Collecting and preserving photographs has been a favourite pastime with most people, young and old. Sometimes they get stuck with so many photos from various occasions and varying times in the past, they wonder how to put them all together coherently.

The most common and popular photo book themes include-

Baby Album – You could start your album with photos from various trimesters in your pregnancy and record your emotions. You could include ultrasounds and photos of the nursery too.

Family Holiday– Holiday pictures are best arranged chronologically, i.e. day-by-day. You could also theme them place- by-place, or you could simply put up your favourite pictures from your holidays and record what you liked most about them.

Graduation Day– You could make portrait portfolios of your friends and ask them to write something for you to give it the feel of a personalised slam book.

Wedding Album– A wedding is the most special and important day in a person’s life. A picture tells a thousand words and your wedding album could tell your whole love story. You could start with the ‘Proposal’ and go on to add your engagement photos, bridal shower photos, wedding photos and honeymoon photos.

But here some not so common ideas that could also be fun and entertaining:

1. Pets and Animals– Pets are part of family too and deserve an album unto them. Your pet album could include the day you brought your pet home and how you decided on a name for him/her. You could also make a portfolio of your pet.

2. Sports and Hobbies– Sports never fails to thrill and exhilarate its fanatics. You could start with a ‘Training Journal’ and go on to add photos of your teams, your uniforms, your coaches and your favourite cheers.

3. Photo Cook Book– A way to a man’s heart is his stomach, or so they say. So why not make an album to record that special dish you made for your loved one for the first time! You could also make an album of the first time your child was in the kitchen helping you or making something for you.

4. Family History Book– What better way to preserve your family heritage than a collection of photos creating your own family tree! You could go back as far as you would like and sometimes be amazed at how many people love you and care about you.

5. Road Trips– While on bikes, cars or hitchhiking on a truck, you will see many billboards, signboards and signals. Click them to create your own ‘Highway’ album.

These are just a few examples. Think wild and you could come up with more of your own!

Source by Aaron Clark

“Do you have Facebook?”

“Yes, of course. But I don’t think you can find me, as there are too many people who have the same name as me. Try searching with my surname as well.”

“Hey, you celebrated your birthday in K-Box, right? I saw the photos in your Facebook.”

“Bro, I saw your comments about the YouTube video that I’ve posted in my blog. I’m happy that you are also deeply moved by the ‘Dancing Peacock Man’ as well.”

Social media or “social networking” has almost become part of our daily lives and being tossed around over the past few years. It is like any other media such as newspaper, radio and television but it is far more than just about sharing information and ideas. Social networking tools like Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and Blogs have facilitated creation and exchange of ideas so quickly and widely than the conventional media. The power of define and control a brand is shifting from corporations and institutions to individuals and communities. It is no longer on the 5Cs (e.g. condominium, credit cards and car) that Singaporeans once talked about. Today, it is about the brand new Cs: creativity, communication, connection, creation (of new ideas and products), community (of shared interests), collaboration and (changing the game of) competition.

In January 2010, InSites Consulting has conducted an online survey with 2,884 consumers from over 14 countries between the ages of 18 to 55 years old on social networking. More than 90% of participants know at least 1 social networking site and 72% of participants are members of at least 1 social networking site. On the average, people have about 195 friends and they log in twice a day to social networking sites. However, 55% of the users cannot access their social network websites at work. In the past, not many adults were able to make more than 500 friends, but with social media, even a child or teenager can get to know more than 500 people in a few days by just clicking the mouse. Social media has devalued the traditional definition of “friend” where it means trust, support, compatible values, etc. Although we get to know more people, we are not able to build strong bond with all the people whom we met as our available time is limited. Hence, there is an upcoming social trend of people with wider social circles, but weaker ties (people we don’t know very well but who provide us with useful information and ideas).

Social media also influences people’s buying behaviours. Digital Influence Group reported that 91% of the people say consumer reviews are the #1 aid to buying decisions and 87% trust a friend’s recommendation over critic’s review. It is thrice more likely to trust peer opinions over advertising for purchasing decisions. 1 word-of-mouth conversation has an impact of 200 TV ads. With the prevalence use of social media, there is numerous news related to it from the most viewed YouTube video on “Armless pianist wins ‘China’s Got Talent'” to Web-assisted suicide cases (e.g. New Jersey college student who killed himself after video of him in a sexual encounter with another man was posted online). Thus, does social networking make us better or worse off as a society?

