Ali Shahikh, Author at RSI Concepts - Top IT Solution Provider Company in Dubai, UAE

August 18, 2023October 11, 2023

How to Design a Modern Performance Management System?

The overall business landscape have drastically changed over the past decade, with the rise of smartphones, internet, social media and digital communication, the way business are building and nurturing their relationships with their customers have completely changed. In the modern fast-paced and highly competitive market environment it is crucial for a business to adopt to modern practices, methodologies and technologies. The performance management system is no exception at all, if you will compare the modern performance management system with the performance management practices just around a decade back, the present day performance management is totally unrecognizable. The modern performance management systems are designed with an aim to support every organization’s unique internal culture, minimize the influence of bureaucracy, increase transparency and maximize the impact of the performance management and human resource programs. Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and other emirates of UAE are witnessing continuous growth, which is attracting more businesses and raising the competition. The governments are also turning toward a modern UAE government performance appraisal system in order to ensure excellent services for the citizens. Furthermore the rapidly changing market trends, and ever-increasing customer demands are compelling businesses to utilize their resources at the maximum potential in order to ensure stability and growth. That is what make performance management system a game-changing tool.

What is a Modern Performance Management System?

The major difference between the traditional and modern performance management system is that the old method relies on annual reviews, the modern methods offer more frequent reviews, better performance data collection and analysis, and include software tools which makes the employee performance management process more effective and impactful. When the employees doesn’t have a proper communication with their managers, they are blindfolded and couldn’t know if they are progressing in the right direction or not. Another biggest difference between traditional and modern performance management system is that it focuses on the people and help managers maximizing their potential. However, the traditional performance management system focus on what has been done in past, and have no visibility of the future at all. The software aided modern performance management system is more integrated, robust, responsive, and reactive and can easily be incorporated in the modern work flows. The modern performance management system offer a more contextual and comprehensive performance data which help managers and employees to identify the problems and help them set course for the future to achieve the excellence. The modern performance management system doesn’t only focus on the monetary incentives, but it offers in-depth employee development programs, it is more engaging and empowering, and help building trust on the performance management process.

What are the Characteristics of a Modern Performance Management System?

Businesses should be aware of modern performance management trends. Because in order to implement a modern performance management system you must understand what the characteristics of a modern performance management system are which distinguished it from a traditional performance management model.

Digital Transformation: The biggest advantage of a modern performance management system is that it enables digital transformation by implement software based solutions and tools. The performance management software help automating several tasks driving efficiency and accuracy in the process.
People Focused: The modern performance management systems focused on both the high-performing employees as well as the low-performer. It offer a great balance between the accountability and the development, which encourage all employees to perform better and also help low performers to achieve their goals while rewarding high-performing employees.
Continuous: The modern day employees want more frequent and instant reward, they don’t like the concept of waiting for an entire year. A continuous performance management system offer continuous communication, frequent reviews (biannual, quarterly, and even monthly), continuous feedback and frequent one-on-one meetings.
Transparent: Most of the business leaders and the employees don’t trust on traditional performance management system due to several factors. However the modern performance management system offers more transparency, it provide more accessibility to performance data and can keep the record of all past data, meetings, and reviews.
Adaptive: The modern performance management systems are great and offer castigation which enables them to adopt to changes in trends, needs and even allow businesses to implement customized performance management strategies and policies. The ability to integrate with other systems and collect performance data from multiple sources make them more adaptable.

These are the essential features which distinguishes between traditional and modern performance management system.

What are the Characteristics of a Modern Performance Management System?

Step-by-Step Guide on Designing a Modern Performance Management System

Now that we understood the difference between traditional and modern performance management system and its benefits as well, let us dive into the actual process of designing a modern performance management system which resonates with your organizational culture and performance needs.

Identify Your Needs: It is important to understand the needs of your organization. Every business have different priorities, different challenges and different culture, this is why it is important to identify your needs. You will have to review the current performance management model and then do some brainstorming to identify the needs of your new strategy.
Chose The Purpose: Once you identify your needs, you should chose the primary purpose of your modern performance management system. There are five major purposes of implementing a performance management framework, accountability, organizational alignment, cultural alignment, development, and recognition. You should prioritize each one as per your needs.
Understand the Workflows: Understand who is making decisions and how decisions are being made. How the information are flowing, what communication channels you are currently using and what you are planning to use in future. Understand how you are currently defining roles, goals and objectives and how the success should look like.
Performance Fundamentals: No matter what performance management model you want to use, the performance fundamentals are the same, reviews, feedbacks and goals. Implement mechanisms to make reviews fair and transparent. Implement SMART goals, focus on accountability, development and alignment and lastly implement continuous feedback model.

If you follow the above steps you can easily identify your needs and the scope of your new modern performance management system. There are two ways to implement a new performance management system. First you can acquire a ready-made commercial off-the-shelf solution, or the second and more effective way is to acquire a professional software development agency in Dubai, such as RSI Concepts and let them build a customized performance management system as per your needs.

Step-by-Step Guide on Designing a Modern Performance Management System

How to Analyze the Effectiveness of your New Performance Management Model

Once you implemented a tailor-made modern performance management system you will definitely witness improvements, however, in order to analyze the effectiveness of your new performance management system you can perform a thorough analysis using the following steps:

Start with market research, understand your industry trends, and set the performance benchmarks for your industry.
Set and enlist organizational goals and objectives and accordingly set the individual goals that you are planning to achieve with your new performance management system.
Based on your organizational goals and objectives define how the success should look like for individual goals, also classify performance in three categories, high-performer, low-performer and average performers.
Now compare your design of performance management system and its success measures with this performance management model based on industry benchmarks.
Now try to minimize the gap between both performance management models and you will get a most efficient performance management system.

This analysis will help you improving your design of modern performance management system and it will help you maximizing the impact of your performance management program.

How to Analyze the Effectiveness of your New Performance Management Model?

