, right? Because how were you treating your people? Because what we offered the managers was that we said, you have a 360, you have feedback from your [00:24:00] managers and your surroundings, and if your manager may not be treating you well in this, maybe you'll get a big surprise, and that has never been addressed, uh, because the manager has never.

Talk to you about these issues, but suddenly you see it in a 360-degree leadership evaluation. What kind of, you could say, communication is that? So that was also an eye-opener for us. So from the central, we saw it was a bigger need than just what we, could address, from the transformation point of view.

Right now we are in the, the, in the, um, uh, what you say, the situation where we are looking into how do we, how do we, Move our service operations manager to become more strategic. We know that our field service managers might be more operational. So will we force them to take those strategic decisions?

Maybe not. Maybe not. So we will also need to go back, and we have not done that work yet, but that is what we are discussing right now. We know the team managers, because I spoke about, you know, the span of control. Uh, if you are a leader, the span of control cannot be 20 or 30 people. Um, so we have a layer of team managers that we also need to educate.

And, um, I think, uh, we are having a big attention here, because speaking of culture, we need them. Speaking about being close to your people, and retaining your people, you need to understand what it takes to, to thrive. What, and the motivational, yeah,

Sarah Nicastro: yeah, no, I think it's so, so important. And I think, um, you know, we, we spoke earlier about the fact that, uh, there's statistics on this.

I just don't have them handy, but, um, you know, companies drastically under-invest or don't invest at all in leadership, uh, training, and ongoing education. Um, and in service, in particular, if you think about, um, you know, historically, the way to reward a strong individual contributor is to make them a manager, you know, a director, uh, and, and have them progress through the ranks.

The challenge with that is, you know, them being a strong individual contributor as a field technician doesn't necessarily mean that they're a strong leader. And so, um, You know, we have to be very careful as we sort of push toward this, you know, more innovative future. Um, do you have the right capabilities within leadership teams to spearhead that, right?

And, uh, if not, you know, um, I know this wasn't the context you said about the gentleman who you brought in that was sort of a, an outsider in the, in Denmark, um, rollout, but it, it can be the same idea. You either need to augment that. Um, invest in, you know, building up those capabilities and certainly, you know, look for people that truly should not be in those positions because it will just ruin, uh, the culture and the morale and, and, you know, increased turnover. So, um, I think it's, it's a really important, uh, area.

Ann Sørensen: I can add to when we did the 360, right? And we had this coaching session because we offered an external coach, a session for that, the trainer. Uh, or the co-facilitator of that leadership training, and then, uh, I acted as a coach as well.

And some of the managers, they were not there, they were not comfortable. So the match was not there. So some of them are not in, those positions today and they are happy. I mean, this is normally also how it goes. I mean, if you, if you cannot see anything else, maybe. Can be a manager then..

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. I think it gets into a different conversation, but I think we need to come up with a way to reward strong individual contributors who do not just put themselves in charge of other people.

Because for some people, you know, not only do they not incline toward that, but, uh, they may not want to do it. They, may not be good at it, right? Um, and, and so, You know, how do we acknowledge their, um, excellence without just saying here, you know, there's a team. Good luck. Um, okay, so, so, Anne, as you look out over the next, you know, three to five years, um, when it comes to talent and, and competence, uh, what do you think the biggest things are that A, we're going to need to be looking for, um, and B, you know, we're going to need to be Uh, thinking about being prepared to address,

Ann Sørensen: I need to maybe put another statement here as well because I see a certain trend as well internally.

And maybe it's not only internally, but I see more of our field service moving from one country to another. I see a lot more crossing borders and, and going for local contracts in different countries. If that's the case outside Alfa Laval, I have investigated. But I see an increase in trend in that I see people going from this area to this area and they, they're okay by having a local contract.

They take the whole family, they go and, they start a new adventure. And of course, there is support, uh, connected with having internal movements. But, uh, I have also recruited when I was senator, I also recruited people from, from, from different countries outside of, and they were also kind of, you know, support in that kind of movements.

If that's, if that's a trend going on outside of, I haven't investigated that, but I see It's an increase in trend inside. Um, that's one thing. Um, AI is one of, of, uh, the things that we're talking about a lot. I was, in Stockholm a few weeks ago at a learning conference. And, uh, AI was of course the underlying theme.

And I think we can benefit a lot from those tools in our, in our area, so

Sarah Nicastro: I agree. I think, um, I certainly don't want to give, the connotation that I'm anti-AI to anyone. I just think what I am is anti-everyone jumps on a buzzword, um, right? And so I think. You know, uh, earlier we had a, a conversation, um, from a question about knowledge management.

Like, to me, that is an area where AI could provide tremendous value and service because we have a wealth of data and knowledge just sitting there waiting to be leveraged. Like, so my mind just goes to, you know, what are some of the Real world today problems we could solve let's start there, you know, and then get to some of the more

Ann Sørensen: forward thinking stuff I also see it more as a tool. It's more a tool to achieve what you are aiming for. Mm hmm. Yes. Yeah

By Sarah Nicastro, Creator, Future of Field Service

I am a huge advocate of the move toward a leadership style and company culture that honors the fact that they can’t accomplish their ultimate goals without their people and makes effort to truly respect, reward, and empower their teams. As such, I was thrilled to have the opportunity to interview Caroline Häggström Marklund, Managing Director and VP Customer Services Nordic at Vattenfall, at the October Live Tour event in Stockholm.

From the moment I first spoke with Caroline, I knew her statements of prioritizing a people-first culture had real authenticity and action behind them. With the correlation between employee engagement and customer satisfaction becoming clearer, we’ve fallen trap to many leaders and organizations who make empty claims of being “people-first” without an ounce of effort to back those claims up.

Vattenfall Customer Service is an example, however, of a company getting it right and its accolades don’t lie. Vattenfall won the Swedish Union's HBTQI award for most inclusive workplace, best service in the energy sector, and has earned its Great Place to Work certification. Lucky for our Live Tour attendees, they got to hear firsthand from Caroline what has elicited these awards and, more importantly, the right to claim people-first and mean it.

Reflecting back on our conversation, I see six key themes that stand out as foundational to what makes this work well rather than fall flat.