Positive Effects of Social Media

Besides having opportunity to know a lot of people in a fast and easy way, social media also helped teenagers who have social or physical mobility restrictions to build and maintain relationships with their friends and families. Children who go overseas to study can still stay in meaningful contact with their parents. To a greater extend, there is anecdotal evidence of positive outcomes from these technologies.

In 2008, President-elected Obama won the election through the effective use of social media to reach millions of audience or voters. The Obama campaign had generated and distributed huge amount of contents and messages across email, SMS, social media platforms and their websites. Obama and his campaign team fully understood the fundamental social need that everyone shares – the need of being “who we are”. Therefore, the campaign sent the message as “Because It’s about YOU” and chose the right form of media to connect with individuals, call for actions and create community for a social movement. They encouraged citizens to share their voices, hold discussion parties in houses and run their own campaign meetings. It truly changed the delivery of political message.

Obama campaign had made 5 million “friends” on more than 15 social networking sites (3 million friends on Facebook itself) and posted nearly 2,000 YouTube videos which were watched over 80 million times. At its peak, their website, MyBarackObama.com, had 8.5 million monthly visitors and produced 400,000 blog posts. In order to ensure that their contents were found by people, the Obama campaign spent $3.5 million on Google search in October alone, $600,000 on Advertising.com, $467,000 on Facebook in 2008, etc. Currently, Obama’s Twitter account has close to 6 million followers.

In 2010, after the earthquake happened in Haiti, many of the official communication lines were down. The rest of the world was not able to grasp the full picture of the situation there. To facilitate the sharing of information and make up for the lack of information, social media came in very handy to report the news about the affected area on what happened and what help was needed. Tweets from many people provided an impressive overview of the ongoing events from the earthquake. BBC covered the event by combining tweets from the work of its reporter Matthew Price in Port-au-Prince at the ground. Guardian’s live blog also used social media together with the information from other news organisations to report about the rescue mission.

It has been two years since CNN officially launched iReport as a section of its website where people can upload video material, with contact information. During the Haiti crisis, CNN had published a range of social media material but not all the materials were verified. The editorial staff would vet the reports from the citizen journalists and labeled them differently compared to unverified contents. On Facebook, a group, named “Earthquake Haiti”, was formed to show support and share updates and news. It had more than 14,000 members and some users even pleaded for assistance to the injured Haitians in the group. Using email, Twitter and social networking sites like Facebook, thousands of volunteers as part of Project Ushahidi were able to map reports sent by people from Haiti.

The most impressive part of the social media’s impact on Haiti is the charity text-message donations that soared to over $10 million for the victims in Haiti. People interested in helping the victims are encouraged to text, tweet and publicize their support using various social networking sites. The Global Philanthropy Group had also started a campaign to ask wealthy people and celebrities, like Ben Stiller and John Legend to use Twitter and Facebook to encourage others to give to UNICEF. An aid worker, Saundra Schimmelpfennig, allowed the advice from other aid workers and donors to post on her blog regarding to choosing which charitable organisations to support. In the meantime, donors were asking questions in Twitter, Facebook and blogs about their donations and endorsements of their favourite charities. After every crisis, the social media for social cause becomes a more effective medium to spread the word.

Negative Effects of Social Media

There are always two sides of every coin. Social media is just a tool or mean for people to use. It is still up to the users on how to use this tool (just like a knife, can help you to cut food or hurt others). Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project and Elon University’s Imagining the Internet Center conducted a study on “The Future of Online Socializing” from the highly engaged, diverse set of respondents to an online, opt-in survey consisted of 895 technology stakeholders and critics. The negative effects presented by the respondents included time spent online robs time from important face-to-face relationships; the internet fosters mostly shallow relationships; the act of leveraging the internet to engage in social connection exposes private information; the internet allows people to silo themselves, limiting their exposure to new ideas; and the internet is being used to engender intolerance.

Some respondents also highlighted that there will be development of some new psychological and medical syndromes that will be “variations of depression caused by the lack of meaningful quality relationships”, and a “new world society”. The term, “Social Networking”, has begun to deceive the users to believe they are social creatures. For instance, spending a couple of hours using Farmville and chatting with friends concurrently does not convert into social skills. People become dependent on the technology and forget how to socialise in face-to-face context. The online personality of a person might be totally different from his/her offline character, causing chaos when the two personalities meet. It is apparent in online dating when the couple gets together in face-to-face for the first time. Their written profiles do not clearly represent their real-life characters. It is more enticing for people to type something that others want to hear than saying the truth.

