Woes of a Fleet Support Engineer During a Pandemic

Synopsis

Pandemics such as COVID-19 lead many organizations to request their employees around the world to adapt to work from home (WFH), while attempting to run operations in unaffected regions as efficiently as possible. This is especially true for organizations that have large global transport and logistics operations. Technology such as wearables and handheld smart devices are a crucial part of any such operation today. The upkeep of this technology is heavily dependent on tech support engineers, who are expected to investigate and remediate user queries and potential breakdowns from all over the world. This operation is commonly known as Remote Monitoring and Troubleshooting (RMT).

This article discusses the challenges faced by such support engineers during WFH periods and how the right tool could have solved these problems.

Off-the-Shelf EMM Software (a.k.a MDM) are Failures as RMT Solutions

* EMM – Enterprise Mobility Management * MDM – Mobile Device Management * RMT – Remote Monitoring and Troubleshooting

Due to misinformed decisions of organizations, many support engineers are stuck with off the shelf EMM tools for supporting Remote Monitoring and Troubleshooting (RMT) requests. Unified Endpoint Management(UEM) tools serve the need of tasks such as O.S and application updates, security compliance and lock downs; but miserably fall short when it comes to remote monitoring and troubleshooting.
Why? Because every organization’s uniqueness reflects in their devices, software as well as how they use them. Being able to troubleshoot such devices and applications require bespoke solutions. Such bespoke solutions are not the focus of UEMs, as they don’t focus on offering all the details required for a support engineer to perform RCA (Root Cause Analysis). As a result, they are forced to resort to very cumbersome methods of obtaining the information they need, such as Remote Desktop, or using a mix of their own scripts and dashboards, which are highly insecure and unstable.

Remote Desktop is a Cumbersome Bandwidth Bandit

Due to the lack of information and remote control for troubleshooting, whenever a ticket is opened, support engineers have got used to resorting to remote desktop access to the end device to get the data and control that they need to solve a problem. Remote desktop is heavily dependent on a stable and consistently fast network connection, which is not something that you can expect from someone working from home.

Domestic Data Rates Are Exorbitantly Higher

Organization’s generally opt for unmetered leased lines for their internet connectivity. When support engineers work from home, they are forced to use domestic connections which are metered, and result in sending the operational costs through the roof.

Can’t Look Away for a Second, but You Have To

One of the biggest perks of working from home, is the fact that you get to be around your loved ones. But, support engineers who need to keep their eyes on a terminal or a display are under a lot of tension whenever they are away from it even for a second. At the same time, being away for a short time is not something that can be fully avoided. This is a lose-lose situation for the organization as well the employee. The support engineer faces anxiety of failing to meet SLAs because he/she didn’t see the incident on time and the organization suffers the consequences.

MATRIX24x7 The Solution

A Tailor Made Solution Vs. Ready Made Software

Free yourself from the fixed functionality and rigidity of off the shelf, ready-made applications.
Mold the platform to your requirements vs. adapting to it.

A Partner Vs. A Vendor

Empathetically driven towards gaining a full understanding of the business and operation prior to solutioning.
Access to our best tech and domain experts vs. business sales intermediaries.

This is exactly what MATRIX24x7 is. An RMT platform that can deliver tailor made solutions, and a partner that operates as the CTO of your support operation.

Heshan Perera

Associate Architect / Manager – IoT Platform