With a client base of over 180 Communication Service Providers (CSPs) that serve much of rural North America, we consider ourselves experts in the challenges facing rural telcos. Inefficiencies become sources of friction – they can gum things up and slow operations. How are successful telcos overcoming these issues? Let us share a few ideas!
When it comes to increasing revenue and improving efficiencies, rural telcos face a number of unique obstacles. There are always more tasks than there are resources. Having served rural providers for over 30 years, we at Mapcom routinely take on these hurdles. Our customers’ sources of friction are often caused by the same issues.
A friction point we see over and over again is the silos of isolated records spread throughout an organization; each department keeps their own documentation, preventing other departments from accessing valuable data and slowing operational processes significantly. The good news is that the records exist SOMEWHERE. The bad news is your company could be squandering resources on an easily solvable problem. What would you gain by centralizing information? In our experience, the answer is: better workflow, optimal operational readiness and even improved customer service. In a perfect world, silos would not hinder an organization because each department would perfectly communicate with each other. In reality, this rarely happens, and sorting through information stored in another department’s silo probably ranks pretty low on everyone’s priority list.
A second common source of friction is new technology implementation. We have yet to meet a customer that has the free time to learn new technologies, master them and then deploy them to customers. Typically our customers have a full agenda supporting existing infrastructure, when a new technology comes along that can drive fresh revenue, reduce churn or improve efficiencies. Somehow that new technology has to seamlessly integrate into the existing agenda and the existing processes. On top of that, asking people to re-learn how to do their job is a daunting task.
If this all seems bleak, take heart – we suggest tried and true solutions to remove these sources of friction. Next we’ll go into details about our suggestions. In the meantime, check out our software page for details on how our modules integrate with each other and your existing programs to streamline your organization’s data sharing!