RentalMetrics

RentalMetrics 60 Second Grill - Episode 004

In this grill, we lighten up a bit.  Hey even we RedMeat craving carnivores need a little digestion help now and again.  Digest this video and take some tips on not "overcooking" your staff.

Technology: Killing the small farm and helping large operations produce maximum yields

Image via Wikipedia

Whatever your opinion on "big farming" pushing small firms into obscurity...know this.  Today's large farming operation is very advanced.  This piece in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel written by Rick Barrett discusses some of the advances that have really produced incredible yields from the same areas. 

"It's apparent how successful technology is in farming today, as we are producing more every year with fewer farmers," said Tamara Kass, director of agricultural products for DTN.

For example, in 1997 the national average corn yield per acre was 128 bushels. Seven years later it was up to 160 bushels. And milk production has increased 18% per cow over the last 10 years.

Click through to the article and read the cool tidbits in the right sidebar!  Here's a hit, I bet you didn't know that they can identify weeds via infrared now did you!  Click it!

RentalMetrics 60 Second Grill - Episode 002

We're cooking up a serious side dish today with some French flair that would make the perfect accompaniment to a huge hunk of bovine goodness (ie STEAK!).  So bring it on, click play, and prepare for a treat.

Great article on Making Change...Pleasurable

It's great to find complimentary articles to courses we offer in our Interactive Learning Environment.  Since we just released our new course on Change Management, the timing of this piece was fortuitous.

The article is titled:  The Influencers: A Manager's Guide to Succeeding at Change

In the article, author Kerry Patterson gives some tangible ideas and concepts on how to make change stick.  One of my favorite points in his piece is number 3:

Principle No. 3: Make the Undesirable Desirable
Humans seek pleasure and avoid pain. So, when tasks are repetitive, painful, or boring, find a way to make them more desirable by either changing the task itself or helping people view it in a new way.

This basic rule of humankind is applicable in the workplace and at home. (If you have kids, you understand this well).

Here's Kerry's bio and website link for further investigation:

For more information and resources visit www.influencerbook.com

Kerry Patterson is coauthor of Influencer: The Power to Change Anything, (McGraw-Hill) and the New York Times bestseller Crucial Conversations. He is also a sought-after speaker and consultant and cofounder of VitalSmarts, an innovator in corporate training and organizational performance.

 

Doug Mitchell's Podcast with Sam Simon at the Construction Equipment Owners Blog

I was recently interviewed by Sam Simon over at the Construction Equipment Owner's Blog for a podcast. 

If you can spare few moments...take a listen.  We chat about extracting maximum ROI from equipment tracking solutions...across the entire enterprise. 

Many times, GPS buying decisions are made by one silo within an organization.  Often the decision is reactionary.  In this podcast, I give some strategies on how to step back and make a sound decision on deploying GPS and getting the MOST out of it. 

Sam also references our Introduction to GPS video which is one part of our Free Trial course in our Interactive Learning Environment (ILE).  To see all of our course offerings in the ILE, click here for your free trial.

RentalMetrics RedMeat Podcast - Interview Excerpt with Cliff Henley of Fleet Management Solutions

If you can spare two and half minutes, take a listen to Cliff Henley, CEO of Fleet Management Solutions as he shares some insight on a key component in the ROI equation for asset tracking GPS solutions - fuel savings.

This is a clip from a longer and very informative interview I did for our subscribers within the RentalMetrics Interactive Learning Environment or ILE.  If you'd like to learn more about the ILE, please click here.

Download fms_podcast_interview.mp3

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Plan, Do, Check, Act

The iterative Shewhart cycle of Plan, Do, Check, Act (PDCA) was made popular in the 20^th century by quality guru Dr. W. Edwards Deming, and with good cause. Scientific thinking yields consistent and measurable results.

Right now the RentalMetrics team is hard at work checking out our soon to be released Interactive Learning Environment (ILE). Why are we testing? Because we care about quality!

Even though PDCA was developed with the manufacturing industry in mind, it works on any kind of project. For Instance, at RentalMetrics:

We’ve made plans to deliver an interactive learning environment.  Through brainstorming and research we’ve created the intellectual framework to design an top-notch portal for those interested in learning more about using business processes and technology solutions to manage their construction equipment fleets.

