“Our effort aims to eliminate layers of traditional hand-offs by putting the necessary tools and information into the hands of the people closest to the work,” says Harley facilities manager Jeff Regner. “This is our way of getting rid of the barriers that exist between end users and skilled trade workers who provide the necessary service.”

The Facility Intranet Request Service Tool, known internally as FIRST, is the company’s answer to eliminating delays that often occur between work order initiation and completion. FIRST has enhanced the company’s ability to respond quickly to maintenance requests and to complete the necessary work within predetermined time frames. The system, launched in January 2000, is currently available to 1,300 employees and contract workers at the company’s 500,000-sf headquarters complex in Milwaukee, Wis., but is structured so that other company sites can be added in the future.
  
Clicks, Not Keystrokes

FIRST planning efforts were shaped by the realization that the new system had to be simple to use and should produce quick results. It was also important to build on the company’s existing technology infrastructure, focusing on what Regner calls a “quick hit,” rather than embarking on a costly multi-year project.

These criteria led to the decision to eliminate the need for user keystrokes in virtually all transactions. The resulting system creates a direct link between end users and skilled trade workers through the use of HP Jornada handheld devices distributed to the maintenance workforce.

An employee initiates the online work request process by clicking the FIRST icon on the corporate intranet. Information about the requester, including name, phone number, and location, self-populates, thanks to an already existing data repository capable of pulling such details from various corporate databases.

Users then select from a drop-down menu of more than 80 percent of the most common requests. These 13 service categories cover a wide range of housekeeping, plumbing, electrical, and other maintenance concerns, with a special category for requests requiring emergency attention. Keystrokes are needed only if the employee wants to explain the problem.

Orders are then transmitted to the FIRST server, which records, processes, and routes them to the maintenance worker who is best suited to complete the necessary repair, assembly, cleaning, or other task. Facilities personnel pick up their orders through downloads from the Jornadas approximately three times per day.

In the meantime, FIRST sends the requester an automatic email reply. This message acknowledges receipt of the information, shows which individual will be doing the work, summarizes the work that needs to be done, and gives an estimated worker response time and job completion.

“Two major drivers prompted us to take this approach,” explains Regner. “First, we wanted to provide a quick and painless way for our employees to get in touch with us and tell us what they needed. Second, we needed to involve the skilled workers, who are going to be on the receiving end of the work orders, in the development process. The trade workers view FIRST with a sense of ownership, not just as another mandate from management.”

RIDE Gives FIRST a Jump Start

According to Harley-Davidson facilities planner Tim Dotson, the company already had a strong infrastructure upon which to build the online work requester tool. The corporate intranet, appropriately dubbed RIDE for Rapid Information and Delivery Exchange, was developed internally by the IS department two years ago.

“We have not added any additional personnel for our RIDE or FIRST programs,” he says.

The RIDE and FIRST projects are supported by upgrades made to the company’s Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) and its Computer-Aided Facilities Management (CAFM) programs. The CMMS software (from Datastream of Greenville, S.C.), originally a stand-alone application accessed through one computer in the maintenance department, was the predecessor to the online program for implementing and tracking work orders. The CAFM software is FacilityCenter™ by Peregrine Systems of San Diego.

Today, FIRST is integrated with the CAFM software, with links to other corporate applications so, for example, the system can import information from the facilities space database or the Human Resources database. Dotson estimates the operating cost of the CAFM and FIRST programs— hardware, software licensing, maintenance agreements, and some development— less than $100,000 a year.

Employees are listed as company assets, right along with equipment and other items, in the CMMS database. When work orders are completed, the costs are stored in the database and the company has a running total of how much it is spending to provide service to various employees. This helps Harley-Davidson clearly identify FM’s top-paying customers.

“An important thing to note about our intranet is that it’s published by the employees and not by the IT department, so all of the information on the site comes from the individuals and departments that will be responsible for the information,” says Dotson. “Rather than hiring publishers, we decided to give our employees the ability to publish to the intranet through an interface. This method benefits us because we don’t duplicate work and the information is more accurate since it’s coming straight from the source.”

Seeing the Results

Realizing that not all problems will be reported and that some employees will continue to call in service requests, Regner is pleased with the rate of participation in the online system.

“Right now, one in four of our employees is using FIRST, and we’ve seen a significant decrease in the number of phone calls,” he says. “About 1,000 of our 7,000 work requests were transacted via the Web last year, and so far we’re up almost 70 percent in 2001.”
 
During 1999, Harley-Davidson employees logged 3,500 work orders, a number that doubled one year later. Regner believes the figures represent the company’s improved ability to capture information about the service requests rather than a dramatic increase in the volume of work.

He also notes that the ease of making the online requests has led users to expect the work to be done more quickly.

“In order for us to encourage employees to use FIRST, we have to continually meet the estimated response and completion times,” he says. “We are meeting our commitments, although it’s not 100 percent of the time.”

Lessons Learned

A key factor behind the success of FIRST was the involvement of the skilled trade workers during the development stage. In addition to providing firsthand input on the maintenance process, participation helped secure their commitment to response targets and other performance metrics.

Regner and Dotson also point out that the intranet scheme will not totally eliminate the call center. Despite FIRST’s ease of use and the promise of a quick response time, employees are still reluctant to address temperature-related problems online.

“Our suspicion is that when employees are hot or cold, they don’t trust that clicking this into a computer is going to get them a quick response,” notes Regner. “They still prefer to pick up the phone to complain about the temperature, so we know the Web requester will not completely replace the need for call centers.”

He also points out that the rollout of any service should be done in conjunction with an educational and marketing program to ensure that the people who will use the product are aware of its availability. When Harley-Davidson launched FIRST, it distributed flyers, sent email messages, and gave promotional magnets to every employee.

“We discovered that the novelty wears off quickly. We’re still repeating ourselves every day, asking employees if they have heard of FIRST and encouraging them to use it,” he says. 

Other FM eBusiness
 
Harley-Davidson began working in 2000 with an application, e-Way, provided courtesy of Corporate Express of Milwaukee, to give employees an online method of ordering office supplies. However, Regner says the facilities group needs to do more marketing to make employees aware of this added convenience, which Corporate Express offers at no extra charge.

Plans are also under way to create an online furniture management system in conjunction with the company’s long-time supplier, C.J. and Associates of New Berlin, Wis. Once the program becomes operational, facilities staff will be able to order and check on furniture directly, while the vendor stores and tracks inventory and provides delivery of all components. Cost for this new service, which includes space for storing furniture inventory, will be $900 a month.

The company is also considering moves toward a wireless network, which could allow maintenance workers to retrieve work orders from their handheld PDAs without having to download the information several times per day. Response times would be quicker since the wireless world operates in real-time.

“By making it easier for employees to do business with facilities, the people on the front lines can spend more time serving our Harley-Davidson customers,'” says Regner.

By Tracy Carbasho

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ISSN: 1096-4894