#1: Understanding & Accepting the Need

The companies making false claims are the ones who see employee engagement, satisfaction, and a people-first culture as buzzwords they “have to” care about; not as an opportunity to think and do differently that can pay dividends.

The reality is, due to the impact of the pandemic, generational ideals, talent shortages, and much more, a people-first approach is simply what’s needed today. I truly believe that companies who fail to embrace this reality will fall behind their competitors that do in short order.

“First of all, I think it's about common decency: Treat people well overall and in general, in business and in society. I think that's just what you do,” says Caroline. “But we've been through decades of automation and lean processes, and the tasks that are in our hands now are way more complex than what they used to be. In order to sort that out, people need to feel enabled and engaged. Also, when work is more and more relationship focused – relationships with customers, with the clients, within the organization, with colleagues and all of that – no matter what AI, our job will always be to sort of maintain relationships. If you're going to maneuver that world, I think you need to be given a lot of trust and freedom. It would be weird of me as a leader to say that I know exactly what all of the 400 people here in this organization need to do, because I don't. But I need to trust them that they know what to do if I tell them what the final goal is. I think a more complex environment, a more harsh overall climate in the world is leaning us towards this.”

In our complex and dynamic world, a prescriptive approach doesn’t lend itself to the agility needed and it stifles the creativity employees bring to problem-solving, brainstorming, and innovating. Like I said, the time for a new way has arrived – it’s just a matter of accepting it.

#2: Authenticity & Top-Down Support

One of the big points of caution that Caroline shared is to never, ever say you want to be people first – or, even worse, claim that you are – without being willing to do the work.

“It's about authenticity in a way, I think. That goes for, I mean, whatever culture you want to build. Sometimes I think that we don't realize that even if we don't sort of state what culture we want to have, we are still creating a culture just by acting in a certain way,” explains Caroline. “A people-first approach, to me, it's all about trust, and the people in my extended team and my closest team, they need to trust that I will put them first when the shit hits the fan and even before that. Therefore, it's about relationship, it's about trust.”

What happens when companies make the claim of focusing on or being people-first without any of the actions that make that claim a reality? They damage whatever trust they already had from their employees, and they lose respect, negatively impacting employee morale, company culture and often performance.

“If I want to earn people's trust, I have to be what I say I am, because if I'm not, it's hollow. If I state that I want to drive a people first culture and then act differently, then this is not going to have any power; rather the opposite,” warns Caroline. “In my view, it's like say that you want to do it and don't do it, it's the worst thing that you can do if you want to create something like that.”

While authenticity in the objective is critical, so too is top-down support – because an individual leader can believe in this approach wholeheartedly but struggle to take actions aligned with that belief if it isn’t shared by top-level executives.

#3: Trust the Payoff Will Come

Caroline stressed to me that there was one myth she wanted to be sure to address in our session, and that’s that a people-first strategy is soft or “fluffy,” not a path to achieving concrete, bottom-line impact. This simply hasn’t been her experience.

“Especially in customer service, it is all about relationships. If your people aren't comfortable or safe in their environment, how are they going to be able to have an open dialogue with a customer and do what is needed to do?” asks Caroline. “So, we started the journey of people and then performance because I am a firm believer, and now I also have clear evidence, that if you as a leader focus on enabling your people, setting them up for success, then the performance will follow. You need to measure it obviously, but you don't have to be ‘there’ if you're ‘here.’ Include and trust in people; it will come much easier.”

At the core, the belief is to stop prioritizing profit over people and trust that if we focus in the right ways on our people, the performance and profit will follow. Trusting this belief is something that more and more companies are beginning to do.

Caroline shared a story that illustrates how Vattenfall really built the momentum with this in her session. If you’d like to listen to the full story, you can find it on our podcast – but to summarize, early on in this initiative there was a problem with performance tied to staffing that needed resolved. Caroline took the steps she felt would resolve the issue, and it did not. The teams looked at her questioning what she’d do next, and she stated simply that she didn’t know – she needed them to tell her what they needed to succeed. This was a point where they realized her intent was genuine and that she wanted their input. They weighed in, she delivered what they needed, and the measurable results spoke for themselves in this approach being effective. Moreover, this was a turning point for building the trust that is necessary for the people-first model to work.

This piece can be tough for a lot of leaders who are pressured to make numbers and hit short-term goals. That’s understandable and something that needs to be navigated, but the example Caroline shared of what happens when you trust the process paints a clear picture of what’s possible.

If you missed our podcast with Venkata Reddy Mukku, Vice President Worldwide Service & Support Organization at Bruker Nano Surfaces & Metrology, it’s another conversation that deep dives into not only his believe in a people-first strategy, but details on how he executes and what the benefits have been.

#4: Create – and Enforce – a No Assholes Policy

This next one might raise some eyebrows, but it has to be said – to make good on a people-first strategy, you must create – and enact – a no-assholes policy. To be honest, this is one area where I feel a lot of organizations with initially good intentions fall short.

The excuses start to feel like reasons, and next thing you know it’s – oh, we can’t get rid of them, they are a top performer. Yes, they are causing some issues with morale but they’re so-and-so’s hire, so we’re sort of stuck. Yikes, they aren’t effective but it’s a really delicate issue.

No. Just, no. For this to work, really work, you have to eliminate the toxicity that exists among the ranks – and that means all the way from frontline to top levels. As Caroline mentions, this is not only not easy, but it also requires executive support.

“At first I needed to do a little bit of a structural change and move leaders that stood for the former culture basically. It was also clear that they were not willing or able to be authentic in the new world or however you want to put it. That was one thing. It was important in order to really establish this culture of people first, I wanted to make it really clear that harassment or any kind of demeaning behavior to others is absolutely unacceptable,” explains Caroline. “We needed to move away from if you were a brilliant mind that created a lot of business, but in the process of doing so, you belittled others or stepped on others or were even mean to others, you were still sort of like a high performer. In my world, that doesn't add up. A high performer is a role model as well as delivering business value.”

