You Can't Fix the Frontline From a Conference Room - #141 - Dan Cefaratti

Speaker A: Frontline workers keep our world moving. They work in high stakes, fast changing environments where technology can empower them or hold them back. And when adoption fails, the impact ripples outward, slowing teams, frustrating customers and undermining the success of the entire organization. This is Frontline Innovators and I'm your host, Justin Lake. In each episode I speak with leaders who are rethinking how technology is introduced, embraced and and sustained on the frontline leaders putting people at the heart of digital transformation. Frontline Innovators is brought to you by Skillful. We help organizations achieve lasting technology adoption for frontline teams so they can work smarter, safer, and with confidence in the tools they use every day.

Speaker B: Welcome to the Frontline Innovators podcast. I'm, um, your host Justin Lake and, and today's guest is the North American Dynamics lead at Valrata where he designs and delivers Microsoft Dynamics 365 Solutions that help organizations streamline operations and empower their teams. With deep expertise in enterprise technology architecture, Dan brings a practitioner's perspective on how thoughtful technology design can transform the way frontline and field based workforces operate. Please welcome to the show Dan Seffarotti.

Speaker C: Hello.

Speaker B: Hello, Dan.

Speaker C: Hey, Justin. Good to see you.

Speaker B: I'm so excited to have you on the show. You and I met at a conference. Um, I feel like I've known you for a long time, but good grief, it's only been April, right? Just last month we met, we're recording this in May. Uh, Dan and I just met in April and I feel like you were one of those people that, as I said, I feel like I've known you for much longer and I felt that way from the minute that we met. We have a lot of things in common about the way that we view the market. So I'm just super excited, uh, to have you on the show today. I'm going to ask you the same question that I ask many people who sit on the enterprise side. They're the consumers and implementers and of technology and operators of the business. But I want to ask you this perspective. From the perspective of a systems integrator, what do you see as the biggest operational consequence of poor frontline technology adoption?

Speaker C: You know, um, it does have a ripple effect, you know, really starting from working with that customer. Uh, one of the things that I always felt and believed is that the frontline worker or the person who is meeting with the customer is really their service ambassador. So they're the ones who have the relationship, they're the ones that, uh, they are making that contact with that customer. And that's essentially where good customer service begins. If they're having a bad day or something like that, you know, that's a reflection where if you've got a competitor that's, you know, looking to get in there, that could be the first excuse or reason why to go look someplace else.

Speaker B: Yeah, I think you're spot on. And yet it seems that so many times adoption feels like an afterthought. Uh, I'm curious to get your take, you know, out of all the proposals you've worked on recently or over the last few years, like what percentage of your customers and prospects are actually talking about the user adoption piece when they're in the system design phase?

Speaker C: It's something that we try to force, uh, up front. So we will a lot of times have to bring up, do you have a change management plan? What is your plan to get these folks up and running? Um, a lot of times, well, it's a different team, but what they need to realize is this is critical to the success. We've replaced very, very expensive software that would take millions to implement. Um, but if they have a poor mobile experience out in the field, it doesn't matter what you've done on the back end to make everything work. It's what happened on the front end. If you're not getting good, if you're not getting good feedback, good user adoption from that tool and not including those individuals in, not the decision making but how the product's gonna be implemented, you're set for a long road ahead or a good chance at some failure, um, of the investment that you're taking on.

Speaker B: Yeah, I know this isn't super detailed research that I'm doing here, but if you had to pick a number, what percentage of customers do you think, uh, actually focus adequate resources and time on the adoption part versus the kind of the discovery and the implementation phase, absent the user adoption. Is this a problem in your world or do you think that most customers are putting forth the appropriate resources?

Speaker C: I would say traditionally it's been a very big problem, um, and a lot of things that's been forgotten about over time. It has increased, but it hasn't increased as much as I thought it would. I think with technology changing, you know, the, um, smartphone coming around, you know, folks getting used to a smartphone, their way around it, um, that has helped a lot. But if your product isn't intuitive, you know, someone's going to get turned off quickly. And so, uh, to give you a percentage, I would say probably about 50, 60% our thinking about it and we make that higher up front because, you know, we're all about project success. Uh, customer success is going to be our success. We want them to tell, we want them to tell about the services that we did for them that helped make them successful, to, you know, reach their North Star, achieve some of the ROI that they're looking to do.