Conclusion

Implementing a modern performance management system can greatly improve your employees’ performance, engagements and help you increase retention. When the employees and managers both trust on the performance management models and tools they tend to perform well and it also help elevating their morale which is absolutely essential for productivity and efficiency. There are several modern performance management systems available in the market, however, it is highly unlikely that any off-the-shelf performance management software can fulfill all your needs and produce the desired results. That is why we recommend going for a customized performance management system. In this blog we have discussed the difference between a traditional and modern performance management system, we also discussed how you can design a perfect performance management system which will empower your management and workforce. If is important to critically analyze the performance management model that you are building for your business. You can revise your model many times before reaching to the optimum results. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to design your new modern performance management system for your business, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

August 18, 2023October 14, 2023

A Complete Guide to a Multi-Branch Queue Management System

Customer facing environments are most sensitive part of a business’s operations. It is extremely important for a business to maximize the operational productivity to ensure the customers are having a satisfactory experience. For large businesses with multiple branches the management is even more challenging. Usually the senior management is sitting in the head office, it is a time taking process to get the updates and information related to any branch. Most of the time the head office will have to approach the branch manager to provide them the required information. The queuing and customer flow management is always difficult. Therefore businesses need a digital queue management system which can help them streamline their customer flow and improve their operational capabilities. The digital queue management system provides live queuing coverage, instant updates, alerts/notifications, business intelligence data and useful features for service agent, branch managers, head office and senior management. The queue management system is an intelligent software solution with hardware components to offer a full control and monitoring over the customer journey which helps improving customer experience. In this guide we will discuss how business can implement and leverage a multi-branch queue management system to drive growth.

What is a Multi-Branch Queue Management System?

A multi-branch queue management system is a centralized queue management system which enables businesses to manage and monitor customer queues and customer flow in real-time across all connected branches. The multi-branch queue management system runs on a centralized software which is hosted on an in-premises server, online or in cloud. The server is connected to all branches. A basic queue management system have multiple devices integrated in a synchronized framework. For example, there is an interactive self-service ticket dispensing kiosk which not only dispense tokens but also take basic information of the customer and in some cases it has ability to ID the customer as well. There is a digital signage screen which displays the live queuing information along with some multimedia content. The modern queue management systems also have integrated counter name plates which display counter number and the token number which is being served at the moment. Furthermore there is an audio announcement system which is used for customer calling. All these devices form one branch’s setup, and if there are more than one branch, in case of a multi-branch queue management system all these devices in all branches are connected to a centralized queue management software which monitor and control all these components of the system.

How does a Multi-Branch Queue Management System Works?

The multi-branch queuing also works on the concept of queue management system and crowd control, but it provides additional management features which greatly improve the efficiency of the queuing process. In a multi-branch queue management system setup all branches are connected via network to the main server software. The server application communicates with all branches in real-time. Whenever any action is taken in any branch the information is sent to the server and then the response is sent to the branch instantly. Think of a website, the website is hosted on a cloud which might be located in another continent, however, when you click on a link or a file, it immediately opens it. Same technical process works here too. When a user/customer in any branch choose a service to generate a token number, the information is sent to the queue management system software which is hosted on a server, and then in return it issues a token number which is being printed out instantly from where the user/customer made the request. All branches are connected to the head-office in a similar fashion via a public or private network. The smart algorithms and source code is executed at the server, and all the data is also stored in the server. The service agents, branch managers, and the senior management or head office staff gets their dedicated administrative dashboards and the access to data and functionality is managed by an in-built administration and authentication module. That is how a multi-branch queue management system works.

What are the Benefits of using a Multi-Branch Queue Management System?

The biggest advantage of a multi-branch queue management system is that it offers a centralized management framework where all the information are stored in a central location, which makes management and monitoring much easier comparing to standalone queue management system. If each branch have a standalone queue management system then the information will be stored in silos, which poses monitoring and management challenges. Furthermore the senior management or head office doesn’t require any intermediate database/integration to consolidate all the information flowing from and towards all branches. Here are the key benefits of a multi-branch queue management system:

Easy Monitoring and Administration from a centralized location
All the data and updates are available in a centralized location which enables real-time monitoring and control over all connected branches
Since there is only one main queue management system software, therefore the implementation, operational and maintenance cost is low
All the dashboards are updated in real-time, the content/configurations can be pushed in real-time to all connected branches
Handling large footfall, congestion, and several other problems is easy with real-time monitoring and it enables the management to take quick and informed decisions
Enables real-time monitoring of customer flow, customer wait time, employee performance and other queuing metrics and system stats
Senior managers, branch managers, supervisors and stakeholders have up-to-date information and data all the time, there is no lag or latency
Easy integration with third-party software tools, customer databases, and central information center help driving efficiency and productivity

A multi-branch queue management system is essential for businesses who are managing multiple branches in remote locations, it help them minimize the administrative efforts while maximizing the operational productivity.

What are the Benefits of using a Multi-Branch Queue Management System?

What are the Best Practices for Implementing a Multi-Branch Queue Management System?

Implementing a multi-branch queue management system is a crucial task. The businesses should be very careful in choosing the right vendor, technology, queuing system type and several other factors. Here are some key points that a business should consider while implementing a multi-branch queue management system:

Identify your requirements and make a plan of what features you want to include
Find and shortlist multiple queue management system vendors
Scrutinize all vendors, evaluate proposals and finalize the best vendor
Choose the right platform and queuing type for your business
Always start with a pilot project, implement the system at one or maximum two branches
Train your employees, provide them with the manuals and required technical support, etc.
Now closely observe the performance of the branch and try to find what can be improved
Take feedback from customers, employees, managers and relevant stakeholders
Discuss and share your observations and finding with the vendor and make improvements
Monitor the system and evaluate the changes you made, and repeat until your customers are satisfied
Now go for full-fledge implementation or start implementing in remaining branches one-by-one

If you will consider the above suggestions you can save a lot of time and efforts.

What are the Best Practices for Implementing a Multi-Branch Queue Management System?

What are the Challenges of Implementing a Multi-Branch Queue Management System?

