In a remote job, employees often manually create and carry out tasks. This can be a hassle for managers.
How do you check the number of tasks completed, rescheduled or left pending? Plus, managers also have to track their employees’ performance and supervise their activity.
All these field operations can’t be conducted manually, especially when your field workforce is large. But the question arises – how to effectively manage the workflow of field executives?
Well, it’s easy!
You need to implement field task management software in your organisation. It can simplify the jobs of both employees and managers. The software also offers benefits like reduced time theft and higher employee productivity.
However, you can’t choose any software blindly. You need to look for some essential features like geofence task linking, ad-hoc adjustments, accurate reports, etc.
Read on to know what key features you should consider in employee task monitoring software.
- Advance Task Scheduling
The first and foremost function of Field task management software is to optimise employee task scheduling and dispatching. It achieves so by allowing:
- Fast and easy task creation
- Bulk task uploads to reduce repetitive steps
- Advance calendar scheduling of tasks
- Visibility of resource and employee availability
- Ad-hoc task creation and adjustment
- Employees to self-allocate tasks or reschedule them
- Real-time updates on task status
- Optimised task allocation
You never want over or under-utilisation of your company resources. This includes physical assets like vehicles, equipment etc and employees.
With field task management software, you can easily overcome this issue. The software ensures optimal use of time and resources. You can allocate tasks to employees based on their experience, seniority and relationship with the client.
You can also assign tasks to employees who are near the client site, resulting in better response times and higher customer satisfaction. This is how the software ensures optimal field staff scheduling and dispatching.
- Order management
Order management is key for most product-based businesses. They employ salesmen to visit clients and take orders.
Now we know that sales, retail and similar businesses rely heavily on field task management software. As such, the software is also equipped with an order management module for the employees’ convenience. Here’s what you can do with it:
- Add and view sales order status (active, inactive)
- Access and maintain an updated product inventory
- Adjust prices, create custom categories and set discount limits
- Track orders in real time and approve them without delays
- Real-time activity monitoring
Field employees work in remote areas and without much physical contact with managers. Hence, they have to be monitored via GPS location.
Field task management software is equipped with a GPS tracking feature to monitor employees in real time. This is useful in several ways.
Managers can geofence the task site and link it with attendance. This ensures that executives can mark their attendance only when they’re present at the task site.
As such, accurate GPS tracking provides insightful data about employee activities and also boosts their productivity.
- Data-driven reports
In today’s age, proper use of data analytics can be a game-changer for a business. You can identify areas of improvement, spot discrepancies and track KPIs.
Field task management software securely stores data on the cloud. Managers can retrieve it at any time, be it to review an employee’s performance or for annual audits.
Here are some important reports that the software offers:
- Task completion timeline
- Employee target vs. achievement details
- Employee activity and time spending
- Route playback and total distance travelled
- Actual working vs. on-duty hours
- Expense History
- Attendance and leave pattern
- Unreachable and stoppage report
- Efficient communication
Communication is a key feature of field task management software. After all, when you’re dealing with employees who are miles away, you need a fast and reliable method to collaborate.
We know that task management software comes with an employee monitoring feature. But to effectively guide them, you also need to be able to communicate in real time.
Well, software like TrackoField has inbuilt chat features allowing seamless communication between employees and managers.
Employees can also share PDFs, images, and voice notes with their managers. The data transfer is accurate, secure, and quick. Lastly, the app provides regular notifications and alerts to employees and managers.
- Integration and Scalability
Field jobs are already difficult. They can further complicate executives workflow if they have to use multiple apps to manage their daily operations like attendance, expenses, orders, etc.
That’s why all top-field task management software allows users to integrate it with other software. For instance, TrackoField can be easily integrated with 200+ HRM, CRM, and Salesforce software.
Scalability is another important feature of employee task monitoring software. Would you prefer an app that begins crashing once it reaches a certain threshold? No, right?
That’s why task management software is regularly updated and constantly improved. It can grow with the company and handle the increasing number of employees and their functions with ease.
Conclusion
For any business with a field workforce, managing the day-to-day tasks of remote employees is an essential responsibility. The organisation has to ensure there is no disruption in the workflow and that employees are meeting their objectives.
Now, in the old days, this was accomplished manually. But you can’t use simple spreadsheets or voice calls to keep tabs on hundreds of employees and their tasks. You need a digital solution to automate and simplify all your manual field operations.
This can only be achieved by implementing effective field task management software. But it should consist of some key features for optimum results. These include:
- Advance Task Scheduling
- Bulk task uploads
- Order management
- Real-time activity monitoring
- Data-driven reports
- Efficient communication
It’s hard to find software with all these features, but if you do, don’t delay implementing it in your organisation. TrackoField is one such software that you can consider.