Speaker B: Yeah. So not to turn this into a commercial for your firm, but it's okay to talk about it. I mean, I brought you here because I want to promote your perspective. Um, again, you know, from the moment that you and I met at the conference, I felt we had a lot of alignment. So I don't think we should be shy about talking about some of the best practices. So let's talk us through that a little bit. You talked about the process of just, even if the customer is not asking you, you are asking the customer. Have you given thought to how you're going to handle this change? So let's, let's talk about what an ideal scenario would look like. What types of services and approach would you take? Are there things that you can give us as best practices about, like what percentage of our project budget should be spent on adoption versus other things? Like, I'm just kind of curious to get inside that process a little bit and see behind the scenes.

Speaker C: So, you know, everyone's got their own project implementation process, but you know, we have an upfront analysis and design where we sit and we talk about, you know, what are you currently doing, but not necessarily what you're currently doing, but where do you see yourselves as far as the business processes that you want to change? What are the business processes that you want to have? And understanding that, um, when it comes to the techs out in the field, we'd like to insist on a ride along, uh, the opportunity to spend some time with the tech, understanding what they do on a daily basis, uh, some of the struggles that they have and how, what's going to make their life easy. Because if their life's easy, um, you know, it's going to reduce turnover because you certainly want to keep these people around. We're facing a silver tsunami here. Right. So we want to keep folks from leaving organizations with all that knowledge as they start to retire. Um, and then how do you keep that knowledge transfer, uh, and how to perform some sort of a knowledge transfer, uh, in the things that they're doing out in the field?

Speaker B: Yeah. Are there any stories that come to mind when you think about doing ride alongs? You know, I, I talk about this on LinkedIn and stuff all the time. If doing field trips with our customers is one of my favorite things, I learn something every single time I go out in the field, even if it's in the same industry or sometimes even with the same company that I've been out on a ride along with before. But every single time I go out, I learn something new. Is there anything that comes to your mind about something that you witnessed or learned about a client? We don't have to mention any proper names, but just that maybe you would never have been able to capture if you had just been doing discovery with that customer in a conference room.

Speaker C: I think the biggest is they're real people. They're no different than you and I. Um, you know, most of them be someone you know, in my case, I'd love to have a beer with and just go out and have a good time. Um, but their struggle is also real. You know, when they get into I have to input over here and then go input over here and then multiple things that they may have to do just to do a simple task. Um, whereas they may have talked about that before, but no one's listened to them. And I think that's the most important thing is how do they convey their message? And some of them are a little bit fearful, I would also say, about saying, here's some of their struggles. Say they don't want to talk about how the processes may be, uh, not, uh, great, because that could maybe potentially cost them a job. Right. So there is a little bit of a fear factor in some of that. So it's just learning and understanding what they do and then being able to relay that and saying, hey, you know what, we're going to help you. The goal is how do you make your lives easier? I mean, they've got one thing, it's, you know, get in, do a good job and then get on to the next job. Um, without, you know, making the customer happy, without making mistakes.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. As I'm thinking about this and thinking about just some of the observations that I've made, I can't tell you the number of times. It's so many is why I can't tell you the number. Where I've been out in the field and the standard operating procedure was for that field employee to be documenting everything that they do during the job. And yet when I went out on a ride along, they were not compliant with that sop. And so what that means in most cases, exactly as you said, they were hyper focused on getting the job done. It wasn't because they were being lazy, uh, they weren't being intentionally non compliant. They were actually focused on the work at hand. But they were often taking a lot of notes throughout the day. One guy I remember worked, uh, for an elevator company and we went out to his truck first thing in the morning, you know, seven o' clock in the morning or something like that. We grabbed a cup of coffee from the office, we go out to the truck and, you know, I strapped my seatbelt on and I think we're ready to go. We spent the next 30 or 40 minutes in the parking lot where he was documenting all of yesterday's work in his handheld today. And so I said, well, why are you doing that? And he goes, well, I don't, I don't have time to do all this when I'm actually out, you know, doing the job. And so that to me was, uh, an again. Now, I have come to see that dozens of times on ride alongs, but that may have been my first time that I witnessed that. And so I went back to the conference room, you know, where we have a meeting with the other stakeholders, and I said, you know, I've only been out with one guy, but so far 100% of, um, the people I've been out with are not doing this the way that you intended. And what are the odds that the one guy you sent me out with happens to be the guy that's not doing it? Like, is it possible you have 5,000 technicians? Is it possible that there's more than just one? And so we see situations like that when we bring it back to the conference room, conversations later. It makes you really question, um, you know, how many people are, are not as compliant as we think they are with the process and really what's, what's behind that. Most of them are not trying to be difficult employees. But what he shared with me is that he felt like it took too much time for him to document the work while he was there on site with the customer.

