A fair trial: three real jobs, your worst user, your worst site

Pick three real jobs

Choose three jobs your team did last month, and run each one start to finish in the system you are trying:

• A breakdown: someone reports it, it is assigned, fixed, and signed off.
• A planned service: it comes due on its own, the checklist is filled in, the next one is set.
• An inspection with a certificate: the result is recorded and the evidence is kept against the duty.

Give it to your worst user

Hand the phone to the person on your team least keen on computers. Do not explain it first. If they can raise and close a job on their own, everyone else will manage. If they cannot, that is what your team will be like in month three.

Take it to your worst site

Go to the basement, the plant room or the remote site with no signal. Close a job there, walk back to signal and check it arrived. A system that only works at the desk will not be used on the job.

Score it the same way every time

Write down, for each system: did each of the three jobs finish, how long it took, and what your worst user said. Compare the notes, not the memory of the demo.

Sources

Our own advice, from running maintenance. This guide quotes no studies and no figures.