ADI Facilities Engineering centralises its company operations using ShireSystem

By running its facilities engineering and maintenance services through ShireSystem, ADI has improved response times, reduced admin, and introduced a fully-branded, automated customer service experience.

ADI Group has over 30 divisions providing ‘one-stop-shop’ engineering and construction-focused solutions to companies in sectors including aerospace, food and beverage, manufacturing and petrochemicals. Its Facilities Engineering division offers planned, reactive and corrective maintenance services across single and multiple sites. This can range from fully outsourced engineering services (provided by a resident on-site team) to off-site support.

Previously, ADI’s Facilities Engineering team had been managing each customer’s requirements through their preferred software programme – and often this solution was ShireSystem. But with multiple licenses and logins, information and instructions could not be centrally managed.

To streamline job requests, engineer workload and administration, ADI decided to start running all its maintenance and engineering work through ShireSystem in 2014. And the company has been exploring new CMMS/CAFM software functions ever since.

Taking a centralised approach to company operations

Unlike many facilities engineering services, which operate a roaming team of engineers, ADI mainly provides fixed on-site engineering teams to fulfil customer contracts. As a result, remote communications are critical.

ADI had been using digital software to coordinate its engineering work, but the decision over which software to use had been led by the customer – which resulted in staff managing several different maintenance and facilities management solutions, including ShireSystem.

In 2014, the company decided to unify its operations by moving to ShireSystem for all CMMS/CAFM requirements.

“Working with multiple software programmes quickly highlighted the benefits of ShireSystem. We saw how useful it was to our business, but it didn’t make sense to have a separate system for every customer site. Moving to one ShireSystem solution enabled us to get even more value from the software – and it saved me from having the remember loads of passwords!” – Michael Hepburn, Facilities Manager, ADI Facilities Engineering Ltd

Centralising its approach to maintenance management using cloud-based software enabled ADI to streamline resources while saving on time and budget. And ShireSystem’s integrated Location Security feature meant that on-site engineers at each of its customer sites could access the software without compromising data security.

Making improvements to the job request progress

Moving to ShireSystem has transformed job coordination and scheduling at ADI. Around 90% of the company’s work is now automated through CMMS software, with customers logging jobs directly using the Work Requester feature.

“It’s much quicker and simpler to manage incoming work with ShireSystem, because nobody on our side is having to capture and interpret information on behalf of the customer. It’s all done centrally and automatically, and it gives each customer the power to manage their own job requests.”

In addition to receiving work requests quicker, ShireSystem has improved the accuracy of information being taken by ADI, as there’s no ambiguity in the request process. Customers can clearly document their requirements, and there’s a digital audit trail to make sure that work being carried out by on-site engineering teams matches each customer’s expectations.

One of the biggest advantages of moving to ShireSystem is that all communications can be ADI branded, giving customers the confidence that their requests have been sent to the correct location.

ADI worked with the ShireSystem team to suggest this branding feature, with customers receiving automated email updates featuring the company logo to confirm when a job request has been received, approved, started and completed.

“Our customers don’t want to know what software we’re using; they just want to know their needs are being taken care of. ShireSystem allows us to automatically send branded emails at every stage in the process, including an online worksheet as soon as our engineers have completed the job. It’s a really important customer service element to ADI.”

Improving on-site productivity with mobile workload management

In addition to enhancing the work request process, ShireSystem has also empowered ADI to manage its engineering workload more efficiently, thus reducing on-site administration.

Once a customer request has been submitted, ShireSystem automatically generates work orders that are sent to the relevant engineering team. Engineers can monitor their workload via laptop or smartphone using ShireSystem’s Mobile Pro Work Orders feature, updating their progress and checking-off tasks while they are on-site.

“Our engineers can sign off jobs in real-time, capturing photographs and electronic signatures to validate the work they’ve done. There’s a real ease-of-use as they don’t have to travel back to an office. We’ve had positive feedback about this from our on-site teams.”

Having cloud-based access to data is also enhancing ADI’s customer relationships. Teams are able to provide performance figures such as the breakdown of planned preventative maintenance (PPM) versus reactive work. This demonstrates the value delivered by on-site engineering services and proves that ADI is meeting each customer’s contractual KPIs.

Accountability with stronger data insights

Alongside measuring contractual KPIs, ShireSystem is empowering ADI to take more of a data-led approach to its company development.

While the company has always reported on productivity, having a unified CMMS solution with built-in KPI tracking makes it easier to set goals and monitor progress – and to share these insights at board level.

“We have a snapshot of what’s going on in the business across every customer site, packaged into one easy-to-understand format. And we can change the parameters of this data to report on anything we want, exporting it and sharing it with whoever needs to see it.”

And although ADI’s analytics capabilities have increased significantly since moving to ShireSystem, the amount of time spent inputting this information has actually decreased. Without having to manually collate information from multiple sources, senior personnel can get their reporting done quickly so they are free to manage their teams.

What next? better resource planning and clear expectations

ADI Facilities Engineering is already gaining a huge amount of value from ShireSystem, but the company has even bigger plans for the future.

Its next goal is to roll-out ShireSystem’s Wallboard feature, which will display an up-to-date view of outstanding activities and highlight top-performing engineers.

ADI’s Facilities Manager, Michael Hepburn, believes introducing the Wallboard will create a strong understanding of what is expected of the engineering team. And the timing is ideal, as all employees based at ADI’s headquarters are about to move into the same room to ensure clearer lines of communication.

“With the Wallboard, we’ll be able to display real-time job tracking and job allocations so everyone can see what’s expected of them during the day or week. Even before logging onto their tablet, our engineers will have a list of jobs right in front of them.”

The new Wallboard will be used in conjunction with ShireSystem’s Resource Planner feature, which will allow ADI to allocate time to each job, creating accurate schedules for its engineering team. This way, every staff member knows what’s coming next and can benchmark their progress against their colleagues.

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