Speaker C: Yeah, I've seen a lot, you know, when they're traveling, going back to their hotel rooms, you know, you finish their job, they're copying something from a spreadsheet or what they wrote down. Um, the thing that I also really found is they really care about the job and doing it right. It's not like, you know, checking boxes, moving on. They have a passion, uh, about what they're doing and making sure they're doing it correctly.

Speaker B: I think that part about the men and women on the front lines caring about Their job, I think that's such an important human element to bring back into the conversation because I do see difficulties with change management and compliance with these enterprise systems and processes. And I think sometimes senior leaders in the organization might just come away and say, well, we just have to make them do this thing right. They just need to come online with this capability. I think one of the biggest challenges that I see, and I'd be curious to get your take on this, is the time that it takes to change and the time that people are afforded to absorb that change. And I'm curious if you have uh, a perspective on that, because the truth is they've been doing something a particular way for a long time. So you guys come in, you're implementing a new solution. And as you said at the top of this conversation, it's not just about the software. You're, you know, you're asking your customer from day one, what are the processes that you want to change and how will they be reflected in a new enterprise system? Which means by definition those frontline team members have been doing that process in some other way until now, and now we're asking them to change. And um, I'm wondering if you've learned any secrets about how to afford them the change necessary, um, so that they can absorb that change and be successful with it.

Speaker C: I think a lot of times, you know, we first meet a potential customer, uh, we get into talking about who we are, uh, we start talking about our, you know, our focus and our capabilities. One of the things that comes up often is because we deal with a lot of asset tens of industries is our power worker for assets offering. And as we get into it and understanding, um, touching all the various areas of a service organization, it is the frontline worker and educating them not only about who we are, but also how important the frontline worker is and bringing that to the forefront. So when we get down the road, it's not familiar to them. So we try to make that something up front because we realize, you know, those folks are going to have the biggest impact on the success of any, uh, of these engagements. Yeah, so it's, it's the early on education starting to make them think and okay, where are we going to incorporate change management, how, you know, we perform, train the trainer, um, how are you all going to make it successful? And I think that's, you know, going back to when we first met, you know, a few weeks back is, that's the, the forgotten child, right? It's, you know, how are we going to help uh, make that successful because sometimes people forget about it.

Speaker B: Yeah. Where do you think that process breaks down? When, when it breaks down, where, where do you see it, um, happen? Is it, is it due to timelines or, or not being able to free the guys up in the field? Like when that change doesn't happen successfully inside a customer scenario? Uh, what do you think is kind of the root cause of that?

Speaker C: Um, a lot of times I hear

Speaker B: we're not talking about a specific one of your customers. Okay. We're just talking generally across the board.