This initial wave of change gave way to the formal no-asshole policy. “That's when I introduced the no asshole policy. If you're an asshole, you will not be promoted. If you act in that way, you will not be seen as a high performer. You need to be both. That was quite effective I think, but you need to then act on it,” she urges. “To stand behind what you say, then you need to have, when someone brings up that they have been harassed or have been in an incident or something, you need to dive into it quickly and deal with all the things that come your way then and not try to move past it. This was not easy. I mean it was a lot of discussion also in my management team when we did performance evaluation like, ‘But he's so great and then he does all of this.’ It was a shift. It was not easy.”

Not easy, but we all know sometimes the most important changes are the hardest ones.

#5: Confident, Vulnerable & Humble Leadership

Putting in place a people-first strategy or culture isn’t possible without not only authentic but adept leadership. And the leadership skills that work well in a people-first world are often different than those that worked well in a command-and-control type environment. So, what’s important?

What I took from Caroline’s retelling of her efforts at Vattenfall is that she’s confident but humble. She believes in the approach, she believes in her ability to lead well in a people-first environment, but she’s aware that she doesn’t have – or need to have – all the answers and must welcome and embrace the input of her teams. “My ambition is to have a people-first culture, but that doesn't mean that I will always make the right choice, right? I'm only human and I can make mistakes and I can communicate things in a way that doesn't make sense and absolutely doesn't feel people-first. Therefore, it is really important to me that people talk to me when they feel that. We want to get to a full-on people first culture, but I don't claim to be perfect and there will be mistakes along the way.”

She also stresses the importance of being genuine: “Don’t try to be something that you aren't because you will never be able to fake it in people's mind. Self-leadership and self-knowledge are super critical. If you want to lead a people first culture, you need to make sure to know what kind of culture you are actually driving or developing just by being who you are. If it is what you want it to be, then that's fine. If it's not the culture that you want, then you probably need to change your behavior first. Ownership of your own behavior I think is important.”

I don’t see this as being about abandoning what feels sincere, but rather finding out how to be you while also being willing to grow as a leader, evolve, and adapt your strengths to what works well in today’s world.

You do have to reconcile that it’s really tough to be people-first without getting personal. “I want to know my organization and I don't want to know it by PowerPoints. I want to be able to greet people and recognize them. It's getting more and more difficult the more we get, but at least meet the people in their onboarding and talk a little bit and get a connection to lower the bar for people to come to me if there's something going on that I would need to know. Getting to know people, show that you actually care.”

Building the relationships that make this approach work demands leaders to be a bit vulnerable. “You can't build a relationship based on facts, you need to build it on feelings,” says Caroline. “That doesn't mean that you have to be emotional in a sense that you're crying or raising your voice or whatever, not that kind of emotion, but just be aware that there are feelings all around. I don't think that's soft. It can be uncomfortable because you have to show who you are as well and what you are thinking or feeling about things, but you can never build a culture if you don't show who you are. That's been a journey for me personally as well.”

#6: Reflect & Course Correct

As Caroline pointed out above when owning that she won’t always get things right, the goal in becoming truly people-first isn’t perfection, it’s intent and progress. This means that reflecting often on the state of things and being constantly willing to course-correct is imperative.

“The feedback culture, the feedback loop is so critical for us to move past obstacles that come our way and for me to learn and be better. It's not just about the organization developing and growing, I need to develop and grow as well,” says Caroline. “If you're not humble or willing to receive feedback, you will not get it. If you never get feedback, I think that's a red flag.”

As you reflect and course correct, Caroline suggests coming back to your core values. “If you wonder what kind of culture you are driving at the moment, go back to your core values. What are the things that are really important to you, that have basically always been important? You were taught this when you were a kid or by a role model at school or whatever. That is a process to get close to your core values,” she explains. “If you don't really know or you aren't really sure, which is pretty common, then reflect over the things that makes you really, really mad. When something ticks you off to the end that you get really mad or frustrated about it, then you've probably met someone or something that shows the opposite of what your core value actually is. You can turn that around and do some self-reflection. I think that is a good start in self-leadership and then driving culture.”

Caroline’s point about reflecting on what makes you mad reminded me of talking with Cait Donovan of the Fried Podcast when she was a guest – she talks about how there’s power in resentment, because it’s telling you something so important. This example of self-reflection shows, again, how leadership is evolving and the thinking that lends itself to really progressing a people-first strategy.

In addition to an individual leader maintaining an open feedback loop with their teams, it can be really helpful to combine that with a company-wide assessment of employee engagement, satisfaction, and feedback to make sure that a people-first approach isn’t being adopted in just one area of the business but across the board.

Sarah is joined by Marco Hugo Guiterrez, VP of Customer Service Operations, EMEA at Tetra Pak, who shares a detailed look at how the company is putting more emphasis on employee engagement and working to promote and maximize field force wellbeing.

Sarah Nicastro: Welcome to the Future of Field Service podcast. I'm your host, Sarah Nicastro. Today we're going to be taking a look at how Tetra Pak has created proven ways to support their field force well-being. I'm thrilled to be joined today by Marco Hugo Gutierrez, who is the Vice President of Customer Service Operations for EMEA at Tetra Pak. Marco, welcome to the Future of Field Service podcast.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Thank you very much, Sarah.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Thank you for inviting me.

Sarah Nicastro: Absolutely, thrilled to have you. So this is a topic that you did a session on at Field Service Europe in Amsterdam in the fall and I know it was incredibly well-received and I think with good reason. When we caught up to talk about this, I think it's such an important area for people to be focusing more on and you have such great specifics about how you and your team and Tetra Pak is doing that. So we'll get into all of that but before we do, just tell everyone a little bit more about yourself, your role and also the Tetra Pak business in case they're not familiar.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: So, thank you very much. Let me start by introducing Tetra Pak as a company. Our company is currently a leader in the food and beverage industry, mainly in the area, so processing and packaging. We are present around the globe as a full system supplier, meaning that we deliver not only the equipment but also the materials like packaging material, caps, et cetera. And we supply also services to, let's say, maintain and keep updated lines during the lifetime of these lines. Consumer knows us mainly through our packages. But we also have a very, very important install base in the processing area, the processing of the liquid that we normally process or other food categories. With more than 100,000 processing equipment and more than 9,000 packaging machines around the globe. For today's discussion, I think one figure that is really relevant is the amount of field service engineers. We have a very strong local presence in the world with more than 2,500 engineers around the world.