Implementing a multi-branch queue management system is not an easy task, there are several challenges that a business could face while implementing a multi-channel queue management system, such as:

Initial Cost: One of the biggest challenge is the initial cost, if you are planning to implement a multi-branch queue management system across all branches at once, the cost could be very high. That is why the best practice is to start with pilot project, and implement the queue management system to all branches in small chunks, such as one-by-one, or 2 or 3 branches at a time, etc.
System Integration: When you are implementing a multi-branch queue management system or any other system, the biggest technical challenge is the integration with other tools, and data synchronization. A modern queue management system with customer-friendly features would require many different types of integration. If your existing IT infrastructure and other systems are not compatible then you might have to develop intermediate tools to streamline the data flow.
Employee Training: Whenever a business implements a new solution they require training for the employees, same is the case with the multi-branch queue management system. You must have to train your employees in order to enable them to leverage the full potential of the queue management system. User manuals, guides, and training videos can be created to make your employees well versed with your new multi-branch queue management system.

It might sound difficult and a bit challenging though but implementing a multi-branch queue management system is not as that challenging. Businesses will have to face all these challenges whenever they implement a new system. However, a queue management system is relatively easier to work with, furthermore the business can use customized UIs and branding tactics to reduce the training needs.

What are the Challenges of Implementing a Multi-Branch Queue Management System?

Conclusion

The customer satisfaction is essential for growth and stability. Businesses are always eager to implement solutions and offer services to raise the customer satisfaction. Businesses managing multiple branches always face administrative issues, the visibility and data flow is one of the most challenging task in any multi-branch setup. That is why when it comes to queue management system, most of the businesses in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and other emirates of UAE prefer to implement standalone systems. However, that is not ideal, in order to leverage the full potential of a modern queue management system businesses need a comprehensive multi-branch queuing solution. A multi-branch queue management system is a very effective tool, it help businesses dealing with technical challenges, and it offer real-time monitoring and control over all branches. That is what makes it most effective. In this guide we have discussed multi-branch queue management system in brief details and tried to answer most of the questions a business could have while planning to implement a multi-branch queue management system. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to implement a customized and very cost-efficiency multi-branch queue management system for your business, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

August 16, 2023

Employee Evaluation and KPIs for Better Employee Performance

With the rise of technology, the customer expectations have increased, the market trends have been changed, and the competition is getting tougher day by day. Businesses need to be very productive in order to be able to survive in the current market landscape of UAE. An effective performance management is the solution to level up your game and out-perform your competition. Businesses operating in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and other parts of the country are well-aware of the competitiveness of the market and the skyrocketed demands of the customers. That is why businesses are continuously seeking ways to optimize their internal processes, operations and workforce. Most of the large businesses, enterprises and organizations are using some kind of performance management process, to monitor and improve their performance. Whereas, small and medium sized businesses usually don’t focus much on this aspect. However, the performance management is equally important and effective for all types and sizes of businesses and organizations.

It is important for a business to understand where they need improvements and how they can leverage the true potential of their workforce to achieve the business goals. For any business employee turnover is a very challenging aspect of HR. Employee retention is connected to employee satisfaction. The employee satisfaction and employee retention is linked to employee engagements. If you are providing a highly engaging environment to your employees where they are given a productive organizational culture, your employee turnover will be less, not only that the employee satisfaction also results in higher customer satisfaction which translates to growth and profitability. When it comes to performance management the employee evaluation and KPIs are they key factors. A good performance management system must provide a comprehensive framework to evaluate employees and monitor their KPIs. In this blog we will discuss how employee evaluation and KPIs can help businesses improve their performance.

For any business employee turnover is a very challenging aspect of HR.

What is the difference between a KPI and a metric?

People often confuse a KPI and Metric, however, both are different. A KPI or key performance indicator is a high-level indicator which provide context about the business goal and it tells how these goals are related to different business functions. The metric is a low-level perspective and it is used to track activities and processes of different business functions. For example, a business wants to increase its customer satisfaction by 20%. That would be a KPI. In order to achieve that goal, different business functions such as customer service team, sales team, marketing, management and various other departments will have to improve their performance, each department or business functions’ metrics will be used to measure the impact of their activities and processes on the high-leave business goal. The best metric to measure customer satisfaction is the NPS or net promoter score, businesses can also use other metrics such as customer satisfaction index to understand their progress towards their goal.

How to set KPIs which are aligned with high-level business goals?

The most common mistake businesses made during their performance management campaign is not aligning their KPIs with their high-level business goals. Here are a few key points to consider while creating KPIs:

Start by setting up or analyzing your business goals, for example, if you want to increase sales, or raise customer satisfaction, etc.
Define what you will measure, for example, in case of customer satisfaction you can measure customer satisfaction index, and in case of sales you can measure the increase in sales.
Once you know what you will measure, you have to understand how you can collect that data, for sales, it is easier you can just see how much sales you made, for customer satisfaction you can use NPS or customer happiness gauge, etc.
In order to measure the performance you must have to be able to communicate and relate the KPI to the employees and managers. Your KPI should be able to engage the employees and it should be able to raise the morale and motivate them to put efforts towards achieving it.
Adopting SMART framework is a great way to boost employee engagement. The SMART stands for Scalable, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Time-bound. Implementing SMART framework and defining the targets or target range is crucial.
Make an action plan for if the KPI falls outside of the target range, and ensure your action plan is realistic and executable given the circumstances and available tools, workforce or skillsets in hand.
Reviewing and analyzing the performance data is a continuous task, the KPIs should be monitored regularly and the data should be analyzed properly to extract meaningful insight from it.
It is important to fine tune your KPIs over the time to ensure your KPIs deliver value to your business and will remain relevant to your business goals, industry benchmarks and competitive landscape.

If you will follow the above steps it would be much easier to set effective KPIs and if you have to redefine them or improve them you can also do easily with the above mentioned steps.

How to set KPIs which are aligned with high-level business goals?

How to collect employee performance data?