Besides the “friendship”, creators of social networking sites and users redefine the term, “privacy” in the Internet as well. The challenge in data privacy is to share data while protecting personally identifiable information. Almost any information posted on social networking sites is permanent. Whenever someone posts pictures or videos on the web, it becomes viral. When the user deletes a video from his/her social network, someone might have kept it and then posted it onto other sites like YouTube already. People post photographs and video files on social networking sites without thinking and the files can reappear at the worst possible time. In 2008, a video of a group of ACJC students hazing a female student in school on her birthday was circulated and another video of a SCDF recruit being “welcomed” (was hosed with water and tarred with shoe polish) to a local fire station made its way online.

Much news has been reported about online privacy breach in Facebook and Facebook is constantly revising their privacy policy and changing their privacy controls for the users. Interestingly, even when users delete their personal information and deactivate their Facebook account, Facebook will still keep that information and will continue to use it for data mining. A reporter asked whether the data will at least be anonymized. The Facebook representative declined to comment.

In the corporate world, human resource managers can access Facebook or MySpace to get to know about a candidate’s true colours, especially when job seekers do not set their profiles to private. Research has found that almost half of employers have rejected a potential worker after finding incriminating material on their Facebook pages. Some employers have also checked the candidates’ online details in Facebook pages to see if they are lying about their qualifications. Nowadays, younger generations have a complete disregard for their own privacy, opening doors to unwelcome predators or stalkers.

Source by Raymond Tay

Taking Care of Your Cat

Being a cat owner is a big responsibility, which should be shared by the whole family. The most important things that young individuals should learn about cat care are as follows:

Regular Visits to the Vet

A cat should visit the vet at least once yearly to undergo a physical check-up, which includes eyes, ears and heart, as well as get deworming/deflea treatments and booster vaccinations. If your cat’s heath or behavior is a concern, it is crucial to see the vet immediately.

Vaccinations

Every cat should go through vaccinations for diseases such as feline leukemia virus or FeLV, cat flue and feline infectious enteritis or FIE. Such diseases can endanger a cat’s life when infected, so it is crucial to go for preventive measures.

Feeding

In order to stay healthy, your cat needs a good diet. Feed it with quality dried or tinned cat food, and make sure that fresh water is always ready. Since cats are carnivorous, they cannot live on a diet with vegetables.

Neutering

Neutering allows cats to be healthier and happier. When a male cat is neutered, he is less prone to wandering far from home and getting involved in fights. A neutered female will no longer have kittens, which is an advantage since there is enough space to accommodate lots of kittens in the UK. Kittens should be neutered from 4 to 6 months, upon the advice of your vet.

Playtime with your Cat

Cats, most especially kittens, should have playtime because this is where they learn the skills they need in life, and it teaches them more about their environment.

Also, play makes good use of a cat’s energy, letting it remain fit and healthy, as well as give an alert and active brain. The best games motivate them to chase, pounce, stalk and safely bat objects with their paw.

Best Tips for Playing

Toys

Even if cat toys are available from pet shops, you can save money and have more time making some by yourself.

Cats like interactive toys, so tie a string on a toy, then move it all around like it were alive.

Catnip

There are cats that go crazy over the herb catnip. Buy toys filled with dried catnip, then hand one over to your cat to see its reaction.

Climbing and Hiding

Cats are fond of climbing and hiding, so it is a great idea to get a cat activity center, or as a cheaper option, just give cardboard boxes for your cat to play with.

Indoor Cats

Cats that stay indoors need more entertainment than those outdoors. So, try to make feeding more challenging by giving cat biscuits via a puzzle feeder or plastic bottle, which is cut in biscuit-size holes with the help of an adult.

The cat will find out whenever he bats the bottle, it releases a biscuit. At the same time, he will eat his food gradually.

Source by Karina Popa

If you’re considering a home based business opportunity, here are four companies that might appeal to you:

1. Motiply Partners – With people on the go and the mobile industry booming, businesses have to be mobile friendly with an app, as well as a mobile website. Up until now, Apps and mobile websites have been far too expensive for businesses. The Motiply App and Mobile Website Builder gives you the ability to make local businesses mobile friendly for almost nothing compared to the tens of thousands of dollars it has cost them up to this point. Motiply has a turn-key Mobile App business that makes it possible for anyone to work from home and market mobile websites and apps to businesses in their community. They provide you with everything you will need to be successful, and no experience is needed. With their training, mentoring program and tutorials, according to them, you will be selling Mobile Websites, Apps and Mobile Marketing Solutions to businesses in no time.

