The world has become busy today and simultaneously more demanding. The demand for creating systematic approaches for managing sales, orders and logistics has thoroughly increased. Supply Chain Management has been the answer to the problems that have subsequently arose for managing and meeting the needs of complicated supply chains and with the improvement of technology, there is more help provided in this direction.
Services like Google Maps Co-ordinate have changed the way route planning systems were handled some years ago. With the new technology in place, managing client requirements and preferences by delivery dates or pickups have become more manageable. Route planning for those who would still be confused of is a specification of the sequence in which selected transport vehicles should ferry between the supply and demand points with the requested quantity of finished goods or raw materials.
Supply chain management is one of the key abilities of a manufacturing and supply chain firms to effectively and quickly reach to changes. It is a system that consists of several independent economic aspects that are further dependant on other fields of activity. A firm’s internal structure is complex, comprising several elements that are interconnected and govern the supply and demand needs. Therefore the demand for a systematic approach for managing sales, orders, logistics and others have further increase in the modern workplace.
The resources in the supply chain management include materials (raw materials, finished goods and work in progress), information, people, money, negotiation and any other resource that motivates the profitability of a business. Logistics on the other hand is the real time positioning of strategic management of the aforesaid resources. In brief, the facilities comprise of:
- Converting / deporting orders and data within the map boundary
- Providing feedback information on errors in locations
- Scheduling orders according to new routes that are feasible within the constraints
- Re-optimizing routes
- Scheduling orders according to existing schedules
The Google Maps Co-ordinate is a form of modern workforce management tool that helps improve the efficiency of mobile teams (vehicles and people). While locations and transport resources are aptly marked on a Google map, it becomes easier to assign jobs according to the nearest / fastest available member. With this real time visibility, the workforce can be scheduled in a smarter and more efficient way.
The Coordinate is also available as an app for Android tablets and phones and will help a wide range of jobs right from taxi and truck drivers to the pizza delivery guy or the FedEx. The idea itself came from the enterprise customers who were looking for a easier solution to organize their mobile teams. Larger organizations will be able to integrate the Google Maps Coordinate into their existing supply chain management system with the use of a full read/write API but for smaller businesses there is no further investment needs.
Users of the service are capable of entering datasets as the custom locations for the service. For n utility company such as the electricity department for instance, this could be integrated into the electricity poles. According to Dan Chu, the product manager of Google Maps Coordinate, this is the first time the internet giant is putting so much effort into a business focused application. Google already has the popular geolocation and Maps service.
The features of the new Google Maps Coordinate include:
- Integrating GPS with mobile devices
- Field and driver support for order views and entries
- Geographic views, as in turn by turn directions
- Scheduling by time slot, location and date
- Managing outbound and inbound orders
- Managing multiple regions (some of which would be overlapping), warehouses and routes
- Optimizing the use of drivers, vehicles, local collectors and vendors by availability and location
- Manual assignments or optimized route automation
- Dashboards
- Administrative functions
Through the integration with Google Indoor Maps, this service ensures that accurate information is presented on real time visibility of the workforce, even when they are inside locations. This, as a result allows administrators for assigning jobs to the nearest available worker. For the worker, the data capture tool provides detailed information on the project at hand and the ways to coordinate it.
Organizations in this field of operation will be able to accept jobs and project on the mobile phone and dispatch the reports to the customers. The check in option allows confirming that the delivery has actually been made while further allowing distinguishing between time taken to travel and the actual time required to do the job. The system will also address employees in the field to collect customer data like feedback forms and receipts thus making administrators guaranteeing a complete workflow of the processes.
The Google Maps Coordinate also has an option for the users to go invisible to maintain privacy and also a time based system that automatically logs in or logs out users in the start or after the end of their shifts respectively. Administrators will however need to get the consent of the field workers for being tracked.
Even the Police in Austin, Texas has started using the Google Maps Coordinates for their management. The Deputy chief of the Travis County Sheriff’s Department says that they used the platform for the first time in the U.S. Grand Prix in November 2012 and “our dispatchers were able to interface and organize the deputies throughout the event in real-time. Our personnel knew the exact locations of all available law enforcement resources in the area at any given moment.”
For supply chain firms, ordering assignments, GPS tracking and turn by turn field coordination gets easier and much more effective by using the Google system than doing it manually or in other similar platforms. The platform has been launched since September 2012 at a price of $15 per month for every user and is available worldwide. The price may go up in the future but there is no confirmation as of yet. However, the Maps coordinate seem to be a highly effective option for modern supply chain management processes.
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