When we are measuring something it is usually a number, however, the human performance is not something which can entirely be measured on the bases of hard numbers. Although a good performance management system measures employee performance in quantifiable metrics but this is not as that simple as measuring the weight or height. Here are a few most effective methods of measuring the employee performance:

Rating Scales: Using the rating scales or graphical rating scales is one of the best way to measure employee performance in different performance areas. The graphical rating scales are usually sequential numbers such as 1 to 10 or 1 to 5. Usually the rating scales are used to measure the behavioral competencies, for technical competencies other tools are used.
Feedbacks: The feedbacks or 360^O Feedback is one of the most commonly used and most effective method to collect employee performance data. The 360^O Feedback includes taking feedback from supervisor/manager, peers, customers, suppliers, cross-team management, and any other stakeholder and then it is analyzed for common trends and similarities.
One-to-One: The one to one meetings are a great way to quickly evaluate the performance and identify the areas of improvement. A good performance management system also facilitate one-on-one meetings and provide intuitive features to document them. The one-on-one meetings and discussions can help bridging the communication gap between the managers and employees which is essential for improving the performance.
Management by Objectives: The Management by Objectives or MBO is a process where the employees and the managers define the objectives with mutual understanding. Thus the employees have a better understanding of what is to be expected from them and how the success would be measured. This is a great way to increase employee engagement and improve communication between employees and the managers.
Self-Evaluation: The employee self-evaluation is one of the best way to increase employee engagements and motivation. Often employees are more critical of their performance than the managers are. Which help managers to compare the employee’s self-evaluation with their evaluations. It help finding similarities and provide a better understanding of the employee performance, it also help managers to build good employee development and training programs.
Check-list Forms: A simple check-list form is a great way to quickly evaluate an employee. It could be used for both behavioral and technical competencies. It will help managers identify the employees with major deficiencies in important performance areas and help them improve training programs and also in forming high-performing teams.

There are several other ways and methods to collect employee performance data, however, the most important thing to understand is that the employee performance management requires continuous monitoring and tracking of the employee performance.

How to collect employee performance data?

Conclusion

No matter how high-tech or advanced your IT infrastructure, assembly line, production plant or customer service center it, one thing is essential and it is your employees who will be utilizing those technologies and resources to generate value. The value which will help you satisfy and retain your customers and help you build a good brand image. Markets in Dubai, Sharjah, and Abu Dhabi or in any other emirate of the UAE are very competitive, the customers tend to switch very quickly if a business fails to meet their needs or expectations. In such a tough and competitive market landscape it is important to ensure you are utilizing your resources at their full potential whether it is human resource or non-human resource. That is why the performance management system is so crucial for a businesses of all types and sizes. The two core aspects of performance management are employee evaluation and KPIs. In this blog we have discussed what KPIs are and how businesses can utilize them to harvest the highest possible value form their resources. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to implement a highly cost-effective and tailor-made performance management system for your business, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

August 14, 2023

Maximizing Efficiency: The Benefits of Implementing a Queue Management System

Every business wants efficient operation, whether it is some internal process or a customer facing environment, the efficiency is essential. When a business has efficient work flows, processes and even the teams, they tend to produce more and better outcome with whatever resources they have in hand. That is the reason in order to generate value and drive profits a business needs efficiency in every aspect of the operations. Now when we talk about the customer facing environments, the biggest challenge is to make customer flow efficient and improve customer experience. Whether you are operating in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi or any other part of UAE you must be aware of the fact that every customer have too many choices, you one mistake and you can lose them to your competitor. Furthermore the customers are also very demanding and they tend to switch service provider very quickly. Even just a single bad experience is enough to make customer the switch. Studies and market research have revealed that it is 9 to 25 times more expensive to acquire a new customer comparing to selling to an existing customer. That is why customer experience and customer satisfaction is crucial for a business success.

What is a Queue Management System?

A queue management system is a tool which consists of software and hardware parts and it is used to manage the customer flow and customer experience. The queue management software is a server application which is connected to an interactive self-service ticket dispensing kiosk or queuing kiosk. It is also connected to digital signage screens and audio announcement system. Some businesses also use dynamic counter plates which can also be managed through the queue management system. Furthermore the hardware part of the queue management system includes a ticket dispensing kiosk which allow your customers and visitors to interact with the system and issue them token numbers. There is a digital signage screen, which displays live queuing details and keep your guests informed about the current activities on each service counter. A business can have multiple signage depends on the premises size. Similarly the audio announcement system is also hardware part powered by in-built multi-lingual audio announcements module. The counter plates are also connected to the queue management system via network and can display the counter number/name along with the current ticket number. These components form a standard queue management system with basic configurations. Businesses can add more software and hardware components to enhance the features of the queue management system.

What are the Drawbacks of Poorly Organized Customer Flow?

A poorly organized customer flow have many drawbacks, it doesn’t only affect your customers but it will also have a negative impact on your employees and their performance. Which will translate to low productivity, poor growth, bad business reputation, higher customer churn rate, lower conversion rate and in the long run it will damage your brand image. When the queues or waiting lines are not managed properly the very first effect is extended wait time. When the customers will have to wait for longer period of time, they will be frustrated and annoyed. This will cause many other problems such as line jumping, customer complaints and more fraction in customer journey. When the waiting lines are not managed efficiently they employees also suffer, they will have to deal with customer complaints, they will have to manage the queues by themselves and they will have more workload, it will also distract them from their primary tasks which will undermine their performance. The customers will reach to the counter in stress and they will be unhappy, this will result in poor interaction with the service agents, and it will also make it difficult for the service agents to satisfy the customer. Long waiting lines, and extended wait time will result in higher customer churn. When employees will fail to improve their performance despite putting all efforts, they will leave too. Higher employee turnover will cause several other problems, higher customer churn rate will damage your business’s reputation.

What are The Benefits of Implementing a Queue Management System?

