VISTAVU ENERGY SERVICES BLOG

Today’s must-do list for field service management software Challenge #4: give me a 360-degree view of my projects

Jory Lamb — Wed, 26 Apr 2017 07:47:09 GMT

When you either bid on a project or quote on a job, that’s your best estimate of how to complete the work and what you propose to charge. Still, how many projects goexactly to plan? How many end up costing youprecisely what you figured?

Fact is, every time you start a project, there’s a lot you don’t know.

How will labor hours align with your projection? How much overtime will you need to pay? How will equipment usage square-up with your estimate? Will you need to rent equipment to complete the work? Before you even start the project, do your people have all the certifications they need to work on the jobsite?

There’s one sure way to know the answers to these questions. Wait until the project is complete. Tally up those paper field tickets, add in any extra rental charges, subtract your expenses from your revenue and see where you land.

Of course, settling-up at the end can produce an unpleasant surprise. If your costs were higher than expected, you could lose money. If your people or equipment didn’t have the right certifications, your reputation can suffer.

For many years in this industry, that’s just how it was. As more customers shared this experience with VistaVu Solutions, we knew there needed to be a better way. So, we built it.

Our all-in-one, field service management software solution is called FieldVu. Built to integrate with SAP Business One, Quickbooks® and now SAP Business ByDesign, it’s specifically for energy services companies. FieldVu gives you unprecedented visibility into your projects, as they happen.

With FieldVu’s electronic field ticketing, if labor costs are trending high, you’ll know it today, not in a month. If some of your people need additional certifications, FieldVu can tell you before they get sent home from the job site. If you need more equipment, FieldVu can tell you which pieces of yourequipment are available and inspected, so you don’t need to rent. If you incur third-party costs for a project, FieldVu makes sure they’re on the customer’s invoice, so you’re not stuck holding extra costs.

With the 360-degree perspective of FieldVu, you have a constant view of the progress and profitability of any project. When it goes according to plan, and costs the same as your quote, that’s not luck. That’s your good management, with a little help from FieldVu.

Today’s must-do list for field service management software Challenge #3: track the hours on all my equipment

Jory Lamb — Tue, 18 Apr 2017 03:16:54 GMT

In a previous post, we discussed why it’s important that energy services companies know the location of their equipment at all times. Bottom line, this knowledge is make-or-break in terms of the profitability of your projects and satisfaction of your customers.

In addition to knowing where your equipment is, you also must know how many hours are on each piece.

Different equipment requires various degrees of maintenance and inspection. If you’re not on top of your maintenance requirements, you shorten the working life of your equipment. You can also expose your business to extra financial and reputational costs.

Have you ever dispatched equipment from one jobsite to another, only to realize that it was due for maintenance between projects? In many cases, service equipment rarely comes back to home base where you can get a look at it. It generally travels from job to job. You need a way to summon that piece of equipment back at the right time, performits maintenance and inspectionsand send it on to the next project.

I’ve found that, when a company only has a few pieces of equipment, all this can be tracked reasonably well with Excel. If there’s an upcoming maintenance booking, you can write it on the whiteboard in big red letters. Your staff might also keep this sort of knowledge in their heads.

In my experience, once you reach 50 or 100 pieces of equipment, the Excel or whiteboard approach starts costing you money and customer satisfaction. That’s when your staff’s feats of operational memory fall short. At that point, you need something better.

VistaVu Solutions developed an all-in-one, field service management software solution called FieldVu. Built on SAP Business One, it’s specifically for industrial field services companies. Our customers know they need ticketing system software and FieldVu delivers. It also performs many functions that are well beyond ticketing and one of these is equipment management. We can set up your FieldVu to capture how many hours are on each piece of equipment. You’ll be alerted when maintenance, inspections or certifications are coming due.

With FieldVu, you’ll not only know where all your equipment is. You’ll have an accurate reading of its hours -- so maintenance, inspections and certifications can be carefully managed. Your equipment will last longer, and so will your relationships with your best customers. In the long run, that’s a recipe for your success.