About myself; I would describe myself as professionally passionate about industrial services with almost 25 years dedicated to this area mainly working for Tetra Pak, but I started in the oil and gas industry. I started as field service engineering in fact. So I had also the experience being there in the field. Then I moved to sales, having different positions. Then I became a service director in France until 2018. And then since then, I have been working managing big organizations of field service operations with today I have a team of 1,100 employees delivering maintenance installations, TPM products, and also training for our customers. I'm also very focused on transformation of the service delivery model. I think that things are changing quite often, and for our customers and also when it comes to the people that we have and we'll talk about that today. And always looking for getting the right balance between two systems data and people.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah, I love that. And some of our podcast listeners may remember Sasha Ilyukhin who is also at Tetra Pack and has been on the podcast a couple of times. And I think it's interesting, you and he both started as engineers yourselves. And I've said to him before and I'll say to you, I think it makes me think two things. One, it's so nice that you have that firsthand perspective because particularly with a topic like today's topic, there's a deep understanding you have about the struggles or the challenges and things to avoid that that would be hard to appreciate as much just secondhand. The other thing that I think is really interesting though, and I'm thinking of you and he both as examples of this is sometimes with all of the changes that are happening in leadership style and company culture and things like that, we have been talking more and more about how in field service specifically, you have a lot of leaders who progress through the ranks and sometimes this is done as a reward for individual contribution, even when the person isn't necessarily super interested in or well-adapt to be a leader.

So what I love about this example and Sasha as well and others, is when you see a leader who has progressed but really is strong at the role and, to your point, is looking for ways to not get stagnant, but to continue to look at the environment. What's changing, what do we need to do differently, how can we be better? It's really powerful, so I love that. All right, so we're talking today about field force well-being, all right. And what I want to talk about first is what makes this topic? We hear a lot in the news about employee burnout, turnover, employee mental health, all of these things. What makes these things so particularly important for a field workforce?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Yeah. Well, I think that several factors came into a place at the same time. I think that from one side, COVID was an accelerator of all these, of this situation. I think in general, the life of the engineer has a factor that is different to other jobs. For example, in the back office, not that is a traveling factor. The fact that they are normally out of home or they have compromised their personal life with a professional life in a much more, let's say, complex way. And what we see normally in the field is we don't normally see a lot of people with burnout. It's something that, at least in Tetra Pak, we don't see a lot of burnout in the field. But what we understand is that being engineer, you have to face normally quite tense situations because you need to, for example, restore a line and the customer is waiting for restoring the production. And there is a lot of tension.

I mean, there are several situations that you need to handle and you have to do this at the same time traveling. So on top of all the things that are coming from our normal life, families issues or health issues, etc, on top of that, you have this complication. This is from one side. So Junk in Generations, they have now other alternatives that are coming from the fact that we have below technologies that really improve the collaboration. Let's say for example, today is quite easy to see that companies are offering positions as programmers, as automation engineers, as remote support engineers, that allows the people to work much closer to their homes, etc. And this is something that we have to, let's say, understand and adapt to the way we set up our services in order to give as much as possible flexibility. So the engineers, they get the best of being engineer. That is, I think is to have a tremendous impact on the operations of the customer to have a very high value for the customer, to be exposed, at least in our company, constantly to international environment.

Talking with, working with people from all the companies, from the countries, being updated constantly to new technologies. I mean, it's a very dynamic job and at the same time, it's really rewarding. When you have a breakdown, you go there, you fix the machine, and then the line is producing and the customer is able to achieve the production target. This is really powerful. There are not many jobs that gives this satisfaction. So I think there's a balance between the benefits of the job and the complexity of the lifestyle that having other alternatives in the work market that allows you to work more closer to your family, etc, sometimes is for us, it's a challenge to find the right model to offer something that is attractive for the talented people.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. No, that makes sense. And I know you and I spoke about that oftentimes the stress that the field force can feel isn't really related to workload. It's some of these other external factors, and often it can be a sense of isolation. And so then there's this need in the labor market, we see people wanting more and more flexibility. And so there's the as is challenges, there's also what's coming, what's continuing to change. And so I know we spoke about the fact that not only is this balance important to strike today, but it also really important for companies to be thinking about what's coming and that having a focus on well-being and employee engagement like we're going to talk about today is going to be even more important as we go into the future. Yes. So what do you think is coming along that's going to make this focus which is already very important, even more critical as we move forward?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Yeah. As I said before, I think that we will... Today we can say we are happy not to have a very high turnover of engineers. We are in the level of 5% which is pretty good on. But I think that more and more, it is going to be more difficult in some markets to attract talent. We already see it in some markets, especially in some areas, U.S, Mexico for example, where it can be Europe, where more and more opportunities are the diversification of the different options for engineers or technicians is becoming bigger. In other markets what we see is that this is socio-economical situations in some areas, like for example, Africa or Middle East or other regions of the world where we see that really the talent retention is going to be in the future, something to take care quite a lot. So I think that, as I said before, we didn't see also in Europe, for example, this big great resignation wave, it didn't happen so heavily.

But yes, I think that in the future, we should be able to offer model of work modalities we allows the engineers to have more flexibility, for example, when it comes to planning their personal life. Also, I think that it's going to be important to have the chances to give them rotations. Rotations in the back office as for example, if they have a situation at home, at home with the family to be able to stay for six months as remote support engineer or other positions that doesn't require to travel so much so they can settle down the situation at home and then return. So I think more and more we will need to be more and more flexible. And I think that the remote support will play an important role in that aspect.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. And I think what you're doing right now to be proactive, to know that will become more and more important and to get ahead of it is the way to do it versus waiting for a great resignation and then try... So it's this idea of, and we talk about this on this podcast a lot too, spending time waiting for things to go back to how they were is useless. It's not happening. And so the quicker we can just embrace, "Listen, things have changed, they are changing," we aren't going to be successful infinitely just operating the way we always have. So how do we adapt? It's really important. Now we're going to talk about these steps that you're taking along employee engagement, employee well-being but before we get into those, the one aspect you mentioned to me to put yourself in a good space from the beginning is hiring well. So can you talk about what you mean by that? What does hiring well look like for these roles at Tetra Pak?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: I think it's absolutely vital because if you don't hire the right profile from the beginning, you will never fix it later on even if you give trainings or whatever. I think it's important to also hire the people according to the right profiles. Looking at the type of service they're going to deliver. It is not the same, for example, a technician who repairs vending machines in the same city than a field service engineer that is working the industry of pharmaceutical or food industry in different locations around the world, overseen large installation projects or even managing big service contracts, the type of stress and levels and responsibilities different. So it's important to consider both, the technical skill and experience and also the software skills that are normally the ones that creates more stress on the person and more problems.