Cost to get involved: $199

2. Cruises, Inc.- Cruises Inc. has over 400 independent agents coast to coast. For over 25 years they have been providing attention to detail and professional advice to every customer. As a Cruises Inc. agent, you will be combining the latest in technology with superior customer service. Their computerized best fare search program enables each cruise specialist to identify outstanding values on all of the major cruise lines. Want to be a part of selling exciting cruise and destination vacation packages…and earn 100% commissions? How about making all that happen on your own schedule and from the comfort of your own home?

Cost to get involved: $249 which includes virtual training

3. Academic Associates Learning Centers – Did you realize know that 1 in 7 adults in USA cannot read this article. This company has 230 reading centers across the country. Their program provides you with the unique opportunity of having your own successful learning center. Their specialized training provides you with all the tools and the skills you’ll need to help anyone become a good reader. Now they are offering you a home based business opportunity to own your own effective reading center using the Academic Associates Reading Program™.

Cost to get involved: $6,000

4. Do Business Smarter – This “business coach” company recognizes that every business is unique. Their approach to business coaching has helped hundreds of business owners to become more successful by implementing proven strategies to grow their business. If you’re a retired businessman or woman, and have always wanted to be a coach, this might very well be a great opportunity for you. The cost to get involved seem a little extravagant to me, but there has never been a better time to become a business coach.

Cost to get involved: $25,000-$45,000, depending on level of participation.

Never rely solely on the recommendation of someone else when you’re looking at a prospective home based business opportunity – not even mine! Make sure you always do your due diligence, and ask yourself these four questions:

1. Is this really a legitimate business?

2. Is this an opportunity that would be “fun” for me?

3. Can I afford this opportunity?

4. Does this business afford me the opportunity to meet my long-term financial goals?

Source by Paul E Huff

Alexander Graham Bell most likely had no idea that he had discovered what would eventually change the world in more ways than can be imagined. The technology that started out for telephones has led to more discoveries in the telecommunication field that keep people in touch and connected around the world.

The Early Days

On March 10, 1876 Alexander Graham Bell transmitted the first speech using electricity. From that day forward, the telephone system changed every aspect of life. Although it did not immediately change the world, it set communication on a path that would alter the future of communication.

The initial lack of acceptance of Mr. Bell’s discovery was due the telegraph being the dominating form of communication and it had been around for over 50 years. This voice across electrical lines that Mr. Bell was proposing was a new and daunting discovery.

In the late 1870’s Bell took his public telephone demonstrations on the road in an attempt to raise awareness and public finance for the project. Mr. Bell presented the telephone as a broadcasting system.

Initially, phones connected only two lines. In June30, 188 there were 287 phones installed, by July there were 750. Ten years later there would be 167,000 phones and a maze of wires overhead. (Pool, Ithiel de Sola; _The Social Impact of the Telephone_; Cambridge, MIT Press, 1977.)

Technology

Mr. Bell wasn’t the only person working on ideas that would impact telephone technology. Thomas Edison invented the first transmitter and receiver that would be practical for commercial use. He had already invented a type of multiplexing that allowed messages to be sent in opposing directions simultaneously.

Many more changes came about in the ensuing years and AT&T incorporated in 1885 to lease phones to homes and offices but maintained ownership of the technology.

Then, in the 1880’s the switchboard came on board. During this time, there was no dialing, no signaling system, and no electronic switches. Callers would crank the handle; get an operator who then connects them to their party and then have their conversation. This type of system had no ringer to alert of incoming calls and no privacy due to the operator being the middle man holding the call together.

By 1946 the number of telephone callers made switchboard operators’ jobs too much for people alone to handle. Nearly a quarter of a million operators were working for AT&T in 1946 but that number would decrease significantly with the invention of automatic call switching.

Although this switching system was invented in 1889, it was not until 1914 that it was installed on a large scale basis in New Jersey. Then, it wasn’t until 1976 that the first computerized switch was put into action and by 1982 almost half of all telephone calls were switched electronically.

Turning the Century

Bell’s patent ran out at the turn of the century and approximately 6000 independent phone companies opened up shop. These independent companies could only connect locally, AT&T refused to allow them to link to the national system. Instead, they waited for the little guy to go bankrupt and then bought them out.