Today’s must-do list for field service management software Challenge #2: plug the leaks on labor, equipment and supply costs

Jory Lamb — Mon, 10 Apr 2017 13:55:55 GMT

Whether a project is fixed-bid or cost-plus, the pressure is always on energy services companies to master cost control.

How often doesa project appear to be on track, only to incur unbudgeted costs that take out most or all of your profit? I call these cost leaks and they occur in three broad areas. Here’s why.

Labor. You estimatehow much labor you need for a project. Leaks occur when more of those hours are higher-priced overtime. Without project visibility, companies often pay more overtime than planned.

Equipment. You know what it costs to run your equipment. Massive cost leaks can occur,however, when you don’t know where your equipment is. A piece of equipment could be just down the road from your next jobsite, but if you think it’s in the shop or parked in your yard, you might rentwhat you already own.

Supplies. When field crews don’t have the supplies they need – I’m talking about items like small tools – they’ll buy them nearby and pay full retail. Those are costs your project budget hadn’t anticipated. If you’re on fixed-bid, these cost leaks come out of your pocket. Under cost-plus, they ultimately make you less competitive.

VistaVu Solutions created an all-in-one, field service management software solution called FieldVu. Built on SAP Business One,it’s specifically for energy services companies. FieldVu goes far beyond what ticketing system software can do. It’s the answer for profit-killing cost leaks. Here’s how.

Labor. With FieldVu, you can access your past projects and learn from them. Your quote-building process will be more rigorous, your labor estimate more preciseand overtime less likely.

Equipment. FieldVu ensures you alwaysknow where your equipment is. You’ll run a leaner fleet, while avoiding cost leaks from renting or buying equipment you already have.

Supplies. FieldVu knows, for example, how many torque wrenches and impact hammers you haveand how many you need. Keep your crews supplied with lower-cost, wholesale-bought equipment so they bypass the hardware store.

In this industry, surprises tend to be expensive. FieldVu, our all-in-one field service management software,gives you true project visibility, keeps cost leaks from occurring and allows you to come in on budget. Youronly surprise might be a pleasant one, when you see a promising project deliver all the profit you expect.

Today’s must-do list for field service management software Challenge #1: show me all my costs, all the time

Jory Lamb — Mon, 03 Apr 2017 17:07:38 GMT

Whenever VistaVu meets with energy services companies, we make the same point. That is, it’s not what you make that counts in this industry, it’s what you keep.

Three years ago, oil was $100 per barrel. Even if a company wasn’t highly efficient, they stillkept a good profit at the end of most projects.Today, the most successful companies are those that manage their costs better than thecompetition.They know how to do more with less, and field service software can help.

VistaVu helps our clients see, understand and manage their costs in several ways. First, we bring many years’ experience working with energy services companies, and we know what separates top performers from the rest. In terms of field service management software, we bring what I am confident is the best overall solution in the industry today. It’s called FieldVu, built on SAP Business One, created by VistaVu specifically for energy services companies.

FieldVu is far more than just ticketing system software. It’s an all-in-one solution that allows you to monitor and manage everything that matters to your business.

Cost control begins with structuring any new project the right way. If you’re on a fixed-bid project, it’s all on you reduce costs to maximize profit. In a costs-plus scenario, you still need to manage costs so you can bid competitively. Either way, FieldVu sets up every project to help you keep more of what you make.

Centralized purchasing, another FieldVu capability, means people aren’t out in the field buying small quantities of supplies at the local hardware store. Instead, when you know what you use, you can buy ahead of time at volume and save on costs. Many everyday supplies can’t be billed back to your customer, of course, so the less you pay, the more you keep.

Do you know where all your equipment is? FieldVu does. This allows you to maximize billable time, while running as small a fleet as possible. The cost implications of this are clear.

Another core competency of FieldVu is real-time field data capture. This helps you deploy your workforce effectively, minimizing costly overtime. Real-time field data capture also saves you the significant costs associated with manual entry of paper field tickets.

No one can say when oil prices will hit $100 again. What we can do is be diligent about costs. After all, on any project, there can only be one low-cost provider. Let it be you. VistaVu Solutions can help.

