At any given time, do you know exactly where every piece of machinery and equipment is, across your entire organisation?
From utes, to generators, to machinery, you probably have a huge amount of equipment to monitor. And if you’ve got GPS tracking across these assets, then you probably have some idea where they are.
But GPS technology has evolved beyond just tracking equipment.
Rudimentary, location-only GPS systems are cost effective for businesses that are just starting out, as is a simple setup of asset management.
Most companies begin with a combination of paper filing systems for maintenance records, certifications in another folder, emails to track staff, and maybe project management software to track budgets.
But as your business grows and we move into a new year, these simple systems are becoming outdated — and will eventually be unmanageable.
If you want to know if your current GPS system is ready for 2018, ask yourself the following questions:
1. Who is using your equipment?
Are you able to look at your mobile phone, search for any asset, and see who is using it?
Probably not. Which means there’s no chain of responsibility.
It’s not that you need to be following every employees’ footsteps like Big Brother — but you do need to know who is operating potentially dangerous (and highly valuable) equipment.
New integrated GPS systems — called Integrated Asset Management — not only track your assets, but can also track who is using it. This allows you to have clear visibility over the chain of responsibility for your high value assets.
2. Who is responsible for equipment going missing?
Tired of tools getting lost on site?
You’d be surprised how much valuable equipment isn’t kept secure on work sites. Security and chain of responsibility are linked; knowing who has used your equipment, who put it back, and when, is just smart project management.
Unintegrated systems (like current GPS technology) also make it that much harder if you were to have a theft or break in. It takes much longer to know the extent of the damage and know what’s been stolen. Your Integrated Asset Management system doesn’t just let you know who is on the tools, it also logs who used them last.
3. Is the person using your asset certified?
It might sound ridiculous that you should be able to check your GPS and know the certifications of the worker driving one of your utes. But technology has come a long way in our industry, and simple, location-only tracking systems are decades old at this point.
It is vital to know if a person using equipment is certified, both for safety reasons and to keep you out of legal trouble — company fines for uncertified staff operating machinery are astronomical. And speaking of safety…
4. What’s the maintenance report on that asset?
Are your maintenance reports tucked away in a filing cabinet? Kept in a spreadsheet on your laptop? Floating around in an email chain?
None of that is much help to the guy out in the field who’s using an out-of-service excavator.
Up to date maintenance logs need to be accessible to every single person in your organisation. It’s integral to being a safe company, and having all your asset information in one place makes management so much easier.
Improve your efficiency with Integrated Asset Management
Ultimately, having an outdated GPS could potentially have huge effects on your bottom line and, more importantly, the safety of your workers.
The best way to improve your approach to asset management is to integrate your GPS tracking back into your project management system. This allows you to have total visibility over all your assets.
Integrated asset management dramatically improves your ability to organise and assign work, as you gain the following capabilities:
- Manage remotely — access asset information from anywhere.
- Track any asset — even track assets that don’t have their own power supply, such as a generator.
- Allocate easily — easy allocation of available assets to people and projects.
- Safeguard allocations — prevent workers without the correct certification from being assigned to machinery.
- Increase safety — automatic maintenance alerts, and QR codes that allow any worker to have access to the full maintenance details of any asset.
Kontrol4’s asset management system is a one-stop shop that allows you access to all the information you need, right at your fingertips.
We offer a Real Time GPS Application for both iOS and Android-based devices, enabling you to receive information that matters, sent straight to your mobile phone.
No matter where you are, you can stay in control and have full asset information in real time, at any time.