There are several benefits of implementing a queue management system, but it is important to understand that there are different types of queue management systems available in the market. You must have to choose the right solution that suits your needs and business type. However, one of the best way is to hire a well-reputed queue management system provider such as RSI Concepts and ask them to build a bespoke tailor-made customized queue management system according to your needs. Here are some of the benefits of implementing a queue management system:

Reduction in Customer Waiting Time

When the customer flow is well-organized, they queuing process is automated the customer wait time will automatically reduce. By implementing a queue management system businesses can automate several queuing process. The ticket dispensing is automated, the customer flow is managed by the smart algorithms of the queue management software, and the employee performance is also improved. A queue management system can automatically take decisions, and set customer route according to the historical data and the live queuing data, which is why the customer wait time is optimized. Furthermore the queue management system also help improving customers’ waiting experience by reducing the perceived wait time. It keep customers engaged and distracted from the waiting by frequently making audio-visual announcements and updating the digital signage. Furthermore the queue management system can also play multimedia content, adverts, promotional and marketing content on the digital signage which also help increasing customer engagement and help optimizing the perceived wait time.

Improved Employee Performance

When a business implements a queue management system the employee efficiency and performance is significantly improved. Without a queue management system the employees will have to adhere to several other tasks, most of which are not productive. Manually managing customer flow, especially during the peak-hours can greatly undermine the employee performance and it also have toll on service quality. However, with a proper queue management system in place the employees don’t have to worry about many things and they are free to focus on their primary and more productive tasks. This not only boost employee performance but also greatly reduce their workload. When the employees work under a balanced workload their satisfaction increases and they tend to perform better. The queue management system automate several queuing processes, and it also offers dedicated service agent dashboards, which can also lift up a lot of workload and help service agents in many tasks. Businesses can significantly improve employee performance and service quality by implementing a queue management system.

Enhanced Customer Experience

The customer satisfaction depends on customer experience and service quality, better experience results in higher customer satisfaction index. When a business implements a queue management system it automates several queuing processes. When the customers know that their tokens are issued by computer operated system, they have more trust over the system, and it assured them there will no favoritisms, no line-jumping, no intervention from the staff, whatever token is issued to them they will be served accordingly. Furthermore the queue management system keeps customers and visitors engaged and help diluting the effects of waiting and reduce their stress. This will improve their waiting experience. As the service staff is also aided by the queue management system, they are also more welcoming, fresh and prepared for the customers. This all results in a better customer interaction with the service agent and also tend to improve the service quality. Implementing a queue management system greatly improves customer experience and results in higher customer satisfaction which help your business building a strong brand image and reputation.

Real-time Monitoring and Remote Management

One of the best advantage of implementing a queue management system is that it offers real-time monitoring and remote management features. Businesses often have multiple branches where they deploy a queue management system, and even in case of only one office the real-time monitoring dashboard and capabilities to manage the system remotely are some of the most productive features. Usually there is a central location or head office where the top management resides, they want to monitor the queuing activities and stats to take timely decisions. The queue management system is a centralized software system which connects all branches and parts and enable real-time monitoring. The branch manager, or the senior manager at the head office or any other user with adequate access can monitor the live real-time queuing data and stats. Furthermore it is very easy to implement the queuing polices and strategies across the entire business, remotely from the head office. Businesses can also set automated alerts and notifications for the managers and supervisors to enable them to be more reactive towards the customer footfall and help them improve the customer flow by keeping them up-to-date all the time.

Collect Business Intelligence Data

The data is the backbone of modern fast-paced markets. Every business who wants to succeed should be able to collect, analyze and utilize the business intelligence data in order to generate value and productive outcomes. A queue management system can provide a wealth of highly accurate and valuable business intelligence data. The queue management system can collect queuing data, system usage stats, waiting time trends, customer footfall trends, employee performance and KPI metrics, and it can also collect direct customer feedback which can be incorporated in several internal decision making process to improve strategies and overall performance of the business. The queue management system can also be integrated with third-party tools and central information center which enables it to collect data from various sources, and it also allow the queue management system to provide business intelligence data for other systems and tools. Businesses can analyze the queue management system data and customer feedback using in-built analytical tools, or they can extract it in form of various intuitive report formats such as summary reports, trend reports and much more which help them utilize the business intelligence data at its full potential and maximize the overall efficiency and performance of the business.

Conclusion

In modern fast-paced markets where the markets are subjected to subtle and rapid changes, a business needs a proactive approach to deal with up-coming challenges. Managing customer facing environments and maintain a satisfactory customer experience is one of the most challenging task a service-based business ever faces. Poorly organized waiting lines and long queues can have devastating effects on a business. Pool queuing strategy and manual queue management can results in poor employee performance, low service quality, and unhappy customers. However when a business implements q modern queue management system, they can greatly improve employee performance, customer experience and consequently customer satisfaction. A queue management system offers many features which can help improving the customer flow and minimizing the customer churn rate. In this blog we have discussed what a queue management system is and how businesses can benefits from it. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to build you a tailor-made queue management system for your business, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

August 2, 2023

Why Custom Performance Management System is more Effective?

In the fast-paced business landscape it is extremely important for a business to utilize its resources at fullest potential. Businesses operating in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and anywhere else in UAE are well aware of the fact that the markets in this country tend to change very quickly, the customer demands are also increasing endlessly. That is why businesses all around the UAE give a lot of attention to performance management frameworks. The performance management is one of the primary task of the HR department and that is the reason HR leaders and businesses are ready to invest a lot in performance management systems and programs. There is another strong reason for investing in performance management system which is the adaptation of agile processes and methods. When businesses adopt agility, a gap is formed naturally between the managers and the employees. Most of the time the business leaders and managers failed to implement proper people management practices which results in dissatisfaction and distrust among the employees and undermine their performance and productivity.

The modern day employees are also more concerned about their personal development and growth, they want more frequent feedback from their managers which help them improve their skills and productivity. There has been several surveys and studies all around the world which suggested more than 80% of the business leaders lost faith on the traditional performance management practices and annual appraisal processes. Almost similar percentage of employees also express their distrust on traditional performance management methods. Therefore a modern, digitalized and technology based performance management system is needed. Basically a performance management system is a software tool, which can provide a continuous performance monitoring tools and analytical data and allow both managers and employees to access valuable performance management data in a very intuitive and interactive manner. Only a modern digital performance management system solution can fulfill the needs of the modern businesses. In this blog we will discuss why a custom performance management system is more effective for your business.