So we have to be really good at evaluation. At evaluating these skills during the recruitment process. And it's also very important from the beginning during the interviews to set really well expectations about the job, what is the job about, what, let's say, circumstances you will find developing your job in a daily basis, et cetera. That way everybody's prepared, you know exactly what profile are you hiring, and you are somehow sure that he's going to develop well his job.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. That makes sense. So it is getting good at the evaluation process, knowing what you're looking for. And I like the point about also setting expectations because I think especially in a tight labor market and we know we need to fill roles but what you don't want to do is sell a vision of the job that is not accurate and then you're causing problems for yourself once folks get into it. And yeah.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Sarah, we cannot forget that an engineer is one of the roles that is more expensive to develop and so, having engineers that you spend a nice amount of money and time to develop properly and suddenly he discovers that, well, that was not what he was expecting, is a problem.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. And in more ways than one, for sure. Okay, so Tetra Pak has a program called Tetra Pak Mental Wellbeing. Okay. Can you tell us about that program?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Well, this program... I mean, increasingly our company has been having more and more focus on the well-being of the employees. But after the pandemic, we refocus a little bit even more in the mental area, the mental health. So we want our people to be not only physically but also mentally healthy. For different reasons but one of the main is that if you are full of energy because you feel well, because you are, then you will go to work, happy to work, happy to collaborate with the rest of your peers but you will transmit that energy also to the customers. And you will come back afterwards to your home full of energy because you have been enjoying doing your job and you have the right conditions. So what we want is our employees to be conscious about the importance of the mental wind, help them to detect symptoms on themselves and also to detect it on the rest of the colleagues if somebody is in a very high peak of a stress, for example.

And we want really to be able to give them an environment to talk safely about this topic. So the program has three main objectives. One of them is the stigmatize, the mental why we have this campaign, "It's okay not to be okay," that we think that is really important. And one of the key things of the areas project is that we are providing also psychological support 24/7 in the local language to our employees, but not only to our employees, but also to the families. So this is very well received in the company. And also one of the objectives that we are achieving is to create resilience in the employees and also in the managers by delivering trainings by sessions. I was reading yesterday that we closed more than 10,000 employees already did the trainings, more than 1,500 managers also received the trainings. So it has been a very intensive campaign but it is really working and paying off and there is a lot of satisfaction coming from it.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. Well, and you mentioned that Tetra Pak has been fortunate not to see a lot of burnout. But again, one of the best ways to safeguard against that is to be proactive and de-stigmatizing the issues, normalizing the conversations, making people feel that not only do they have someone professional to talk to but that if they're feeling not okay, they can go to their manager, they can go to someone and speak up goes a long way toward not letting people get to that point. So I think that's a great focus area.

Now, to go beyond what is happening within the Mental Well-Being program, you started an employee engagement initiative and the first step was surveying your workforce to get direct input which I think is so important because often you see companies come up with these programs or initiatives based on what they think, not what people actually feel or want or need. And so, can you just talk a little bit about what was, I guess first, what was the catalyst to go further than this corporate well-being program? And what things did you ask in that survey that set the stage for the steps you've been taking?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Sure. So everything started in 2020. So we realized that we got completely used to have the scoring of the employee engagement surveys for the field force were always behind. And we all have the issues as well, it's normal, they have more complicated lifestyle and blah, blah, blah. But one day we said, "Okay, this cannot be like that. We are sure that we can really catch up at the same level as the back office employees." So we started in specific field force wellbeing improvement project in Europe called Blue Cap. At the time, the ability value was expanded to other regions like Middle East and Africa. So the first objective for us was to capture the feedback of the field service engineers because yeah, most of us have a background of field service engineers but we wanted to know today, tell us in each one of the country what is specifically what makes you enjoy and have, let's say, a happy delivery of your job, let's say that.

And which ones prevents you to feel proud of your job? What things makes you feel stressed, frustrated when you are in a normal service delivery? It was very interesting because we thought at the beginning that we would have something different in each market, but no, there were a lot of things that were common to the markets. Some of the things related to the specific lifestyle of the engineers, some things related to the way the Tetra Pak was managing certain areas of the operations, but there were also a lot of things that were very local, very much local to the market. So this allow us to know at the time, very well in detail, what was the reasons behind this dissatisfaction and also help us to create a very strong, let's say, action plan at local level, global level, but always created from the proposals and the input of engineers.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. Now can you share with us Marco, some of the most important things that you uncovered in that survey? What stood out to you as, whether it's the most impactful to you personally, the biggest commonalities, what did you find that you knew you needed to take action on?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: I think you already mentioned at the beginning, one of the probably most important things is this factor of isolation. Okay. This is probably one of the most critical areas. So from this point, you start to understand a lot of things. Never forget that the engineers, they are normally remotely managed, okay? They are normally not stepping into the office. So for them to get, let's say, positively contaminated by the company culture is more difficult for them to be updated on the latest decisions or reasons to do some specific movements in the company. If they do not have a good manager that really keeps them very well updated, can result into an isolation, even further isolation. So by the end, you can have... If you have the bad luck to have one manager that doesn't have the time also to really coach and manage the engineer, you may have an engineer that is closer even to the customers than to the company culture.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: So, isolation for us is something very important. So to recover this sense of belonging on the engineers, to keep them updated, to demonstrate them the value and the contribution they do to the company is absolutely vital. And that was probably one of the most relevant things. This factor of isolation that seems that is not very relevant but it's extremely relevant.

