By John Nolan, CAPP, MSM

Why do we spend so much money on business technology? We do so to help leverage our operations and improve business outcomes. These outcomes include our ability to deliver timely and accurate information—information that improves service outcomes but at the same time increases customer expectations.

Technology, like any product, is subject to the lifecycle effect. The product lifecycle is broken into four stages: development, growth, maturity, and decline. The process of strategizing ways to continuously support and maintain a product that avoids decline is called product lifecycle management. Within this management cycle exits the ability for competent management to extend and improve technology’s impact on their operation. When technology companies fail to understand or recognize where they are in that lifecycle realm, it often results in competitors or outside influencers jumping into the market and leaving them behind.

As a managing director of 12 various service departments, the ongoing assessing of various technologies is critical to delivering system performance that is essential to high-quality outcomes.

Within our parking organizations, parking leadership must constantly keep in mind the process of total quality management (TQM) and continuous quality improvement (CQI). Research within the marketplace to improve our condition, impose project discipline, and promote better communication through data and metrics is critical to performance excellence.

Amazon’s recent quarterly report significantly beat analysts’ expectations. The No. 1 factor the market cited was their switch to one-day service. The investment they made last year in managing their service lifecycle is now beginning to pay big dividends and once again challenging the marketplace for service dominance.

It’s very important that as parking professionals, we continuously engage with ourselves and our teams to understand what technologies in the market will improve our operation, especially when vendors are unresponsive. And, it’s important to not be afraid to make changes that improve our operation and our customers’ experience, even when it’s easier to continue with the status quo.

John Nolan, CAPP, MSM, is managing director of transportation services at Harvard University. He will present on this topic during the 2020 IPMI Virtual Parking & Mobility Conference & Expo, June 1-2, wherever you are. Click here for details and to register.