Why Technology for Cleaning and Security Contractors Matters Now

By TEAM Software April 15, 2020 Categories: , ,

Keeping your software needs top-of-mind now sets you up for future success.

It’s no secret that we’re in the middle of a global pandemic, with the end still at some unknown point in the future. What was once business as usual isn’t any longer and security and janitorial contractors are working fast to adapt. Everything from new business needs and processes to demands placed on you and your workforce are changing, sometimes on a daily basis. We understand that big buying decisions are on hold to conserve and divert money to where it’s now needed most. Because of that, you might think this is the worst time to be examining your business needs. But there’s nothing like a crisis to really uncover where your gaps and inefficiencies are.

Don’t let financial concerns and uncertainty of the future pull you away from considering important business decisions like your technology. Instead, lean into this as a time for learning and discovering what you’ve been missing in your business software instead of being overwhelmed and paralyzed by the things you can’t control.

Can you stay in compliance?

With legislative updates and new compliance reporting, are you struggling or able to do the things you need to do to stay in compliance?

Are your employees struggling?

Inefficient scheduling tools like spreadsheets can’t keep up with rapid changes in real-time and can leave your employees out of the loop with shift changes and newly added or eliminated posts. The lack of ability to easily add in new shifts or rearrange guards to different posts based on overtime or availability could also be hurting you with unnecessary costs.

In addition to not knowing where to go and at what time, your cleaners could also be confused over new protocols and understanding the importance of certain cleaning standards when dealing with the presence of a highly transmittable virus. This in turn could be costing you in the forms of cleaning rework and an increase in deficiencies. Or even worse, not meeting your service agreement and having your customers report deficiencies.

Can you trust your data?

For many cleaning and security business leaders, poor integration and lack of data has been a barrier for a long time. The right technology software can help you turn that corner with reliable, proven data and integrations, connecting your distributed workforce to your back office. And because the data is centrally located, it can be shared across departments which eliminates duplicate data entry and ensures everyone has access to it as soon as it’s entered into the system. When you work with a software that can grow with your business, you can take on more work without increasing the head count in your back office.

Do you know your true job costs?

Without the truly transparent and trusted data mentioned above, you can’t see whether or not a job is successful and increasing your profits. Cleaning and security businesses are service based with low profit margins and not a lot of wiggle room. You have to be able to maximize profit margins at every job. But without known job costs, you can’t dig into the data to replicate processes from the profitable jobs to those that might be missing the mark.

Is your business future proof?

In order to withstand this crisis, businesses are forced to develop better strategies and processes. Those improvements not only have to be effective today, but in the future as well. Preparing now can help you handle the next unexpected occurrence and future proof your business. What things happened or are happening during this crisis that you can look at and say, “I never want this to happen again?” Use any downtime to visualize your future state that minimizes disruptions, manages risk and capitalizes on opportunities. Plan on having flexible processes so you can be sure that regardless of what’s happening, you can weather the storm and come out just as strong, if not stronger.

Have you given your business a health check?

Look at a wide variety of things including communications, payment collection, compliance, reporting, employee engagement and more. Think about what you want to provide to your employees and customers regardless of what’s happening in the world. Then ask yourself:

  • Where are your pain points?
  • What problems are you experiencing?
  • What gaps exist?
  • What knowledge is missing?

Everyone, no matter how well prepared they are, is encountering new challenges that they’ll learn from. This disruption to the cleaning and security industries is affecting all businesses regardless of size and forcing everyone to develop more streamlined processes and procedures.

Read the rest of the posts in our COVID-19 blog series: