MAN Truck & Bus
The lockdown as a boost factor: “Coronavirus hugely accelerated digitisation of the work environment and introduced a transformation”, is the phrase used by Gunnar Kilian, personnel director of Volkswagen AG and Group board member responsible for the Truck & Bus division, to summarise one and a half years since the outbreak of the pandemic. “Not only the massive and necessary rise in mobile working, but also new work modes, new technologies and new human findings from that time bear this out.”
Volkswagen has therefore launched its ProjectOffice2025 concept for a hybrid work environment post coronavirus. This foresees that modern, high-quality offices and convertible, agile workspaces for brainstorming should be geared even more to the needs of all employees, while working from home can serve as a retreat for concentrated work. “The office as we know it will no longer exist”, predicts Kilian.
Albeit the consequences of the digital boom extend even further as a driver for new work environments: greater freedoms, more self-determination, increased personal responsibility. And hence also better opportunities. MAN Truck & Bus has recognised this and is already shaping the opportunities offered by the advent of digitisation in everyday professional life. So the commercial vehicle manufacturer is not only abiding by its motto “Simplifying business” at the point of sale, but is also using efficient digital methods to reorganise itself internally for the benefit of all employees.
FASTER WORKSHOP PROCESSES
The best example of this is MAN D.R.I.V.E., an international programme involving digitisation and automation of all workshop processes from drop-off and repair to invoicing, which is rolling out in six sub-projects to around 280 MAN service operations by 2023. D.R.I.V.E. represents the vision of using procedural and IT initiatives to advance digitisation of the MAN retail network and approach a sustainable future in a forward-thinking and simple way. MAN D.R.I.V.E. is intended to make every customer contact point more efficient.
And this is how it will work one day: The service team uses the MAN ServiceCheck-in (SCI) app to record the vehicle drop-off, reads out the vehicle data via a dongle and can use a digital checklist to advise the customer of any necessary repairs. The MAN ServiceCalculation app is available for them to calculate the order. The customer confirms digitally and the workshop receives the order approval. This enables the workshop manager to assign the order to a specific mechanic and in parallel the necessary parts order is automatically received in the warehouse.
The work can therefore begin quickly, which the mechanic of course also digitally documents via tablet. Such knowledge management reduces queries at head office. If some are raised, the service support desk provides assistance and reduces the vehicle's downtime. Once the work is completed, the workshop service team issues a digital invoice and the customer can collect the vehicle again.The result: a consistently optimised experience that is transparent at all times and better uptime for the customer, but also reduced turnaround times, fewer complaints and lower costs thanks to paperless processes in the MAN service operation.
THE FUTURE OF SALES
The digital transformation within Sales is in full flow: as early as 2020, MAN’s cloud-based SalesMAN platform was successfully rolled out in Germany as the sales workplace of the future. MAN SalesMAN is especially characterised by its integration into the existing process and system landscape. It enables different products, such as new and stock vehicles, service contracts and finance, to be coordinated, calculated and ordered within one offer. Other highlights are the numerous collaboration options, a 360-degree customer view and intelligent self-control functions within Sales.
MODULAR TRAINING CONCEPTS
The MAN Academy also relies on the potential that comes with digitisation in its training of employees. The Truck Training Camp was for instance further developed in cooperation with the sales team from being purely a classroom event to become an innovative launch and training concept in which the sales team is being trained on the new MAN truck generation in a multi-stage modular design: the entry point is via virtual self-study including digital live streams with expert interviews, films and interactive workshops, followed by a face-to-face event on site for consolidation and driving experiences.
Many visions of the future have become a reality at MAN. This applies to the tablet in the workshop on which the customer places their digital signature, just as it does to customised training for those working from home. “What was previously considered unthinkable is now reality”, Gunnar Kilian concludes. The VW personnel director is convinced that “digital tools are accelerating our corporate success – although pragmatic and humane behaviour are fundamental in this.” MAN is consistently adopting this approach to complete its digital transformation.