In 1984, AT&T got out of the local telephone service at the end of a ten-year lawsuit pushing to break up the telecommunication giant. This resulted in the forming of the so called ‘baby Bells’.  This breakup also allowed users to own their phones and hook up their own devices to them.

Prior to the 20th century phone systems used twisted copper wires which were expensive to install and absorbed a great deal of electrical energy. The coming years would see copper wire give way to coaxial cables, then microwave stations and then telecommunication satellites.

Digital transmission, though not new, did not come into telephone play in a large way until the 1980’s. Using fiber optic cables, digital transmission was up to 125,000 times faster than that of copper cable. Copper wire is still in use in many areas due to the high cost involved with running fiber optic cable to every home, though many areas have replaced the lines with fiber optic cable.

Beyond the Telephone

Having mastered the basic telephone and communication across great distances, there were still technological advances waiting to be discovered. The fax machine uses telephone lines to transmit digital signals to a modem on the receiving in which decodes the signals into messages. Then along came the mobile or cell phone.

Cell phones appeared in the early 1980’s and today there are millions in use. Cell phone networks use the regular phone system connected to a computer controlled center and transmission towers to transmit messages. Originally, there were few transmission towers and the mobile phones were bulky and had to be used near towers in order to have clear transmission.

Within a few years, the phones became small enough to fit in the palm of a hand and towers were located nearly everywhere. While there are zones with poor reception, most cell phones are always in a usable zone.

Today, cell phones do much more than just allow for voice conversation, cell phones allow access to the Internet, email, business applications, pictures and much more.

Source by Sam D Goddard

Whether one is in his or her home or outside, home security is amongst the top priorities of most people. Home Security does not only imply safety and protection from burglaries or thefts, it also includes protection from prospective damage from fire, flooding, power failure and gas leakage. While one would essentially be taking all the routine precautionary measures against any of these damages, professional home security and various home security gadgets are at the center stage due to their wide spread popularity and success.

A wide range of gadgets like sensor doorbells, CCTV cameras, Wireless Wi-Fi cameras, burglar alarms and other anti-theft security systems are readily available today. Comprehensive Security systems are also available in a wide price range for installation in your home by professionals.

At the basic level, any home security company will offer you a package which includes entry and motion sensors to protect (and warn you) against someone opening a door or a window or breaking a glass to enter your home.

Latest and most likeable features which most security companies offer you include:

1. Super-fast cellular connection – A connection without a phone line and one which cannot be cut by intruders.

2. Round the clock monitoring – For instance response and police dispatch.

3. Mobile Control – From your laptop or smartphone.

4. Secret Alerts – Optional for your gun safes, closets and file drawers etc.

5. SMS and E-mail Alerts – So that you know what’s happening when it’s actually happening.

6. Protection that’s smash-proof – Alerts the police if a burglar breaks the keypad.

7. Protection from power outages – Systems which operate on lithium batteries that last up to 5 years and work in case of power failures also.

8. Advanced Fire and Smoke Detectors – For protection in case of fire or gas leaks.

9. Sensitive long range wireless sensors – To fit your needs even in large homes.

10. Portability – Just in case you are moving home.

11. Pet friendly – The equipment fits well with your pets at home.

The latest state-of-the-art home security systems available today give you the various features mentioned above and allow you to keep an eye on your home from wherever you are by simply pressing a few buttons on your smartphone, tablet or laptop. You can use these friendly cameras to keep an eye on intruders or on your children or pets at home.

Luckily for you, there are organizations experts who offer free reports to those who want to learn how to protect their homes.

Source by Marc-Eddy Drouinaud Jr

The modern Muslims are getting used to using a religious software and information services (e.g. sms) to get a right time for prayer (salat), that is regarded as an important part of muslim’s life. Now at the very start of RSS boom Muslim community got the access to Muslim Prayer Time

(Azan) RSS feeds for PCs, mobiles and other devices from Pray In Time Information center.

Accurate calculations of Muslim prayer times for every location is a non-trivial task, because the time of prayer depends on the sunrise and sunset times and geographical location. The sunset and sunrise is different in different locations and change throughout a year. Historically, prayer timing was determined by Islamic religious scholars and the prayers were informed about start of a prayer by the muezzin from a minaret.

Now in the most of modern cities there it is difficult for Muslims to hear an adhan (call to prayer) that makes alternative way of informing prayers about prayer timetable more and more important.

