Fans of the Apple world have integrated their products into our daily lives, in such a way that they help us on a daily basis. From using Fitness+ to play sports, controlling our HomeKit devices at home, using the Apple Watch Series 7 as a tool to know our health status, managing our notifications wherever we are… All we have adapted the use of these productsand its ecosystem, in our needs to cover tasks and provide us with additional comfort.
In the case of the company, the digital transformation solves at the enterprise level processes traditionally implemented which have been able to adapt to new tools and the technological context: the one we know best is the transition from physical paper documents to the digital world, integrating the electronic signature, the management in line and other changes that we are all used to in the current environment.
More complicated are these transformation processes in certain more industrial fields, such as the management of an automotive technical service in all its stages: from the reception of the vehicle, its follow-up by the customer and the provision of information in real time for repair professionals. In this direction, Volvo Car Sweden achieved great success in implementing Apple Watch technology in these types of situations.
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The Apple Watch and iPhone as essential parts of the scanning process
Over the past 18 months, Volvo Car Sweden has moved from traditional workshop management to implementing a new system to digitize this process. rely on help from iPhone and Apple Watch. The objective achieved was a simplification of their work, since it allowed them to move away from traditional office workstations, to be able to access information from anywhere without having to be in front of a PC as was done. until now.
the the heart of this system is the Apple Watch, an essential part of this new set of tools already allows technicians to have the information and interact with it from the wrist. In the words of Johnnie Andersson, Personal Technician at Volvo Cars: “With Apple Watch, I have everything I need for my job on my wrist. It’s also much easier to train a new technician on Apple Watch and iPhone than on our desktop systems.”.
The convenience and ease of use of the new system represents an improvement over the traditional catch-up time for new technicians, which was up to six months in the old format. Volvo Car Sweden chose iPhone and Apple Watch for their integrated securityrobustness of custom applications and ease of use for employees.
This is how habits became new tools
The trickiest – and most important – part of a digital transformation process is precisely how adapt this change and these habits to couple it with digital tools and services that optimize what has been done before, and make it even better. To do this, an app called Volvo Service was developed, where the scanning team accompanied the service technicians for weeks – to understand how they worked, what information they needed at each stage and how to integrate all these needs in a custom iPhone app and Apple Watch.
This was precisely one of the important aspects of success: these observations revealed that the mobility of service technicians was essential, almost for 40% of the working day, since they had to move between the interior and exterior of the building of the workshop, the reception, the computers and the warehouses. Previously, there were more than 15 information systems where these technicians consulted the data necessary for their work, and they were all desktop PCs.
However, the new Volvo Service app for iPhone and Apple Watch has been designed to align with these stages of the technician’s work, covering the entire process: from planning to customer reception, service, delivery and subsequent follow-up. “With the Volvo Service app, we are connecting people through technology. In one workshop, customers report a 37% improvement in the ability to access their personal service technician”said Volvo Car Sweden digitalization director Makus Lundström.
This app has been perfectly integrated with various Volvo information systems, allowing service technicians to manage, monitor and get work done wherever they are. This is essential for this transformation process to be successful, in the words of Erik Bylund, who leads systems integration for Volvo Car Sweden: “The Volvo Service app integrates seamlessly with our back-end systems, giving our technicians the data they need in real time.”
The success of this implementation was reflected in the recent study highlighted by key workshops across Sweden:
• Up to 40% less printing by technicians every day.
• 30% increase in the number of post-service follow-up calls and emails to customers.
• 80% of technicians using the app increased their total customer satisfaction score.
Jessica Span, CEO of Volvo Car Swedencommented that through this new application, and using the Apple Watch in this new process “Our personal service technicians are able to build stronger and closer relationships with customers.” This is arguably one of the quickest ways to measure the goal of successful digital transformation: increased customer satisfaction.