Only a modern digital performance management system solution can fulfill the needs of the modern businesses. — Only a modern digital performance management system solution can fulfill the needs of the modern businesses

What is the Difference between a COTS and Custom Performance Management System?

Before we discuss what is the difference between a custom and COTS performance management system it is important to understand that a performance management system is a software which is used to streamline and improve the performance management processes such as one-on-one meetings, acquiring feedback, appraisal, developing personal development and training programs and other such tasks. For any HR department it is their prime goal to retain and sustain a skilled workforce and ensure other business functions can get the required talent and skillset. The performance management system is built on a powerful analytical and statistical engine, along with smart algorithms and AI software tools which makes it more efficient, impactful and effective. When it comes to acquire a new software tool there are two options, one is hiring a professional software development agency like RSI Concepts and have a tailor-made solution which matches 100% of your business needs. The second option is to quickly implement a cloud-based solution or acquire a ready-made performance management software. Both the ready-made and cloud-based solutions are COTS software, it means Commercial Off-the-shelf Software. The COTS are not designed for a single business or a specific set of users, in fact they are general purpose tools which are designed and available to a mass audience ranging from a few hundred to millions of users.

What made Custom Performance Management System Superior and a Better Match to your Needs?

Whenever a business needs a software solution and they decide to go with a commercial off-the-shelf software or COTS they usually seek to match as much of their needs as possible, on an average a good COTS solution will meet your 80% of needs. That means you will have to make compromise for the rest of the 20% of your needs. That is one of the major reason business prefer to have a tailor-made custom software solution because a custom software solution is capable of meeting 100% of your needs as it will be exclusively designed for your needs. Another great advantage of a custom performance management system is that it can provide a great competitive advantage. Furthermore the custom performance management system is exclusively designed for your business, so you also hold the ownership rights for the product. This will free your business from vendor-dependency. Businesses can manage, customize and upgrade custom performance management system in-house as well as they can choose any vendor to do so, as the entire software tool and its resources such as source code, databases and integration tools are handed over to the business who will be using it.

Here are some key advantages of choosing a custom performance management system over a COTS solution:

Custom Performance Management System: Effectively Implement Strategy

It is important to understand that the performance management is a very flexible concept. Every business has a unique organizational culture so does the strategy to implement different performance methods. It is due to the preference which every business have different from the other. These preferences are based on the business goals, strategic objectives and their desire to improve certain aspects of the performance. For example, some businesses might prioritize the technical competencies and some might want to focus on behavioral competencies and so on. Along with that for a different set of employees the KPIs are different the desired outcome is different, hence the strategy and focused performance aspects would be different. Furthermore there are different performance management methods and every business would have different choice, on top of that most business leader prefer to use a combination of two or more methods to implement their own unique performance management strategy. That is the reason the commercial off-the-shelf software solutions can never fulfill all of your needs. Furthermore the COTS are built as per industry standards and offers more rigid framework. However, a custom performance management system can offer you more control, flexibility, freedom and customization which enable you to effectively implement your own unique performance management strategy. You can utilize in-built templates and configurations wizards to setup your own customized KPIs, OKRs and performance metrics as per your needs. This allow you to laser focus on your prioritized aspects of the performance management which can greatly improve the impact and outcome.

There are different performance management methods and every business would have different choice

Custom Performance Management System: Easy Integration with Data and Third-party Systems

The entire performance management system depends on collecting, flow and analysis of the data. It is extremely important to understand that if data collection would be easier, the outcome would be more accurate. That is why most modern performance management systems have ability to automatically collect data. Businesses can manually upload data too or they can use dedicated dashboards to input the data but it is important that uploading data or integration and automated-data collection is as per the needs of the business. The IT infrastructure of any organization is a very complex eco-system, it develops gradually and evolve as per the needs and changes within the organization or due to the impact of external factors. This means there would be a lot of different system some of which might be integrated already with the central information system. There could be a lot technology platforms and different vendors that a business is using to form their IT infrastructure. When a new software application is deployed in such environment the biggest challenge is integration and communication between different third-party systems and tools. Since the commercial off-the-shelf software are usually standardized tools, hence integration could be a big challenge, it could be very expensive and in some cases it could be impossible. However, the customized performance management system is exclusively built for your needs, so all these problems are already accounted for. All these challenges can be dealt effectively and with convenience when you have full control over the structure of the software that you are building. That is why the customized performance management system are more effective in integrating with third-party tools and databases, which allow them to easily attain automation and built innovative features to minimize the effort and workload of the users. Even in case of manual uploads or dedicated dashboard to input data the customized performance management system is much more effective and far superior to any COTS solution in the market.

Custom Performance Management System: Get Customized Features and UI

Similar to performance strategy implementation, the features of the performance management system also require customization if you want to align the system with your needs. The biggest problem with the commercial off-the-shelf performance management software is that they are built according to the industry standards and only follow standardized procedures and processes. Which is helpful but sometimes it could be a hurdle instead of support. The custom performance management system software is exclusively designed as per your requirements hence there is no such barrier or limitation. You can customize each and every feature, process, SOP, protocol and even the reporting formats and designs. For any performance management system the ultimate goal is to collect performance data, drive reports from the data and then take informed decisions to maximize the probability of the success. There is another most important aspect which is the user interface (UI). Most of the businesses doesn’t focus much on it, however, it is extremely important aspect of any software application. With the custom performance management system you can customize the GUI or UI as per your requirements, you can have your customized branding, and even functionalities can be customized and labeled as per your needs which can greatly enhance the efficiency and efficacy of the performance management system. The stock or off-the-shelf solutions doesn’t offer such customizations.