Technology is on the rise in Calgary

Jory Lamb — Fri, 10 Mar 2017 16:58:02 GMT

We’ve heard it for years. Calgary needs to diversify. Alberta needs to diversify. Every time things get tough, it becomes the number one mantra.

And over the years, we Albertans have certainly ridden the ups and downs of our oil-based economy. Really, who can forget the bumper sticker “Please God give us another oil boom, we promise not to piss it away this time.”

But in my opinion, this recession has been different. We’ve gained a strong undercurrent of innovation in this province that is bringing with it a wave of new technology.

I was wowed by the winners of the Energy New Venture Competition hosted by the University of Calgary on Feb 28. In this case, energy really did mean energy – not just oil. We are starting to diversify and are seeing energy in a 360 degree view that takes into account the latest technologies from around the world.

As a member of the board of the competition, it is great to see the level of interest in new ventures. We received 75 applications and the winners were impressive – it’s worth checking out their websites below.

Concept Stream:

1st place: MycoRemedy – Kelcie Miller-Anderson (Calgary)

2nd place: Pursuit Technologies Ltd. – Steve Fitzel, Dave Jellett (Calgary)

3rd place: Geometric Energy Corporation – Scott Dooley, Timothy Bjorndahl, Samuel Reid (Calgary)

Venture Stream:

1st place: Cold Bore Technology – Jamie Clarke, Brett Chell, Tyler Sanden (Calgary)

2nd place: Vintri Technologies – Jeff Boyle, Brendan Boyle, Phil Roberts (Calgary)

3rd place: WattBox Solar – Patrick Leslie, Frank Laxshimalla (Calgary)

I also had the opportunity to be a guest speaker at the competition and got to see first-hand the voracious appetite in the city for technology around energy. I am really excited to be part of this and wanted to share my main learning from the Q&A session.

When I speak, I typically get lots of questions about how to scale and pivot, what are some of the biggest lessons I’ve learned and how do I hire a marketing or a sales person. All of those questions are tertiary.

The number one question new entrepreneurs never ask but should is, “How do I build a business bigger than myself?” What I’ve learned – with a little bit of time and grey hair – is that you are only a leader if someone follows you.

So the most important starting decision is: Who do you partner with? Who is your number two?

I think that most successful startups have typically been partners. It is usually teams of two people who complement each other.

So I believe the single biggest decision an entrepreneur will make is who is the second person who will follow in your vision? If you can get that right, life is a whole lot easier and it is just that much easier to attract great talent when you already have a strong team with a solid vision. But if you get that wrong, you have a failure to launch.

One thing that came out of the Energy New Venture Competition is that many of these start-ups have great vision. They have a commitment to technology around energy and the incubation of startups that will diversify our economy is truly starting to occur.

It’s exciting to see the rise of tech advancement in Calgary and I can’t wait to see what next year brings.

Your baby is ugly

Jory Lamb — Thu, 26 Jan 2017 19:42:56 GMT

Every entrepreneur thinks that their new venture is the best, world-changing idea out there. But I have a different thought that is best summed up as – your baby is ugly.

To explain, let me start with my own story.

I got into business when I was just 23. I left a stable, comfortable job in the oil sector with an idea to connect farms together through a bulletin board system – delivering pricing, weather, news and information.

Only 11% of the farmers owned a computer in Canada so it was a bad idea from the onset but through my research, I realized my real opportunity was in training. I was going to sell computers, farm accounting software and training, because 89% of the market didn’t have anything.

To give perspective to this idea – here’s a 23 year old kid, who had never managed a company, didn’t have a computer degree, didn’t grow up on a farm, didn’t have any contacts, and didn’t have any customers.

This is the extreme version of your baby is ugly.

The 44-year-old version of me never would have invested in this idea – EVER. I’d have run away from the 23 year old version of me, because he didn’t know what he didn’t know.

Back when I was 23, I didn’t ask for help because for me it was a sign of weakness. I have seen this so many times that I’ve realized an entrepreneur’s initial ideas for their business need refinement, maturity and the benefit of review by others. Just that willingness to ask the question, to take feedback and to have hard discussions will make all the difference.

