Google has unveiled a new tool, Google Maps Coordinate to improve communication between businesses and their offsite employees in the field.
The system will track the location of employees in real time and allocate jobs through an Android smartphone app.
Google senior product manager Daniel Chu told on the the company’s blog post, "As the number of mobile employees continues to grow, so does the need for a location sharing solution that works in real-time."
"Google Maps Coordinate combines the power of Google’s mapping technologies with modern smartphones to help organisations assign jobs and deploy staff more efficiently," Daniel added.
"Any business can sign up for Google Maps Coordinate. Google Maps Coordinate is built to work seamlessly with the entire Google Enterprise Maps and Earth experience, and it comes with an API that can integrate with any of your existing systems."
Available to employees online and on Android smartphones or tablets, Google Maps Coordinate integrates Google’s mapping and geolocation infrastructure and offers location even if they are indoors.
Google Maps Coordinate allows the admin to customise the fields that the mobile team needs to capture while they are out and collect including measurements and client contact details, directly in the application.
It will also allow dispatchers in the office to add team members to a Google Maps Coordinate team and see their locations in the Google Maps Coordinate web and mobile application.
Google cited research company IDC which had estimated that there would be more than 1.3 billion mobile workers by 2015, which is about 37.2% of the global workforce.
The system also allows employees to locate the job at the problem site, assign the job to the nearest team member and notify them instantly.
Employees can also view past jobs and locations including the locations of all their jobs and teams, and assess where they should be assigning or hiring more workers and how to optimally place their teams.