Custom Performance Management System: High Scalability and Easy Upgrade

Whenever businesses are acquiring any software solution, the scalability and ability to upgrade it in future are the two most important aspects to consider. The commercial off-the-shelf software comes with several restrictions and limitations. Similarly the commercial off-the-shelf performance management system could be easier and quicker to deploy but down the road it will pose more challenges. Furthermore these software are usually cloud-based and comes in different tiers and plans which are designed to target a specific size or industry. Hence if you need some features which are not available in your plan you might have to subscribe for additional plan, which will be more expensive and at the end of the day most of the features comes with expensive plan might not be useful for your business. The markets evolve very fast, the customer demands could change over the night, and business need to be very vigilant and responsive towards such changes, which is usually not possible with the commercial off-the-shelf solutions. Furthermore these applications take ages to develop and build new features, there are several challenges for the vendor to upgrade them. Businesses keep growing and after sometime scaling up these software would cost you a lot. The custom performance management system is completely free from all those limitations and restrictions. You can customize it whenever you want, you can scale it up or downsize it whenever you need and without paying even a single dime. Furthermore you can also customize your custom performance management system to add new features or to make changes at a nominal cost unlike the COTS which incurs hefty fees and charges for such requirements.

Custom Performance Management System: Cost-effective and High ROI

When we compare the initial cost of the commercial off-the-shelf solutions and the customized software applications, the COTS apparently looks more cost-effective. However, that is not true at all. The COTS can be deployed quickly but won’t be able to fully match your 100% of the requirements, however, the custom performance management systems have higher initial cost but can fully aligned with your requirements and fulfill your 100% of the needs. In order to compare the cost we will have to look at the ROI over a longer period of the time. The stock or commercial off-the-shelf solutions have regular subscription charges which you will have to pay on monthly, quarterly or yearly bases as per your plan. You will have no control over the software vendor, the vendor will own the application and in some cases your data is also stored at vendor’s server which is not as that secure. However, the custom performance management system is exclusively designed for your business, the vendor doesn’t have the ownership of the application, instead you will own the ownership rights of the software and you will also own all the software code, resources and the entire application which will be handed over to you. You can have full control over your custom performance management system, there is no vendor dependency, you can chose any vendor or even in-house team to maintain and upgrade your software. Your data will be hosted with you or at the server/cloud of your choice which offers better security. There will be no subscription fee or hidden charges, the customization will be very cost-efficient and if you calculate the ROI over an extended period of time the custom performance management system will cost you less than half of a reputed commercial off-the-shelf performance management system. The custom performance management system have longer life-cycle which can be further extended by making few changes and iterations, but in case of COTS you might have to acquire a completely new software after a few years.

Conclusion

Businesses operating in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi or any other emirate of UAE knows that very well that the markets here are very competitive. The overall government policies and environment is very investor-friendly hence the competition will keep rising in future too. Furthermore the customer demands are also skyrocketing and the market is subjected to rapid changes. In such environment if a business want to maintain a steady growth it is extremely important for them to have a proactive performance management strategy. The modern day employees need higher engagements and the business leaders also want more productive and effective tools to maximize the performance and productivity of their organization. That is why businesses deploy performance management systems which are mainly a dedicated software application designed to streamline the performance management processes and aid management in performing performance management tasks. When it comes to acquire a performance management system software, businesses have two way, one is finding a suitable commercial off-the-shelf solution and quickly implement it and the other is slightly longer path, which is to develop a tailor-made and fully customized performance management system which is exclusively designed for the business by keeping in mind all the needs, requirements, and existing IT infrastructure.

In this blog we have discussed several aspects of performance management system and tried to highlight the aspects which make custom performance management system more superior, effective and impactful then its counterpart, the commercial off-the-shelf performance management software. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to develop an exclusive tailor-made custom performance management system for your business, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

July 25, 2023

Why Laravel Framework is gaining popularity in Software Development?

The digital eco-system is evolving at a rapid pace, businesses will have to keep up with the changing trends, customer demands and competition in order to ensure growth and stability. A modern day business needs a variety of software tools and applications in order to maintain required productivity and performance. Business management software and tools not only help improving operations, but they also help minimizing the cost and help businesses drive innovation which gets them a great competitive advantage. Here in Dubai and anywhere else in UAE businesses knows very well that how competitive the markets are and how demanding customers could be. In order to maintain a steady growth in such environment businesses need to level up their game which is impossible without implementing right software tools and digital solutions. This need gives rise to software development industry in the country, especially the customer software development. The customized software are exclusively designed for businesses to fully align with their business needs and vision. Furthermore the upgrading and customization is a fundamental need of any custom software application.

What is Laravel Framework and Why is it So Popular?

When we talk about custom software development it is extremely important to choose the right development tools and frameworks. These days with the rise of cloud and in-depth integration of smartphones, the web-based software applications are gaining huge popularity, as they are cost-effective, require less time to develop and offer better customization and scalability. The PHP (general purpose scripting language) is one of the most commonly used programming language. We have witnessed the emergence of hundreds of different PHP frameworks over the period of last two decades. The Laravel Framework is one of the most popular framework of PHP programming language. The Laravel Framework gained this popularity due to its modular development approach, easy scalability, high efficiency and innovative functionalities. The major architectural pattern of the Laravel Framework are based on Symfony, which is an open-source PHP library featuring reusable components. The Laravel Framework is also open-source and free to use which made it best alternate to CodeIgniter, which is another rapid development framework used for web-based software development. The Laravel Framework offers more convenience, easy-to-use tools and components which makes it the most popular PHP Framework.

What makes Laravel a Perfect fit for Modern Software Development Needs?