Sarah Nicastro: Oh, I think it's incredibly relevant. I mean, when you said you had folks that say they feel closer to the customers they serve than they do Tetra Pak. And then we didn't really talk a lot about this in the beginning, but one of the things that stood out to me and our prep conversation is you talked about that oftentimes, we talked about the fact that it isn't really the work that stresses technicians out the most, it's these other things. And you actually said to me and you know this because you did the job, that there's this dopamine that comes from... For a technician, you're there to solve problems and fix things and every time you do that, you feel this reward and this success but it's with the customer. So the company Tetra Pak in this instance has to be very careful not to let that relationship grow and the relationship between the company and the employee not grow.

Because it is great that they feel that sense of ownership, that they feel that sense of accomplishment when they solve these problems, that they're so close with the customer but that can't be at the loss of not having that with Tetra Pak because then there's just a lot of things that come into play. And I think, just to share a bit, I've been remote for five and a half years, well over five years since I took this role. And regardless of what level I've gotten to in the company or who all I work with, there are times that you do feel detached from what's going on because you're on your own. And so looking for those ways to foster that is I think really important. And the more people can feel that connectedness, that belonging, not only does that only help them care more but it's imperative to retention and satisfaction and yeah.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: I think it is very important. For us in the services business, we want the guys very close to the customer with high empathy with the customer needs. As somebody told me when I joined the company, they told me, whenever you enter into the plant, customer problem is your problem. And you don't leave until the problem is fixed now. So this is the way it has to be but at the same time, they have to be understand, they have to understand why the company is making several decisions. Because if you don't have the full picture and you don't have the sense of belonging, you may not understand that in the long term or in the midterm, some of the decisions of the company will clearly give a benefit to the customer in terms of better service or a new tool, new implementations of new service modalities or whatever.

So yes, they have to be very close to customers and that's why the customer trusts them so much but at the same time, we have to secure that they are very much understanding and feeling the culture of the company. Otherwise, it's complicated.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: To handle transformations and changes.

Sarah Nicastro: And I would think in the worst case, it can almost become an us versus them situation, meaning the technician and the customer almost versus Tetra Pak if they don't understand versus everyone's in it together, right?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Right.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. Okay. So let's talk about... Now I have, you know because you saw my outline, I have a whole bunch of bullet points. I don't want to read all of them. What I'm going to do is just let you talk about what happened after the survey, what actions you've put in place and then I'll just keep... If there's anything we missed, we'll come back to it, okay? So let's just talk about, you have this firsthand input, you see these commonalities, you see these areas of both what makes these people so fulfilled and then also what the stressors or the struggles are. So what did you do with that information?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Okay. So what we did, first of all is we group somehow the different proposals, the different problems and proposals coming from the field force. That was the first thing that we did now. So for example, when it comes to management, there was one part related to leadership. And when it comes to leadership, what we find out is that the better are the managers, let's say develop, the better define is what is their job about, the job, they're managers, when it comes to the solution, when it comes to customer management, when it comes to other areas. I mean the better this is defined, the better is... The easier this is to let's say block sometimes of the service delivery manager, in our case the team leaders for the engineers, to focus on the people development, okay? Because there's always a temptation to run behind the issues and what is the spare part you need and not giving enough time for the engineers to coach the engineers.

So we want engineers that are properly updated by the company, we want engineers that are properly managed in the sense that they are supported. So if there is a crisis in the customer, we avoid that the engineer gets stuck trying to fix the problem at all price with this hero syndrome that we were talking about. So they suffer, everybody suffers. So we want to refocus as much as possible the managers to have the right proportion of time dedicated to the teams. Another thing that we were working for example, is in recognition. So it's about securing that they are really recognized by the company for all the tremendous contribution they do to the business. I mean, at the end, the engineers, they are in the... Sometimes, I use a terminology that is... I mean, we are always with the dead body on the floor, no?

Sarah Nicastro: Mm-hmm.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: In front with hands full of blood, which means that we are there always in the middle of the problem. They are always in the center of the storm. So once the problem is solved, they feel like, "Wow, we fix everything. Everybody's celebrating. But guys, we are still here."

Sarah Nicastro: Who cares? Yeah.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Yeah. Exactly. We were here until two o'clock in the morning securing the line. We normally do a recognition of these kind of things but at the same time, we think that it's not enough and they tell us it's not enough. We like to see more, better recognition, more structure, et cetera. Another area that for us, probably one of the most relevant that I heard is about we want to have a career path that is clear. We want to have a career path that is really showing us the way on how to develop our professional life in Tetra Pak. So we completely rebuilt it and rebuilt our career path and our job structure in a way that now is very visible for them how to grow within the company, in which areas they can grow even outside the field service world. Okay? And they have a clear career advancement criteria.

So everybody feels that there is a fair career that is a transparent way to move within the company, that they know that their managers will be the ones supporting also to build up the competencies to move to the next position. So this is also very much welcomed by them. Other things are more related to the new technologies that we are implementing. So for example, for training, we are implementing much more, let's say, distance learning modalities or blending online trainings with other type of systems we have now available. So that is helping us to give them more updated, easier way than before. And also I think another thing that is extremely important is about the support we give them. One of the things that frustrates more the field service engineers is probably the fact that something is not ready for the moment of the service event.

If you arrive to maintenance event, you have spare parts missing or something is failing with supply of some material or something is not properly communicated. They were the ones telling us which are the key things they feel that are failing most commonly and also the ones that are impacting more than others. So that way, we were able to, let's say, review the processes internally between the different operations team and then that way, we were polishing and polishing. Still nothing is fully perfect but at least they see that we are really listening and we are, let's say, closing gap by gap now.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. Okay. So a couple of things I want to go back to. I think the recognition is so incredibly important because to me... Well, so is the relationship with the manager but those two things to me are what I think of when I think about improving that sense of belonging. Because I think if you have a good relationship with your manager and you feel acknowledged and valued and rewarded and recognized, then some of these other things you'll overlook more or be more patient with as you fix some of the support systems, et cetera. But the thing that I loved when we talked about recognition is you said, "We're ensuring field force efforts are acknowledged at the company level and tied to company objectives." And this is where I think a lot of organizations go wrong, because to your point, someone probably had always acknowledged those tremendous efforts.

