Page
Field Service Software Requirements Workshop
Two-to-three-session workshop to document what your operation actually needs from an FSM platform, separated from what vendors will tell you.
Most FSM software selections fail at the requirements step. Owners and operations leads sit through vendor demos, get impressed by feature lists, and end up buying software that does ten things they didn’t need and misses three things they did. The requirements workshop exists to invert that sequence — document what your operation actually requires before any vendor enters the conversation.
What’s involved
Two to three working sessions, ninety minutes each, with whoever owns dispatch, field operations, and back-office reconciliation. Sessions are conducted remotely (Zoom or Teams) unless you’re in the southeast US, in which case on-site is an option. Between sessions I work through your existing process documentation, dispatch board, invoice samples, and any pain-point notes you’ve already collected.
The output is a written requirements document organized by:
- Operational must-haves — features without which the platform fails on day one (e.g., multi-day jobs for water mitigation, refrigerant tracking for HVAC, route optimization for waste haulers)
- Operational nice-to-haves — features that would improve the operation but aren’t deal-breakers
- Integration constraints — accounting, payroll, GPS, parts supplier, customer portal, anything that already exists and must stay connected
- Compliance and reporting requirements — what your industry, insurance carrier, or regulators require the system to capture
- Constraints you can’t change — number of technicians, geography, peak-load patterns, existing hardware (rugged tablets, vehicle GPS, etc.)
Who this is for
Operators with 10–200 technicians who are either replacing a legacy FSM platform or moving off spreadsheets and paper for the first time. Below 10 technicians the requirements list is short enough that a workshop is usually overkill — read the Buyer’s Guide instead and pick a platform from the SMB tier. Above 200 technicians the requirements work usually needs to combine with formal enterprise procurement, which is outside my scope.
Deliverables
- Written requirements document (15–30 pages depending on operational complexity), formatted as a vendor-neutral scoring rubric
- A copy of the rubric in spreadsheet form for use in vendor evaluation
- A 30-minute readout call with your team to walk through the document
- One revision round after the readout
The rubric is yours to keep and use however you want — including handing it to a different consultant or running the evaluation in-house.
Time and structure
Two to four weeks elapsed time from kickoff to delivered document. Fixed-scope engagement, fixed price. Pricing depends on operational complexity (number of trades, geographies, integration count) and is quoted in writing after a free 30-minute scoping call.
Next step
Book a free scoping call to walk through your situation. If a requirements workshop isn’t the right starting point, I’ll tell you what is — often it’s the Software Evaluation engagement if you already know your requirements, or no engagement at all if your operation is small enough to self-serve from the Buyer’s Guide.