Speaker C: But a lot of times we hear, well, that's a different group. That's our training team, you know. Okay, well how do we get your training team involved? Because at some point in time that's going to be important. But I will also say it's a bit of a double edged sword because we're trying to sell our services, we promote Microsoft technology. Um, we do need to toe the line to, hey, we still have to win the business. Between competing with other partners, other vendors, we still, um, have to win the business. And how can we do that that's going to be fit within their overall budget? Because if they haven't thought about some of these things, we certainly don't want to blow the budget.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker C: And um, I think that's also one of the big things when I met you is like, you know, hey, to have Skillful is now part of this. We're not necessarily, we're not really breaking the bank on um, what it's offering. So let's get these folks in early and often to whether it be what I mean folks, it's get that training team, help them understand there are options, uh, that are going to be important to make this overall project successful. A lot of times the customers say we need to come up with an roi. Well, in order to do that, we need to understand what y' all are going to do to help make this successful.

Speaker B: Yeah. I don't want to gloss over your suggestion that Skillful should be brought in more often. So yes, I'll support that. But I actually, I want to go back to, I think the bigger piece of this, which is, you know, just throughout my career working with large companies, I've always found it very helpful to break down what needs to get done on a project, regardless of whether, you know, I, I've worked for service companies in a similar capacity as yours. Right. It's not even that you should hire us to do this, it's just, let's kind of, in a very matter of fact way Just go through all the things that it's going to take to be successful and Then let's say Mr. And Mrs. Customer, which of these things are you prepared to take on? So that we don't obviously then have to include them in our proposal. But what that has often done is surfaced up a whole bunch of things on that list that everyone obviously agrees need to get done and they were not in the RFP for us. And there's no one on the customer side to take responsibility. And the reason that, you know, I started the company that I started in particular is because this is one of those categories where user adoption seems to be that thing that kind of like everybody's pointing to each other saying, hey, it's not my job, you know, like that's those guys over there. And you said this in your description before and I think it's actually one of the risks that we ought to talk about more often, which is if everyone owns end user adoption, then no one really owns it, because in the large complex organizations that you serve and that we serve, um, if everyone owns it, it becomes this like it happens in the corner somewhere, which means it's really not happening anywhere. And so I advocate for a team or an individual in that program being explicitly responsible for end user adoption. And in my opinion is that it ought to be the business stakeholders in the program because they're going to be there after your team has implemented the solution and the project is kind of scaled down, they're going to be there. And I'm wondering, do you see the business stakeholders taking responsibility for that or does it become a little bit of a Teflon thing?

Speaker C: Sometimes it does become a little bit of a Teflon thing. I mean, it is difficult. Um, you have the business sponsor for these engagements. When you lay out the timeline, you've got your different phases that everybody has. Well, in this 6 to 12, 18 month timeline, there's always this little piece at the end that is UAT and then another little section called Go Live. But you've got this huge long timeline and there's this little thing and all of a sudden just like, okay, yeah, we're to go live. What's happening in that? Go Live could be as impactful as what's occurred over the last months. It's taken to get to that point to go live. And that's the critical part of it. And there's a lot that has to happen behind the scenes in order for that, particularly if you are rolling out to thousands of technicians, whether it be across America or globally. You know, what's behind the scenes that's going to make that successful.

Speaker B: Yeah. I had a, um, customer recently. We were discussing the idea of muscle memory. And I always have. You know, I've probably talked about this on the podcast before, so if I have and you're listening, I apologize for me repeating this again. But the, the idea of muscle memory is not really what we're working on with Skillful. I'm really trying to help them develop an understanding. These frontline workers, I want them to understand and have the communication that they need to know why this process is changing and then how to do it and then to have a resource. But a customer recently made a point that the biggest challenge in change is helping them unwind the muscle memory they have from the old process. And it sounds so obvious now when I say it, uh, out loud, uh, but that it really had an impact on me that the biggest problem is change is not necessarily what we're going too, but it's holding on to where we were because that's what's comfortable.

