A Simple & Effective Equipment Management Platform
April 23, 2018
Every construction project has 2 major costs Labor and Equipment. A project manager who is able to control these 2 main categories will more than likely have a successful project. However, having an effective equipment management platform is very difficult to find.
Devrah is a flexible Project Management platform that can be implemented at every level of a project. This article looks at how the platform provides fleet management teams an effective way to implement a system of Equipment Management & Tracking.
Devrah allows teams to interact with information in a simple and effective manner by visually reflecting your organization’s current processes i.e. allowing everyone to understand your internal processes facilitating quick assimilation and opportunities to improve existing processes. Devrah accomplishes this by implementing a Kanban UI/UX as well as different ways to view work like a Calendar view as seen above.
How does it work?
1. Determine System/Process. Devrah unlike your typical management system serves as a blank slate and can be molded to fit the systems you want to be implemented. Do you want 1 or 2 individuals to oversee the assignment and return of tools/equipment? Or will it be a self-checkout / self-check-in approach?
2. Map Out System/Process. The Devrah platform operates under the same premise as if you were using a whiteboard and sticky notes. So you could name your columns in whatever manner you wish e.g. checked out, checked in, being repaired etc.
The best way to understand the basic premise of Devrah is to think of a physical whiteboard where you can create columns and sticky notes that you can write on, store information, and move from one column to another. Just as you can organize and change how you setup a physical whiteboard you can do the same with Devrah’s Digital Whiteboards. So you make Devrah reflect what your company processes. Unlike other PM Platforms where you have to change your organization’s processes to fit the platform.
3. Sticky Notes. Create sticky notes for each piece of equipment/tool. In the sticky note you can have the name of the tool, writes notes about the tool, date checked out, the due date for return, and date actually returned. Also, you can attach additional documents such as user’s manual, pictures of the equipment/tool. Create checklists on maintenance or usage steps as well as additional photos of incidents such as damages etc.
4. Implement. Now you are able to track and implement your tracking system. All team members can access the tracking system via web application using your internet browser or mobile device via our mobile application.
Here is an example below:
1. Determine System/Process. Assign the management and tracking of equipment. This employee will create and oversee the checking out of material, equipment, and tools to construction crews.
An additional board will be created to store all equipment, tools, and material ready for check-out.
Two Digital Whiteboards are created 1. An Eqpt Checkout Board where equipment is tracked when sent out to individuals/crews. 2. A second Board where equipment not checked out is stored. This is just one way to setup Devrah, you can represent whatever processes your organization has adopted. What you have effectively done is create a digital representation (sticky note) for every piece of equipment and now you can digitally track where these pieces are moving.
2. Map Out System. Process. The digital columns will be:
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Checked Out: Column for Tools, Equipment, Material etc.
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Returned: Column for Tools, Equipment, Material etc.
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Review / Repairs: Show assigned Mechanics completing review/repairs
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Ready for Checkout: Return to ready to check-out Board for check-out
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Reflect the steps or processes your organization has for tracking equipment. There are countless ways you can do this for example columns can be individual names, crew names, or customer names etc.
3. Create Sticky Notes. Devrah allows users to upload from excel the name of sticky notes as well as any checklist items, notes, etc. This allows users to quickly upload spreadsheets of equipment into Devrah auto-populates the creation of sticky notes (sticky notes are called cards in Devrah), a template for setting up a spreadsheet for import to Devrah can be downloaded from the platform.
Creating the sticky notes you can name the notes and include a cover picture of the equipment or tool.
You can store several types of information attach pictures, pdf’s, word documents, excel sheets, Compressed ZIP Folders, add start, end dates, completion dates (returned), Add comments, and add checklists as needed to store relevant information pertaining to that specific piece of equipment etc.
You can quickly preview attached documents, blow-up documents into a separate tab, and/or download documents.
4. Implement. Employee overseeing equipment, tools, and material will update Devrah as tools go through each step of the mapped out the process of checked-out, returned, Review/Repairs, and return to ready to check-out board.
These boards can be exported to an excel sheet to show all the equipment on your digital boards. This can be an easy way to view all pieces of equipment and their state in a one-page document.
Devrah provides an option to export your projects into an excel sheet so you can see all the state of all the pieces of equipment within your project / Organization.
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