One possibility is to use Azan Islamic software for mobile and PCs, sms azan services that created a market for religious software developers. With the start RSS era this service became available globally for free. It only requires an RSS reader (such as IE 7.0) and hence can run on virtually any PC, PDA, cell phone and any other computer device. The prayer should just visit the Pray In Time information center’s web site: http://www.pray-in-time.org, select the necessary location and subscribe to this free namaz time service RSS. At the moment more than 6 millions inhabited locations are covered and the number is growing.

Glossary.

Adhan (Azaan, azan and other spellings) (أَذَان) is the Islamic call to prayer, recited by the muezzin. The root of the word is ʼḏn “to permither derivative of this word is uḏun, meaning “ear”. Adhan is called out by the muezzin from a minaret of a mosque five times a day (Sunni Islam) or three times a day (Shi’a Islam) summoning Muslims for fard (mandatory) salah (prayers).

Salat (also salah, solat, solaat, namaz, solah, salaat, namaaz and other spellings) (Arabic: صلاة, Qur’anic Arabic: صلوة, Persian: نماØning to pray, or to bless, generally refers to prayers that Muslims offer to God (Arabic:Allah) and most commonly refers to the five dailyritual prayers in Islam. It is one of the Five Pillars of Islam in Sunni Islam, and one of the ten Branches of Religion in Shi’a Islam. As such, it is compulsory (fard) upon every Muslim.

About Pray In Time information center.

Pray In Time was created to provide a reliable information to muslim community via web. Started as a Prayer Time information service it added a global muslim directory covering almost all aspects of Muslim’s life.

http://www.pray-in-time.org

Source by Abu Yusuf

CRM (Customer Relationship Management)

CRM (Customer Relationship management) is all about the theory used by companies to administer and manage their customers, partners, vendors and other stakeholders efficiently.

Features of CRM

CRM is made up of three key features, which are Operational CRM, Collaborative CRM and Analytical CRM.

• Collaborative CRM is to directly communicate with customers without inclusion of any sales or service representatives.
• Analytical CRM is to investigate customer data for a vast range of reasons and functions.
• Operational CRM deals with providing complete front office support to sales, marketing and similar services.

The communication with the customers is recorded and added to the customer’s contact history database and can be easily retrieved for future reference. The biggest benefit about maintaining this contact history is that the customers can easily contact with the service personnel without having to repeat any of the earlier communication or information.

That is why CRM software is used popularly in call centers or BPOs for supporting the call center staff.

Direct interaction is carried out with collaborative CRM that includes feedback from the customers and reporting of issues if any. This interaction can be carried out through a variety of channels like email, phone, SMS, etc. The main objective behind going in for collaborative CRM can be reducing the company costs and improving the services provided.

Analytical CRM finds multiple uses such as taking management decisions, predicting future trends, analyzing customer behavior, planning and executing marketing campaigns and much more.

Operational CRM is mainly concerned with automating customer processes and providing appropriate support to these services.

CRM is not just a mere technology; it is in fact the move towards handling your customers better and more efficiently. The top management should tap CRM’s complete potential to maximize the benefits for their respective organization.

Source by Rama Krishna

Why Text?

Text messaging is a quick way to stay in touch with people for personal or business purposes. With text messaging, you can chat with a partner by typing on the keyboard and reading what they write to you on the screen. Many text messaging products can work with cell phone text messaging (aka SMS or Short Messaging Service) so you can chat with people who aren’t in front of their computer. So, why not just pick up the phone and talk?

It’s faster than e-mail and phone calls. And you don’t have to pay anything to text. If you need to chat with someone briefly or ask a quick question, it’s much less intrusive than calling someone. As with most developing technologies, several types of text messaging are available and each one is incompatible with the others. But don’t let that keep you from trying it out. The main text messaging products are ICQ (www.icq.com), MSN Messenger (www.msn.com), AIM (www.aim.com), and Yahoo Messenger (www.yahoo.com).

btw (By the Way…)

Each one is free and simple to download, install, and sign up. You can locate your “buddies” by searching in an online directory by their screen name, e-mail address, name, or telephone number. Once you get the hang of it, text messaging can be extremely addictive. As you continue to use text messaging, you will find yourself learning to abbreviate words and sentences. When you leave an online chat, you might say BRB (Be Right Back), I’m afk (away from the keyboard), or TTYL (Talk to You Later). See glossary below.