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker B: And it requires less energy and less stress to follow the thing that we've been doing for weeks or months or years before. And it takes a lot more energy and a lot more stress to do the new thing. And so I've been really. This individual made this comment to me about a month ago, and I've been kind of stewing on that thought for a little bit because that is a lot of what we're changing.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: People are used to doing things in a particular fashion, especially the men and women on the front lines who are very task driven.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: They are given X number of tickets a day that they've got to close or X number of deliveries a day that they have to perform. And so they're going through that motion and they've been driving that truck or servicing that type of equipment for years. And then all of a sudden we like hit the emergency brake on Monday and say, hey, from this point forward, by the way, you're going to do that differently, you know, and that's, that's a difficult thing to overcome.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: And, you know, it's like teaching a batter to change their swing or their stance or quarterback on how to throw. Um, there is a lot to go through that. And particularly when it's like, I just need to get this job done.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker C: Do it correctly. M and all the other things spinning through their mind. You know, what if I don't, you know, what's the knowledge base that I need to Go look for. To get the answer to do something. So, yeah, it's. How do you make it simple to, to get through that process?

Speaker B: I, I want to surface up something you and I talked about offline, uh, both when we first met a few weeks back and then in preparation for today. And I, I just want to serve this up, uh, so that you and I can talk about something that we're both seeing in the market. I don't know that you and I are going to have any answers today, but maybe if we can make our point and have one person on, uh, not in this conversation, listen to what we're talking about. And this topic is. Dan and I have both spent our careers around large enterprises where we have both believed that it's important for us to go spend a day in the life of the men and women in the field. You know, Dan and I both told stories already on this short episode so far about the valuable insights that we learn about the men and women on the front lines and therefore we learn about the customer that we're trying to serve. And Dan, you and I have talked recently about how it seems that we've been having a harder time getting customers to say yes to that. Not completely shutting it down, but it does seem like after Covid, seems like that's a bit of the dividing line for me that after Covid, in 2021 and 2022, when things started going back to normal in most other ways, we started going back to events and we started, you know, going on site with, with uh, our, our own companies and our clients, organizations and stuff like that. But, but the one thing that doesn't seem to have come back is the frequency or readily available nature of doing ride alongs. So I'm curious. First of all, I want to make sure I'm, I'm, I don't want to represent, uh, your thoughts on this. Are you. You are seeing pretty much the same thing where there's a little bit of hesitance before going out into the field.

Speaker C: Now you're, you're spot on. Um, you know, and even with m. Meeting with our clients, with some of our, um, you know, we like to be. You know, Covid has helped in some ways as far as, you know, not requiring everybody to be on site, but it's also been a little bit of a detriment because something. There are so many things that are missed just walking the hallways or taking the break and getting coffee or water or whatever it might be going out to dinner after a long day and having discussions There's a lot of things that are missed, um, that you just don't necessarily pick up. And to me, what's critical is in those early analysis and design meetings is being in a room and understanding when you got to go build something. That's fine. Everybody does their thing and come back. Um, but the ride along is critical. Um, people are dispersed now. I mean, they're not necessarily going into an office. So a lot of the teams that I'm meeting with, they're multiple different time zones. They, uh, don't really have a reason to get to an office. Um, so that's been a little bit difficult. And then trying to find somebody who is available to do the ride along, because it's almost like an inconvenience. It almost should be a priority. And, yeah, I don't know if we got an answer. We'll come up with different ways, hey, we're going to be in town. Does it make sense to get together? And it's like, well, no, because I got going right after this right to another meeting. And with the back to backs, uh, where wasn't like that necessarily pre Covid. It's. It's just hard to get some time.

Speaker B: Yeah, it's, um, well, it's something. And I want to give credit to an old buddy of mine, Mike Lasky. He's not listening to any podcasts anymore because he has since retired. But when I came on board, uh, to work at Symbol Technologies back in the early 2000s. So, yeah, like 20 something years ago, um, I remember having a hard time just absorbing all the change that I just left another company and had come to Symbol and I had so much to learn. And I remember saying to Mike, like, how the heck am I going to catch up with all this? And he said, just go out and ask your customers to give you, you know, a tour through the facility or have them do a ride along with one of their guys and see how they're using our technology. And you'll learn a lot from that process. And so I did that, and he was exactly right. Every customer that I called said, yeah, come on out, man. We'll spend the day with you. We want, we wanted to show you what we're doing. We want tell you what's working and maybe some of the things that we'd love to see you guys improve. We love that you're even asking. Right? So they loved that the vendor was asking for that participation. And I then learned that it was a great way for me to learn more about my customers and actual Use cases.

