Important Parameters To Track Your Field Team Activities

There are multiple reasons for a company to implement a Field Force Automation Solution and probably the most common of all is to ensure adherence to discipline across entire field team. Actually, lack of discipline is the first problem statement that an organization would like to solve when they plan for such a solution, and they are very right in doing so because for any brand having an active and disciplined sales team on the field means half of the job is done.

However, in order to solve this problem, what an organization looks for is a mobility-based solution which is capable of geo-tagging and time-stamping. Many a times they do not dig deep to understand what KPI parameters they should measure and track to analyze discipline related issues and more importantly, whether the SFA solution provider can suggest them on the same and has capability to provide such data points basis the regular use of SFA app by the field team. With vast experience of Assistive team in not just building Field Force Automation solution, but also in managing large field force of many fortune 500 brands, we believe we can help our clients in deciding those right parameters and guide them on how to track those parameters. Here is a list of six most important parameters that we think an organization must closely track to measure discipline of its field force:

Average Visits Per Day: This is a very simple yet an important metrics to track for your field team. We have seen many examples where this metrics drops significantly in the first couple of months of SFA implementation when compared to the manual data received so far. It clearly means there exists a lack of discipline in the team. With regular monitoring and necessary actions, many companies are able to achieve 100% improvements in this KPI within first six months of implementation.

Average Working Hours: Indiscipline is contagious and hence, you must ensure all your field employees are meeting organizational guideline of minimum working hours. In absence of a biometric device to capture such data, you should get the same from your SFA app. The definition of working hours may vary across organizations. For example, some may want start time to be attendance time, and some may want start time to be the time when the field employee leaves his home. Similarly, end time could be last outlet transaction time for some and for others, it could be sign out time. No matter which definition you want to follow, you must monitor this KPI parameter for your field team.

Average Market Hours: Field team is supposed to spend significant part of their daily working hours in the market and it’s a common problem for many companies that while their field team are following working hours guideline, they are not there in market as much as they are supposed to be. Hence, a metrics of Average Market Hours, which is eventually time spent between first outlet visit and last outlet visit, should be measured and monitored thoroughly.

Average Store Hours: As the field team is mostly in motion for most of the time of the day, it is important that they spend less of their market hours in travelling between outlets and spend more time actually at the outlet doing different activities. While it can be attributed not just to poor discipline, but also towards poor planning, irrespective of the reason an organization must check average store hours its field team is spending. This metrics can be derived simply by considering the difference between check-out and check-in time at a store.

Average Time Spent per Store: A derivative of the above metrics the Average Time Spent per Store which is simply Average Store Hours divided by number of stores visited. A very high value of this metrics means team or a person is not making enough visits and a low value means vice versa.

Average KM Travelled per Hour: As travelling is must in any field job, a field employee has to spend Travel Hours which is Market Hours minus Store Hours. But, indiscipline comes when the person is not travelling enough during these travel hours. That is why it is important to measure Average KM Travelled per Hour which can be derived easily if the GPS coordinates are capture for each outlet visit and then using Google APIs, distance between the outlets are calculated.

It is necessary that all these metrics are calculated at most granular level (i.e. for each employee and for each day) and then rolled up the organizational or geographical hierarchy so that all stakeholders at different levels of the company gets visibility of these KPI parameters first at summary level and then they can drill down to the extent they want to.

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