For the past few months we’ve done the work to integrate a variety of software tools and developed multimedia content.

Right now we’re checking out what we’ve made. We’re testing the login system, billing system, and the usability of the navigation to ensure proper function. How do we know if it works “right?” We check our results against what we’d planned!

As we act on applying changes and bug fixes we don’t end the PDCA process. We keep updating and reviewing our plans, doing what it takes to work out the kinks, checking and re-check the changes we’ve made, and fixing the problems we find.

Simple. Yes. Powerful. You bet. No matter what industry you’re in, or the end goal of the project, PDCA is a helpful framework for organizing projects in a scientific, results oriented manner.

 

Project Management & Team Collaboration - Interview with Isaac Garcia, Co-Founder & CEO of Central Desktop

In this episode of the RentalMetrics RedMeat podcast we chat with Isaac Garcia, co-founder and CEO of Central Desktop.

Central Desktop provides some pretty high horsepower on-demand team collaboration software.  In fact, Central Desktop's solution is what I'd call "core" to operations here at RentalMetrics.  We use it for our own intranet, document management, wiki/team collaboration, and project management.  Don't forget that every single subscriber to the RentalMetrics Interactive Learning Environment gets a subscription to Central Desktop...at no additional charge.  We're so convinced you'll love it...and that you need it...that we'll pick up the tab.  Enjoy. 

RentalMetrics subscribers can hear the FULL interview with Isaac in our course called Introduction to Central Desktop in the Project Management Solutions category.

 

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Should I pick ONE fleet management-asset management GPS solution across the enterpirse to maximize ROI?

We get this question quite a bit.  Often, larger organizations have divisions or departments that are tasked with "finding a GPS solution that will solve their needs".  In the end, that solution does just that...solves ONE group's needs.  The group tasked with choosing a GPS fleet management solution will examine the wants, needs, must haves, delighter's, etc. with their lens on, often overlooking synergy between other departments. 

Most often, the transportation department will not be consulted or considered when buying ASSET based GPS fleet management devices. 

That's too bad, because often times 10-30 minutes of wasted time per day per rental transport driver can be saved by dispatching the driver directly to the machine based on its exact and current location NOW...not the location of where it was dropped off. 

Whatever your dispatching system (white board, Nextel, yellow pad, software system) just providing transport with a means to know exactly where their pick up located vs. guessing based on drop can yield enough ROI to pay the monthly bill for the tracking devices.  Remember, if canvassing an area for 15 minutes searching is enough to put driver A into overtime...you've not only paid the monthly bill for one GPS device...but likely 3 or 4.

It's very important to look at your operation as a whole (THE ENTERPRISE) to fully exploit the economic benefit (ROI) of a fleet management GPS solution.  This is often very difficult to do with busy schedules and competing interests.  The RentalMetrics team highly recommends a comprehensive look at the each piece of the enterprise before deciding on a solution.  Making the right choice of fleet management GPS solutions NOW...will pay huge dividends down the long and winding road.

We dive into many more examples of this situation and explore the ROI opportunities in our Interactive Learning Environment or ILE. 

Coming Soon: More In Depth Interviews

I've been busy lining up some pretty incredible interviews for you.  Over the next couple weeks, you'll hear from some great technology solution providers as they discuss ways to become more efficient while reducing "noise" in the construction/equipment rental sector.

We'll also be having an incredibly valuable discussion with the CEO of Central Desktop, Isaac Garcia.  Central Desktop is the award winning web based team collaboration / project management software included with every subscription to RentalMetrics...that's right....included.  We figured it was pretty smart to wrap up the goods you need to succeed in one nice package.  I've personally used Central Desktop to reduce technology project deployment costs and times in half.

As Spring has sprung in most of country (sorry Wisconsin), we know that business volume should begin to ramp up.  As such, the time is now to devote some quality time to your business processes.  Tune them up like you would an overworked and under serviced dozer.  Doesn't she look beautiful when she comes out of the shop all shiny and purring like a kitten? 

Let's shine up your fleet management or marketing plan together.