It was probably their manager saying, "Oh, we really appreciate. Thanks for staying late, thanks for doing what it takes," whatever. But I think this is where the historical perception of field service almost puts companies at a disadvantage because it has been siloed. So they may be recognized in that silo but it's not always tied to, is someone outside of their direct line acknowledging what they're doing and are they showing how it's helping the company achieve its primary objectives? Because we know it is, it's just that a lot of times the work to tie those things together or the thought to do it or the communication to get that message out is where we're lacking and I think that this is a really important area of opportunity for a lot of organizations to get better at because it does matter so much and it isn't about huge bonuses or something like this. It's about knowing that people see those hours you're putting in and that they matter.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Exactly.

Sarah Nicastro: And I think those really the emotional side of that isolation, it's such an important way to help alleviate that. So I just wanted to come back to that one because I think it's not just about their direct manager saying, "Hey, great job." It's about that company-wide visibility, it's about shifting that perception across the organization of how important field service is and how much what they're doing ties to the overall goals. So.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Yeah.

Sarah Nicastro: I love that. I think the career planning such an important piece as well, especially with new talent coming in. And I love the idea of essentially you're saying now everyone's playing from the same playbook. There's no one getting advanced at a different rate pace or on different criteria that someone can say, "Well, that's not fair." It's very clear folks know what they need to do. They can own their own journey, they can feel a sense of empowerment to move at the pace they can. We talked about working, the work you're doing to ensure all of these supporting functions like spare parts are optimized so that they're not being this source of pain. A couple other things is one thing I want to come back to Marco is you intentionally set aside the pay discussion when you embarked on this initiative, knowing that anytime you're asking employees for input, it's likely to come up.

I understand why you wanted to set that aside because that matters to everyone, but you wanted to get into what else matters, what really deeply matters. But my question is how did you get them to set that aside and then when was it appropriate? Because I know you have set some transparent pay standards, et cetera. How did you get them to set it aside and when was it time for you to come back to it?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Okay. Good. No, I think this was at the beginning, an important discussion. No?

Sarah Nicastro: Mm-hmm.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Do we include or don't we include the money discussion? But as we know, money is normally a hygienic factor, meaning that employers are not necessarily demotivated by hygienic factors but on the other hand, the requirements are not met and they may feel clearly dissatisfied. Salary policies today for us is not a problem. So we are constantly looking at the market data, reviewing market data to ensure that we remain competitive as employers. As mentioned before, there are many other factors that probably one by one you may think, "Well, this is not so relevant for the employees," but at the end, if you put everything together, all these things from the support side in the career path, et cetera, putting them all together makes completely the difference between being engaged or not. And as you said, we wanted to have full focus without being distracted by the money discussion and we discussed it with them. We told them, "Guys, we are not talking about this because we have other forums to discuss these areas." And it was reasonably well perceived.

Sarah Nicastro: Okay.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: By them to say, "Look, okay, let's focus now on these other areas, leadership, support, recognition, et cetera. Let's continue fixing this." They have other forums if they need, and they know that they are other forums in some places we talk about generally negotiations with their work councils or whatever. There are other forums for that. And I think at the end, they know properly that having a good, let's say, being properly covered when it comes to the salary for them, what really makes a difference in the daily base are the other things, these small pieces that really makes a difference in their frustration level or in their enjoyment level.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. No, that makes sense but I do think, so for people listening, I want to say a couple things. I think a reflection that you've already gotten to a decent place of good, fair and transparent pay. Because if that weren't the case, they would not have been as receptive to setting it aside. So we had an event in Birmingham in the UK back in May and I remember a gentleman, we were at a round table discussion and he was so frustrated, rightfully so, but he just kept saying, "We have technicians coming and training and then leaving for 50 cents more an hour." And I said, "With all due respect, if it's 50 cents an hour, they're not leaving for the money."

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Exactly. Absolutely.

Sarah Nicastro: And so the thing is, if it's easy to blame the big picture on that one thing, but number one, you have to pay people fairly and if you're not based on market trends, based on competitive landscape, et cetera, that's an issue that needs to be righted. I remember we also had a working group maybe two years ago where we were talking about... I had an HR expert come and speak to our service collaborative, and we were talking about everything related to recruiting, hiring, retention, et cetera. And one of the things that came up is that a company was struggling because the rate of people coming in was way higher than the rate that they had been paying people. And she said, "I know you don't want to hear this, but you need to balance it out." I mean, it's just, that's where we are today. And so yes it's hard, and yes, you have to figure out how to do that in a stepwise way, et cetera. But I mean, paying people fairly is foundational to this conversation.

And so I think I just want to give you credit to be able to set that aside means you were already doing a good job at that.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Okay. Great to have you recycle that.

Sarah Nicastro: And so for someone listening who isn't, you're going to really struggle to get into some of these other things if people are really feeling unfairly compensated. That's going to be an emotion that's hard to set aside to get into what else matters. Yeah. All right. So how would you describe the benefits that you've seen so far from this initiative?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Well, I said before, initially in the past we were, let's say somehow assuming that it was normal to have this lower employee engagement in the field force. So first of all, today we understand with a lot of accuracy which are the problems, what is the problem description? The problem statement for each one of the market and in general, for them. We know exactly which areas we should work as soon as possible to improve their... So the low hanging fruits that will improve their lifestyle and their professional life. Second, all the plans that we have put already in place in a quantitative way, what we see is that the employee engagement surveys scores are going up. And especially in some markets where it was traditionally very difficult to, let's say, get this level of recognition from the employees about it, I'm really feeling engaged in my job. Suddenly we are moving at the same or even in some cases, higher than the back office positions.