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker B: I worked for a hardware manufacturer at the time and so it would be very easy to get wrapped into the speeds and feeds of the devices that we were selling. But what was far more important is how does the company's business operate?

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: How do they actually do their job? Where do they have gaps that we can try to close? And so that process became such an important part of how we worked with our clients. And so I've, I've just made that a part of how I execute as a professional. And it does seem like over the last few years it still happens. Certain customers I think still find value in it, but it does feel like it's getting fewer and further between. And so at a time when adoption is more critical than ever, we're pushing more technology to the edge of the workforce than we ever have before. The pace of change is more rapid than it's ever been before. Those types of observations that we, that we can experience in the field are really more critical than ever before. So if anything, the curve should be going up, not going down. So if anybody on the other side, the customer side of this happens to be listening today, Dan and I are telling you we want to invest, we want to invest our time to get to learn about the men and women in the field. And frankly, if you're not doing this, you should be like you on the inside of your customer, on the inside of your company is you can't figure out what the guys in the field need from a conference room at headquarters. Right. So you need to be getting out into the field. So Dan, I don't know if you have anything to add to that other than just my soapbox rant here.

Speaker C: No, it's, it's true. I mean it's really a two way process. It's, it's an opportunity for us as uh, the service provider to learn. Um, it's also an opportunity for the customer to fully explain some of their needs. And look, we view implementations as a partnership and it's a two way street. Um, I'm of the, uh, old school of people buy from people they like and it's, how do you build that relationship? Um, and I think that's the other thing. I think some folks are just afraid to build that relationship with a particular vendor. But if you can do, because it does benefit the customer as well, because the vendor is going to learn more about you, um, and ultimately have a vested interest in making you successful.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. What is some, um, advice that you would give to customers when looking for a Field service, Uh, I know you're not just field service, but you are pretty heavy, uh, focused on field service applications. But when they're looking for a company like yours, what should they be looking for? What should they be asking?

Speaker C: Um, somebody who understands the business, you know, some examples of things that they've done. A lot of times customers will say, um, you know, I need some references. Um, and it's important to get references. Um, we're one of those where we can provide references and, um, it's not a big deal for us. Um, I've been with large organizations where we're always dreading, can I get a reference? And then that's the scramble. Who are you going to get? Who are you going to talk to to do that? So that's one thing is finding a partner who understands your business, who has maybe built some IP around it. Because, let's be honest, software is very moldable and meldable. Um, and not every, every, um, vendor out there has a solution for everything, but somebody who may have built, um, some capabilities to fill that white space, um, that means they understand their business. We'll refer to them as accelerators. Sometimes we have them out there. But who's got some accelerators that understand what I've been through, that's going to really make my life easier. Those would be some of those things to ask, uh, some of the vendors that they're dealing with.

Speaker B: You are pretty steeped in the Microsoft business. You specifically, um, head up the Dynamics practice for Valrata. What's something about Microsoft? You've been around the Microsoft ecosystem for so long. Um, what's something about Microsoft that maybe most people don't understand specifically as it relates to field service, like Dynamics for field service. Um, I'd be curious to learn a little bit more about that because I think there's so much that people don't know about Microsoft's abilities, capabilities in this area that I think you might find. You've known it for so long that you might, um, take it for granted.

Speaker C: Yeah, it's crazy. I'll go to some of these events and I'm still running into folks. It's like, I didn't realize Microsoft had a CRM solution. I didn't realize Microsoft had an ERP platform. It's all about the productivity apps, uh, teams, Office, Outlook, Azure and Copilot's everywhere. Everyone's talking about some of the Copilot capabilities. I think what's different about Microsoft versus some of the other vendors? It takes all of those other platforms and brings it Together tying it with the business applications to have everything working at once coherently without moving from seamlessly. Um, to be able to get an email in Outlook and automatically generate a work order, ah, that comes out of it, which, or customer or uh, a service request that comes from that. Or leveraging teams that, you know, a teams chat that you might have that has an impact on a work order. If you're working with uh, an external vendor to be able to capture that teams chat and to have that complete areas that are touched every place and do a quick, you know, copilot query that pulls everything together. Um, I think that's probably the biggest differentiator Microsoft has over uh, some of the other traditional vendors out there.