The truth is, your first idea is your worst idea.

Here’s what happened to me when I first started out. I had a payout package from my former employer and I used that money to send out unaddressed ad mail to every rural address in southern Alberta.

I printed 28,000 pamphlets (I wanted to start small) called Harvesting the Internet. To kick off the initiative, I had scheduled presentations in three communities a day to show farmers what the Internet was and what computers could do. Then the goal was that they’d sign up for my training, buy computers and software.

So I took boxes and boxes of an 8.5” x 11” page with tiny font; 1000 words per page to Canada Post. Yes, that was my pamphlet – it was the dictionary!

At the time, I had no idea that it took six weeks from when you dropped off ad mail at Canada Post to when it actually went into the recipients’ mailboxes.

Two weeks after the mail drop, I had arranged to go to Bassano, Gleichen, and Brooks for my first road trip.

I bought all the equipment, (screen, projectors, computer, and software) and I rented a van. At 5:00 am, I loaded it all up and headed out to Bassano.

I had rented the community halls in all of these towns and had a 40-cup urn filled up with coffee – ready for the onslaught.

But no one came. I thought it was weird, but I was undeterred. I packed up all my stuff. Loaded up my van and continued down the road to Gleichen and did it all again.

No one showed up except the man who let me into the building and he was sitting at the back of the room.

I said to the guy, “How would you like to hear my presentation?”

So he grabbed a front row chair and I started my presentation. I ended with…”So with computers you can revolutionize the world”…ta da. Then I asked him, “Are you interested?”

His response “I would be if I farmed…but I drive the school bus.”

This was awful on so many levels!

When I finally got back and called Canada Post, I got the explanation.

Looking back on that initiative, it was so poorly executed and I was embarrassed…mortified.

The thought that I had given up a perfectly good career at a company was tough to swallow. And to ask someone for help was like admitting defeat.

In hindsight, I have realized that people have different reasons for not wanting to ask the tough questions. But when I look at one of the fatal flaws that entrepreneurs make, it’s that they don’t ask for help. They don’t bounce ideas off people who will give them honest, maybe painful, feedback. They burn a tremendous amount of time and energy that they’ll never get back.

The message here isn’t that your idea is bad – it’s that your idea is not refined.

I believe that the group is always smarter than the individual. So if you allow the idea to mature – with unbiased people who have your best interests at heart – you are going to be so much more successful…much faster than if you take the Jory Lamb approach and send 28,000 unaddressed ad mailers out.

Ask the tough questions. Learn from others. And be a proud parent.

Eliminating Rekeying Field Tickets

dan.parsons@vistavusolutions.com (Daniel Parsons) — Wed, 30 Nov 2016 16:01:48 GMT

Post 3 of 3: Welcome to the last post of my series, The Perils of the Paper Field Ticket and How to Avoid Them. In the first two posts, we looked at how field tickets can be easily lost, become damaged or are just illegible. Now, we will look at what happens in the back office.

Re-entering the Paper Ticket

Regardless of the quality of the paper ticket, the fact remains that it is paper, and it will need to be re-entered into the company’s accounting system. Poor quality or lost tickets makes this required, tedious function even more difficult and problematic.

Depending on the type of service provided and size of the company, a service company might have to re-enter thousands of field tickets a month. This is a time consuming task that is error prone and adds no value to the service provided.

I recently visited a trucking company that has hundreds of tickets per week. They had a full time staff of five bookkeepers that do nothing but process field tickets for billing. They have a great manual system in place, but still ended up with a high number of tickets disputed by their customers due to all the reasons already discussed. These disputed tickets cost them time and money and could have be avoided if they had a better way to accurately capture their data out in the field.

The Better Way

The electronic field ticket is the quickest and most accurate way to get billing and labor data from the field to the back office. Electronic field tickets have been around for several years now, but are still not widely accepted or used by service companies. The larger service companies have their own proprietary electronic field ticket systems. But smaller companies have been slow to pick up the technology.

The reasons for the slow adaption of the electronic field ticket are twofold: 1) high cost and 2) the need for the tickets to be stamped and signed.