Some text messaging products are beginning to offer voice and video chat. The future of digital communication is an integrated product, since voice, video, interactive text messaging, and e-mail are all effective means of communication. In the future, you will be able to switch between text, voice, and video with ease. Until then, we will continue to use different methods for different communication needs 🙁

Glossary

🙂 Smiley face. Means that someone is happy

😉 Smiley face with wink.

🙁 If someone sends you this in an e-mail, they’re probably not having a good day

BTW – By the Way

FYI – For Your Information

FWIW – For What It’s Worth

IMHO – In My Humble Opinion (or IMO)

TIA – Thanks in Advance

WRT – With Respect To

LOL – Laughing Out Loud

ROTFL – Rolling on the Floor Laughing

AFK – Away From Keyboard

TTYL – Talk To You Later

CYA – See You Later

Source by Deryck Richards

You have no doubt read various examples where Lean Six Sigma was used to identify and eliminate waste in both manufacturing facilities and service companies (i.e. financial institutions and hospitals). Most of us can quickly see how concepts such as inventory reduction and improved product quality are applied to physical objects or documents. But what about Field Service Organizations where the primary product (a completed service request) is often vaguely defined and the main component (technical expertise) is intangible? How can we apply the same techniques to obtain the same results (increased speed, reduced costs, and improved quality)?

In this article we will focus on just one element of Lean Six Sigma: Waste Reduction. While service managers may intuitively suspect that there are many areas of waste within their organization, they may not realize that the same tools used to streamline production assembly lines can be used to improve field service processes.

Let’s begin by comparing the fundamental activities performed in both a manufacturing facility and a service field organization:

System Inputs

• Manufacturing: Product sales order is entered directly into the MRP
• Field Service: Phone call or e-mail manually entered into SMS

Scheduling

• Manufacturing: MRP checks parts stock lead times, current inventory, etc. before sending detailed demand to plant floor.
• Field Service: Typically SMS only checks technician availability before dispatching (with limited detail).

Process Activities

• Manufacturing: On plant floor – fabricating; assembling; testing.
• Field Service: At customer site – replacing parts; troubleshooting; adjusting.

Completion

• Manufacturing: Final QC inspection; Ship; Invoice.
• Field Service: Customer Sign-off; Forward info; Invoice.

Although the specific tasks are different (along with the terminology), you can see that there are many parallels within the two processes. And, being similar processes they often are subject to similar sources of waste. Below we examine the most common areas of waste that are normally targeted by Lean Six Sigma projects.

Processing

Processing waste is often the results of over processing in both manufacturing and service. In manufacturing this refers to making products at higher (and more costly) specifications than required by the customer.

In a field service organization you can over-service a customer by exceeding the contractual Service Level Agreement (SLA). For example, you may provide an average one-hour on-site response when the SLA only specifies an average 4-hour response. While it is usually better to over-perform than under-perform on SLAs, it still represents waste as you are not matching the customer demand requirements – which can lead to higher costs or missed revenue opportunities.

TIP: Measure your actual response times separately for each service area and compare to the local competition. In some areas you may have a competitive advantage (e.g. lower than industry standard response times) that can be leveraged by your marketing team.

Transportation

On a manufacturing floor, products are transported from station to station throughout the process. When these are mapped and measured carefully, you will often find the product moves great distances throughout the facility, and represent potential opportunities to reduce waste.

Transportation waste in a field service organization takes the form of miscommunication. Service request information is transported (communicated) from the customer to the call center, from the call center to the field technician, and (often in paper form) from the technician back to a central billing location. If you have a separate dispatching or triage help desk, there are even more handoffs. Each handoff represents an opportunity to introduce delays, errors, and non-value-add activities.

TIP: Create a pipeline report that shows the number and average age of service requests in each stage of the process (Opened – Not Dispatched; Dispatched – Not Started; Started – Not Completed; Completed – Not Invoiced; Invoiced). This will help you to identify bottlenecks that are caused by transportation delays within the process.

Motion

There are several Lean Six Sigma tools that focus on creating effective work areas by, among other things, reducing the unnecessary and awkward movements an operator may experience while performing their activities.

Perhaps ironically, motion waste in a field service organization is often the result of an attempt to improve quality. For example, if a Dispatcher needs additional clarification of a SLA requirement, they may physically walk over to the Contracts area to retrieve a paper file. Likewise – especially during an end-of-month billing frenzy – the Invoicing team may run to the Finance area to find a “live” person to check credit status.