Speaker B: I know you're good friends with the Microsoft folks, so I don't want to take this as an opportunity to take a shot at them. Um, so I'll just put that disclaimer out. But I am a little bit curious because we've had a few Microsoft folks on the podcast over the years, specifically folks from their uh, frontline product teams. It feels to me that they haven't quite gotten the traction that they hoped that they were going to get on kind of some of their frontline focus. And I'm curious, first of all, is that true? I'm not in the ecosystem enough to know that for sure. So it's just really um, kind of an unvalidated perception that I have. Is there truth to that? Have they achieved what they'd hoped to on their frontline focus or are they still struggling to get where they think they can be?

Speaker C: I think they have, um, their mobile application has come a long way and with the power app capabilities, um, to be able to create a mobile app that may not even talk to one of their core business applications, but building something from scratch that now has offline capability that also incorporates Copilot Gentek AI uh capabilities with maybe uh, a custom app. We um, built many custom apps for someone who doesn't need a full complete field service system. Maybe they just need something that's going to go out and get uh, a survey or be able to create an inspection report. Simple things like that, uh, where you can be offline in the middle of an oil field and be able to capture what's going on with a piece of equipment or an inspection checklist and then have it go back and then be able to sync that offline. So I think that's probably one of the biggest things they've done is just isn't known, uh, too much out there with the public, but we're getting there.

Speaker B: Yeah, that's good. Well, man, I appreciate you, uh, coming on today. Uh, as I said, it was great to meet you. Uh, we were at Field Service next, the WVR conference out in San Diego. Uh, we'll probably be there again next year, so I hope we're going to run into the air. What other events are you guys doing this year?

Speaker C: Um, we've got the Power Platform Conference that's coming up, so, um, has grown tremendously. It's going to be in Vegas, uh, the October time frame, uh, this year. So that's a big one for us. So, um, looking forward to seeing many folks there.

Speaker B: And is that horizontal or is that specific to the field service vertical or is that just really across the board?

Speaker C: It's horizontal. So you'll see folks from every single industry we attended because we've got a very large, successful power platform practice, uh, when I was just giving an example of things that we've been able to create offline. So it extends into healthcare, not for profit, uh, and of course the field service world.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: But a lot of the things that we do are around the frontline workers. Um, and that's where you and I just kind of hit it off instantly. We've got a customer in the healthcare industry where they have mobile nurses that are going out and using forms that could be 60 plus pages long. Yeah. How do you get them trained on it? Uh, that's a big deal.

Speaker B: The problem of adoption in the front lines persists across the board. Actually, the problem of adoption persists far beyond just frontline. It's just that there are a lot of other solutions that address technology adoption for knowledge workers. The gap that you and I are talking about is that we need to put the same emphasis on frontline, which by the way, actually represents somewhere between 70 to 80% of the global workforce would really be considered frontline workers. And they've been really underserved in this area. So I think that's why you and I have kind of, you know, found such a match here. And hopefully, uh, in the future we'll be able to talk about some great successes together.

Speaker C: For sure. Absolutely.

Speaker B: Well, Dan, thank you so very much for, uh, for your time today. Where can folks find you if, uh, if they want to sit down and, uh, have another conversation with you?

Speaker C: You can reach me on, um, LinkedIn. Dan, uh, Sephorati. You got my name down there, I believe. Or dan.separatielrado.com we'll have that linked in

Speaker B: the show notes, and, uh, we'll be sure to share that with everybody. Dan, thanks for your time today.

Speaker C: Thanks for having me, Justin. Really appreciate it.

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