First, let’s discuss cost. The majority of smaller service companies use QuickBooks. This is an inexpensive accounting system that works fine for smaller companies, but does not support electronic field tickets. There are existing, third-party electronic ticketing systems that may or may not hook up to QuickBooks, but they are too expensive to justify. Some of these existing systems cost thousands of dollars, much more expensive than QuickBooks itself.

The second problem is the dreaded stamp. For years, oil companies have used rubber stamps that have fields for the company man to write in AFE, Cost Center and account numbers for the back office. This stamp does not translate over to an electronic field ticket. You can’t stamp a laptop or tablet, although you may want to sometimes.

So here’s what you’ve all been waiting for: the better way. The better way is an inexpensive electronic field ticket solution that runs on a PC or tablet and can easily turn the field ticket into an invoice.

Affordable and doesn’t cost thousands, of dollars
Captures electronic signatures or can attach a scan of a stamped ticket
Integrates with QuickBooks and other accounting systems for quick and accurate billing
Runs in an off-line mode when you don’t have a cell or WiFi signal

VistaVu Solutions offers such a field ticket. It is FieldVu Mobile and it solves all the problems of the paper field ticket.

Problems solved. No more lost, mangled, illegible paper tickets. Quicker invoicing, more accurate billing and payroll. There really IS a better way.

Check us out

If you would like to make your field service company RUN GREAT, then check out our website and sign up for a 30 minute demo. We’ve helped hundreds of companies just like yours improve their bottom line.

VistaVu featured on 2016 Deloitte Technology Fast 50 and Fast 500 Lists

Jory Lamb — Fri, 25 Nov 2016 19:43:42 GMT

We are proud to announce that we’ve been featured on the 2016 Deloitte Technology Fast 50 and Fast 500 Lists. The lists feature quickly growing technology companies in Canada and North America. Only the most cutting edge, innovative companies are awarded a spot on these exclusive lists.

"We are proud to receive this very prestigious award and to be part of a growing Canadian technology movement," says our Founder and President, Jory Lamb.

We have seen tremendous growth over the past few years and are pleased to join the ranks of the prestigious companies featured on the 2016 Deloitte Technology Fast 50 and Fast 500 lists.

Read the whole story.

For more information about VistaVu and the 2016 Deloitte Technology Fast 50 and Fast 500 Lists, please contact:

Lauren McMurray
Alchemy Communications Inc.
403.819.9792
lauren@alchemycommunications.ca

GE set to disrupt oilfield services

Jory Lamb — Tue, 15 Nov 2016 21:14:31 GMT

Since the launch of GE’s Predix platform, GE has been positioning itself to become the major player in the industrial Internet of Things (IoT) space.

Predix is a software platform for the collection of data – lots and lots of data – from industrial machines.

As the owner or leader of an energy services company why should you care about GE and Predix?

Yesterday, GE announced the $915M acquisition of ServiceMax (http://fortune.com/2016/11/14/ge-servicemax/), which, according to Capterra, is one of the leaders in Field Service Management software.

I am by no means in the inner circle of GE; however, if we follow the bouncing ball, it is highly plausible that using the Predix platform with sensors hooked into industrial equipment and the ServiceMax field data capture software, GE will know the following:

1. Your customers
2. Your purchases
3. Your assembly components
4. Your pricing
5. Your employees

If they know all that, they will also know your growth rates, your production rates, your efficiency and your profitability.

What are my data points?

Data Point #1 – GE has made two strategic moves that will affect the oil and gas industry. First, the bid for Baker Hughes enables this technology to get out into the field more readily. Second, the acquisition of ServiceMax provides field service management software that further expands on their IoT platform giving their people in field the tools necessary to be both timely and disruptive.

Data Point #2 – GE became a sponsor of Zone Startups in 2016, a Toronto-based accelerator operated by Ryerson Futures (http://www.zonestartups.com/). Through mentorship, technology and funding, GE encourages industrial technology firms to build their solutions and integrate with the Predix platform. Several companies have now been purchased by GE as complimentary solutions enabling the Predix platform.