Sarah Nicastro: Mm-hmm.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Okay. So that's for us one of the key things. And we also see that we have a reasonable, I would say in some cases even higher workload for the utilization of the engineers. But at the same time, we see that as before, we have a pretty contained turnover of engineers which means that they're happy and they see that they are participating in the solution. So because they are part of most of the plans that we are creating to help them, they are piloting all the solutions before. So we use their testimonials to tell to the other colleagues, "Guys, I'm already doing it. This is working, let's implement it." So I think that one thing is that we know what was the problem, now we have with clarity what is the problem. Second, we know how to improve it using their own proposals, the proposals of the engineers. And third, I think is very important that they are the ones selling it in some of the cases which is also very important.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. Now, what would you say are the biggest learnings or pieces of advice you would share with others based on the process that you've been through here?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Yeah. I think first of all, as I said, listen to them, make them part of the solution and the design and the piloting of all the actions and keep them very much updated. Keep them updated about how it's approaching the actions, the plan, at the global level and at the local level. This is one of the key areas. I think it is very important to be transparent from the beginning about what is not possible because sometimes there are a lot of good ideas but some of them are not potentially possible, feasible, for financial reasons, for organizational reasons, or etc. And the last thing that I think is very important, if I have to give it, is yes, try to keep as much as possible these high unique factors well covered, well managed. So for example, the money discussion and put it aside, focus one by one in each one of the areas. So split into different discussions, support, leadership, etc, the discussion with engineers. Because that way, you manage to get real useful insights that later on will help you to create good improvement plans.

Otherwise, it's going to be everything mix and fuzzy, and it's not going to be really efficient.

Sarah Nicastro: Yeah. No, that's great. And the one thing I wanted to say too is on the, keep them informed piece, the other thing that you said that you've done is to show where you're making investments. To show them, "Here's what you told us. Here's the action we created. Here's what we're investing in to make this piece easier or this part better."

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: This is right.

Sarah Nicastro: And I think, again, that helps with that sense of feeling valued. You're showing them, we're willing to invest in not only, again, not only your success because their success is the company's success, but your satisfaction, your engagement, your feeling of fulfillment because that's important to us, right?

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Absolutely.

Sarah Nicastro: And that's, I think, one of the overall key things here in this conversation is just that we can't be so focused on the company's success that we forget that these people are what leads us there. And you have to genuinely put effort and care into them as people to get that outcome. And I think it's really important and you're doing a wonderful job. So I appreciate you coming and sharing all of this with us and with our listeners and I'm excited to see how the journey continues.

Marco Hugo Gutierrez: Thanks a lot, Sarah. Thanks a lot.

Sarah Nicastro: Yes, thank you Marco. You can find more by visiting us at Futureoffieldservice.com. While you're there, be sure to sign up for the Future of Field Service Insiders so that you receive the latest content to your inbox every other week. The Future of Field Service podcast is published in partnership with IFS. You can learn more at IFS.com. As always, thank you for listening.

By Sarah Nicastro, Creator, Future of Field Service

Field service organizations are struggling with several staffing problems simultaneously. The workforce is aging, and experienced technicians are retiring – taking valuable institutional and technical knowledge with them. Younger workers entering the labor market often lack the technical skills needed for field service work, or viewed by some potential employers as too demanding when it comes to pay, scheduling flexibility, and work environment.

For companies on a growth path, an inability to resolve these issues can stymie your ability to take on new business or even to deliver quality service to existing customers. But by leveraging some creative thinking and the right technology, service organizations can address at least some of these labor challenges by developing an upskilling or development program.

Setting up an internal training or career development program can seem daunting, particularly for companies already struggling to hire enough people, who are short-staffed and feel there’s already too much to do. While an investment of time, a well-designed upskilling initiative can pay dividends when it comes to attracting and retaining workers.

First, it helps the company stay on top of technical training. Whatever industry you are in, servicing your customers gets more complex every year. Products are always changing, along with the environments in which they are installed. A good field service operation should already have an education/training program in place so that technicians are up to date; the upskilling program can piggy-back on that.

Second, a focus on upskilling can help attract new hires and keep them around. Competition for technicians means that many companies are going to have to hire relatively green employees with non-traditional backgrounds and provide a lot of upfront training to get them up to speed. By providing training and certifications not only at the beginning but on an ongoing basis, field service organizations can become more attractive to their pool of potential employees and have more success retaining existing talent.

Upskilling Increases Employee Engagement

How? Upskilling and career development keep employees engaged. We know that there’s a correlation between employee engagement and customer satisfaction, so this is a worthwhile effort. It also provides employees a path for growth within the company, empowering employees to strive at their pace toward advancement and better pay, while sending a message that the company is invested in them.

Finally, these programs can potentially help keep retiring workers around a little longer by offering them opportunities to shift their work responsibilities as they age. You can also ask older employers to stay on, perhaps on a part-time basis, to help run these training programs.

Training is labor intensive, but technology can help. A number of solutions and applications have emerged that can bolster training/upskilling programs without the need for hiring more trainers:

Augmented/virtual reality tools allow technicians to virtually diagnose and repair equipment. There is no substitute for hands-on training, of course, but this type of 3D virtual instruction can accelerate the process.
Virtual collaboration tools leverage this type of AR/VR interface so trainers can work with new employees (or even techs operating in the field) remotely. A handful of trainers or senior technicians can support new employees (and each other) from anywhere.
On-demand training assets can be accessed by technicians on their mobile devices. This can reduce some classroom time, which can help keep the training schedule manageable. This type of flexible, self-directed training can be appealing to younger workers.

I wrote recently about the importance of career development, and interviewed Jennifer Morehead of Flex HR about how these programs can benefit service organizations. An important theme that came up was that you must consider taking care of your employees needs in the same way you look at providing good service to your clients. If your technicians are not happy or they don't feel like they have the right tools to do their jobs, that will eventually affect client satisfaction.

That element of workforce development also came up in my conversation with Gyner Ozgul, former President and COO of Smart Care Equipment Solutions. In describing the Smart Care training/development program – which provides opportunities to become managers, trainers or sales reps – Gyner told me “We've been very clear to map out each one of those for our technicians, so they feel that this is an organization that no matter what path they take, they can feel supported and be successful.”

How has your company approached upskilling and development? What challenges have you faced, or opportunities have you created? I’d love to hear your experiences.

Six Levers to Improve Employee Satisfaction in Field Service

Six Levers to Improve Employee Satisfaction in Field Service

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In this episode of the Future of Field Service podcast, host Sarah Nicastro draws on recent enlightening conversations to compile a list of six focus areas that leaders should be prioritizing to improve employee engagement and satisfaction in field service.

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