TIP: How often do you observe call center personnel walking around the office while speaking to customers over their wireless headphones? Consider physically rearranging the work areas and/or creating electronic data marts where customer account information will be easily accessed by everyone in the office.

Inventory

Spare parts inventories in either central warehouses or technician vehicles are often subject to management review and scrutiny. In fact, this may be the one area where you have already applied Just-In-Time or other Lean Six Sigma techniques.

However, inventory can also be thought of in terms of unutilized field service hours. These hours are typically non-productive and non-billable. Since Field Labor cost (excluding overtime) is essentially fixed, even minor productivity gains will have a significant impact on your bottom line.

TIP: Revenue-by-tech is an often-used and sometimes misleading measurement. Technicians can boost this metric by replacing more parts or increasing repair times. While your company may benefit from short term revenue, customer satisfaction and overall profitability will suffer. Technician productivity (hours billable / hours available) is a key metric for any field service organization and should be measured continuously and reported daily.

Waiting

Just like a worker on the production floor or a teller at the bank window, field technicians are generally paid even during idle times. But beyond this obvious cost concern, delays within a field service process are typically passed directly and immediately to the customer – leading to increased frustration and lower satisfaction.

There are multiple opportunities for waiting in a field service process including: Dispatching (technician waiting on service requests), Parts Shipping (technician waiting for parts to arrive at site), Invoicing (billing personnel waiting for completed paperwork from field technician), and Contract Administration (waiting for site audit information or pricing to enable contract set-up in SMS).

TIP: When measuring Time-To-Dispatch, make sure you measure from the service request Open time to the technician Accepted time (not when the call center first relayed the request to the field). This ensures you are measuring delays that impact the customer, not just when calls are “thrown over the wall” to the field.

Defects

Most manufacturing facility closely monitors product defects throughout the production process. The goal is to identify and correct defects before they are passed forward to downstream operations.

You are probably aware of (and currently measure) two of the most common and visible product defects in service organizations: Call Backs and Re-bills. But note that these are end-point defects, that is, they are often the results of other errors passed throughout the process. For example, the Call Center may mistakenly identify the wrong piece of equipment when the service request is entered into the Service Management System. This defect could lead to assigning/dispatching errors and/or the technician arriving to the site without the proper replacement parts. If the technician then returns the completed paperwork without correcting the product information, the Invoicing team may apply the incorrect pricing and payment terms. The same defect is passed through multiple operations causing multiple errors.

TIP: As a general rule, you should divide Call Backs into a least two categories: with and without parts. If parts were used, you may need to review stocking practices and policies. If no parts were used, it may indicate a technician training issue (insufficient troubleshooting or other repair skills).

Overproduction

Producing too much product is easily visible as excess inventory in a factory setting. But how does overproduction affect field service? Remember, your finished product is a completed service call. While it may seem counterintuitive that you could have too many completed service calls, you must consider this in terms of scheduling. For example, a technician may have four Preventive Maintenance (PM) visits scheduled over the next two days (two PM visits each day). If the technician completes all four PM visits on the first day you may feel you have gained some advantage. But what if these PM visits are performed at the expense of other non-PM service requests? What about the schedules of the other technicians in the same service area? Were their PM schedules affected as they covered the non-PM workload of the first technician? Did the service office as a whole experience more overtime expenses as the team scrambled to meet customers commitments?

Smoothing out field service production is as important as a manufacturing floor. Not only does it make you a more efficient organization, it also reduces the stress on the Dispatch Team, Field Management, and (most importantly) the customers by reducing the need to constantly adjust and communicate ETAs.

Tip: Segment the each field technician’s labor hours by Time-of-Day, Day of Week, and Service Type (PM, non-PM, Install, etc.). Then compare this information among technicians working in the same service area. If the hours-distribution varies significantly among technicians it could indicate a scheduling or performance issue.

The items noted above represent just a few examples where waste could be found throughout the field service process. There are many, many more – each which could have a significant impact on your service business. Also, you may have noticed in the comparison above that manufactured products are typically subjected to various quality checkpoints throughout the production process. This helps ensure defects are not passed to the next work station (an important Lean Six Sigma objective) or, even worse, to the customer. However, field service events have no final inspection – except by the customers themselves. This factor alone should encourage you to consider using Lean Six Sigma to proactively identify waste and other process issues.

Source by Lloyd R Lewis