How Google Is Changing How We Approach Asset Professionals

For many businesses, the efficient tracking of their installed base or in-service equipment, and also the management of their spare parts inventories are key factors in determining the prospects for internal productivity and customer service profitability. On the contrary, many organizations do not yet utilize a comprehensive asset consultant tracking and management process to be certain the availability of quality data that may be used to generate the business intelligence that will ultimately save them money and improve efficiency. This really is unfortunate, because the tools are readily available - it really is simply a matter of making it a priority.

There are numerous definitions of "asset management", although most deal primarily with financial considerations. Some are based on evolving upkeep management systems; some on the management of factory floor equipment configurations; and some for the purposes of monitoring network equipment as well as railway car and container locations. In contrast, in spite of what situation or application your business deals with, the core definition remains constant; asset management is "a systematic process for identifying, cataloging, monitoring, maintaining, operating, upgrading and replacing the physical assets of the business on a cost-effective basis".

To be truly effective, the asset management process must be built upon a foundation of widely accepted accounting principles, and supported through the proper mixture of sound business practices and financial acumen. It can provide management by having an effective tool that will be used to derive better short- and long-term planning decisions. For this reason, it's something that every business should consider adopting - and embracing.

Poor asset management leads to poor data quality - and poor data quality can negatively affect the business over-time. In reality, experience shows that there are many of common causes that will lead to poor asset management, including lack of business controls for managing and/or updating asset data; lack of ownership for asset data quality; and an out-of-balance investment in people, process, data and technology. Likewise, some businesses might not consider asset management to be a critical function, centering on audits only; whilst others might not consider asset data to be an essential component of the business's intellectual property.

The primary symptoms of poor asset management are usually fairly ubiquitous, and may include anything from numerous compliance and security issues, to uncontrollable capital and/or expense budgets, excessive network downtime and poor performance, under- or over-utilized assets, incompatible software applications, increasing operational costs and headcount, and non-matching asset data derived from different organizations and/or business systems.

Also, poor ongoing asset management practices can impact a business by degrading customer service delivery, polluting the existing installed base of data and distracting sales resources with customer data issues For example, Service Delivery may be impaired by inaccurate depot sparing creating customer entitlement issues, increasing escalations to upper management and lowering customer support. An uncertain installed base lengthens contract renewal cycle-time, limits revenue opportunities and inhibits technology refresh planning.