Someday, it could be possible that your customer hooks up GE sensors to your product and links it to the Predix platform, which sends out a request for you or a Baker Hughes / ServiceMax / GE tech to come out and address the problem – all without you knowing or being involved.

In the way that Kodak didn’t react quickly enough to the change from film to digital photography, the same risk lies here with energy service players.

What can you do?

As a provider to the oil and gas industry, GE needs you to adopt their platform to be successful. By choosing to purchase your solution from a software-only company like SAP, Oracle, Microsoft or one of 100 independent solutions, you will ensure that your data remains yours and more importantly your client relationship remains yours.

You can also see the latest blog post on LinkedIn.

What Are You Doing With Your 20%?

Jory Lamb — Wed, 09 Nov 2016 18:52:03 GMT

20% of your time and energy determines your success – what are you doing with your 20%?

It’s the year 2000. The company I was running at that time was technically bankrupt. We were standing on the precipice of extinction. Debts were greater than assets and by all accounts – we had negative equity – we were bankrupt.

It was a very tough time for me. As a 27-year-old entrepreneur, I had managed to build up a business and then put the company into this tough position for a whole series of reasons. But likely the most important reason was how I was spending my time and what I was doing on a day-to-day basis.

So faced with impending doom, I did what any entrepreneur would do – I went to the Bank of Mom for a loan. I gave it to accounting and said, “Sprinkle this out across all the vendors that we owe money to. I am going to Australia.”

I jumped on a plane and went to Australia for 6 weeks, which is an awfully long time, but I knew we could stave off the immediacy of what was coming for at least 6 weeks.

After 3 weeks in Australia, I focused in on the problem. Until that point I’d managed to do a good job of avoiding thinking about what was waiting for me at home.

But one day, I was on a bus going to Townsville on the coast of Australia and a cyclone came in. We were on a long highway and the water started to fill up on the road until it came up to the top of the bus tires. We couldn’t go anywhere.

With nothing to do but think on this bus, I reached in my backpack and grabbed a book – The E-Myth by Michael Gerber – and started reading.

I ended up with a whole new perspective on what I needed to do and how I needed to behave.

When I got back home I changed a lot of things. I started listening and I got a mentor.

Over time, what I came to learn is something called “20%ers” based on the Pareto Principle, which says that 20% of what you do drives 80% of your results.

It’s only a fraction of your day, your week or even your month that matters. There are likely only 2 or 3 key decisions you’ll make in a year that will influence your business – one way or the other.

Once I got clear on my where I spent my time, the company got clear and this completely changed my trajectory.

Figure out your own 20%ers

#1. List Your Weekly Tasks

Write down all the tasks you performed from a single week. Include everything from picking up the dry cleaning to putting together a strategic presentation for a major corporation. You’ll have a big list.

#2. Ask Yourself Two Questions

• What am I good at?
• What do I enjoy?

The more you do of what you are good at and what you enjoy, the more successful you’ll be.

Go through the list and check off everything that you are both good at and that you enjoy. That will leave you with a long list of things you are neither good at nor enjoy – nor do you aspire to be.

#3. Ask Yourself Three More Questions
Make sure you ask these in the following order of priority.

What can you delete?
These are things you will never do and no one else in your company will do either.

What can I delegate away?
It needs to be done but it won’t be you.

What can I defer?
Not everything has the same priority. Focus on the things that will have the biggest benefit and do those first.
If you can fill your days with things you are good at and that you enjoy, and then surround yourself with people (contractors, full-timers, part-timers) who are good at and enjoy the things that you don’t, then I guarantee that you’ll change your own trajectory.

My own 20%ers are:
• Carry the vision, build the culture (lead)
• Pass down the stories (teach)
• Get external (learn and promote)
• Plan, budget, review and revise (inspect)

Summary
When I look back at that time in my life, understanding what 20%ers were and applying them to my daily activities absolutely changed my trajectory. I believe that everyone can zero in on their 20%ers. If you spend as much of your day on this as possible, it will change your trajectory too.

PS. You can also see the latest blog post on LinkedIn.