The modern software development industry requires more robust, efficient and scalable applications which extend the lifecycle of the software and enable businesses to keep improving their applications over the time. Here are some key features which makes Laravel Framework a perfect fit for the modern software development needs:

Process Automation with Packaging System: Laravel Framework enable packaging multiple support tools and software along with ability to add pre-built libraries which help developers achieve process automation in their web-based and custom software applications. Laravel uses an advance dependency manager, a composer which manages all the packages and information needed to manage these packages and allow developers to automate processes.
Object-Oriented Approach and MVC Architecture: One of the best advantage of using Laravel Framework is that it uses MVC or model, view and controller architecture along with exceptionally easy object-oriented syntax.
Advance File System and Distributed Environment Support: The Laravel Framework have in-built support for multiple file system and it can support local storage, cloud storage and rack-space storage. On top of that the Laravel Framework offers easy-to-use APIs which remain same for all the systems and also enable developers to use all three file systems as a distributed environment.
In-built Authentication and Authorization System: The Laravel Framework offers in-built configurations for the authentication and authorization system. The developers can implement authentication and authorization to their custom software application by using only a few simple commands which saves time and is very simple-to-use.
Enable Real-time Data with Broadcasting Feature: The modern-day software applications requires a lot of real-time data broadcasting between the server-side and client-side. The Laravel Framework offer an in-built Events and Broadcasting features which enables software developer to implement real-time data and live feeds in their customized applications.
In-built Command Line Interface (Artisans Console): The Laravel Framework offers an exclusive in-built command line interface, named Artisans Console. The Artisans Console allow developers to easily publish packaged assets, migrate databases, seed and generate boilerplate code for controllers and models. The Artisans Console also support custom command which gives developer more control.
Advanced Task Scheduler: The Task Scheduler was introduced along with in-built command line interface, Artisans Console. The Scheduler utilizes Cron Daemon to execute a single Artisans Console job which executes the configured tasks. This enable developers to easily do programmatic scheduling of the periodically executed tasks.
In-built Object Relation Mapper (Eloquent ORM): The Laravel Framework offers one of the best object relation mapper, known as Eloquent ORM and it comes as an in-built utility. The Eloquent ORM allow developers to use expressive syntax to manage database relationships and to interact with database objects.
Blade Template Engine: The Laravel Framework comes with highly effective in-built templating engine, known as Blade Template Engine. Blade Template Engine also offers internally mapped control structure for PHP counterparts such as conditional statements and loops, etc. It also enable combining one or more template to produce resulting views with a data model which can greatly improve the performance of the software application.
Multiple Testing Modes: The Laravel Framework offers in-built unit testing functionality featuring multiple tests to prevent and detect regressions in the framework along with ability to integrate PHP unit testing framework. The Artisans Console, command-line utility can also be used to run unit tests on the application.

Above are some of the most commonly-used features of the Laravel Framework which make it superior to other open-source PHP Frameworks.

What makes Laravel a Perfect fit for Modern Software Development Needs?

Highly Advanced Out-of-the-box Official Laravel Packages

Here is a list of official Laravel Packages which can make integration of different features super-easy with the application built on Laravel Framework:

Laravel Passport: The Laravel Passport allow user authentication via API while utilizing the OAuth Server. The API uses token and the Laravel Passport enables full OAuth Server implantation with simple steps which takes only a few minutes.
Laravel Socialite: The Laravel Socialite is an excellent package to easily implement login and authentication mechanisms via social media sites such as Google, Facebook, Twitter, GitHub, etc. for your customer software application.
Laravel Horizon: The Laravel Horizon is a highly effective intuitive monitoring tool which enables both dashboard and code-driven configurations. It is used to monitor the output of a job along with time required to execute the job and it also tracks job failures.
Laravel Cashier: The Laravel Cashier is a great in-built package which is used for e-Commerce and payment-based software applications. The Cashier is used to manage coupons and invoices and offer a full toolkit for managing subscription billing services.
Laravel Envoy: The Laravel Envoy simplified the automating the common tasks using minimal and simple syntax. The Envoy utilizes a similar syntax as Blade template and it makes it easier to setup tasks and utilize Artisans Console commands.
Laravel Scout: The Laravel Scout is a full-text search engine which utilizes the Eloquent ORM model along with Angola as its default driver which offers excellent service. The Scout also support custom drivers to enable improving the full-text search functionality.

The features and out-of-the-box packages offered by the Laravel Framework are better than any other available open-source PHP framework which is the main reason of its popularity in software development.

Highly Advanced Out-of-the-box Official Laravel Packages

Top Software Development Trends which will Increase the Demand of Laravel Framework in Coming Years

The Laravel Framework is trusted by millions of businesses and developers all around the world and it is known for developing high-performing and featured-rich custom web-based software applications. Here are the top software development trends which will definitely increase the demand of the Laravel Framework in the coming years:

Rising Demand for Multi-device Integration
Emerging Trend of IoT Implementation and Integration
Rising Demand of Intuitive User Interface (UI) and User Experience (UI)
Emerging Trend of Blockchain, Digital Payment and Crypto Currency
Security, Encryption and Password Protection
AI Enabled Customer Service Chatbots
Rapid App Development and Cost-optimization
Increasing Popularity of Cloud-based Software Applications

These top trends of software development industry are indicating even higher demand for the Laravel Framework in the coming future which is also sensed by the software development industry and that is why the popularity of the Laravel Framework is rapidly increasing.

Top Software Development Trends which will Increase the Demand of Laravel Framework in Coming Years

Conclusion

It is important to understand that whenever a business decides to develop a customized software application they have certain goals that they want to achieve with it. However, there are certain things which every business wants in their software applications such as the software application should be fast, feature-rich, intuitive, have high compatibility, integrates with existing infrastructure, have low cost, develops quickly, require less maintenance and easy to operate. These are some fundamental requirements every business have in mind when they are planning to develop a custom software application. Here in Dubai and all around the UAE you can find tens of hundreds of software development agencies who can build your customized software applications with the desired features and functionalities. However, it is important to understand that your software application should be have certain capabilities such as easy-integration, low-cost scalability, simple upgrade and customization and should be able to stay relevant for coming years.

The Laravel Framework is the excellent if not only choice to achieve the same. The Laravel Framework is open-source, the skilled developers are available easily, and it packs a tons of modern and highly advanced features which makes it the perfect choice for the customized web-based software application development and that is the reason why the Laravel Framework is rapidly gaining popularity not only in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and other parts of UAE but all over the world. If you are interested in learning more about the subject or if you want our custom software development service for your next game-changing software application development, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

July 24, 2023

Redefining Queue Management: How to Enhance the Customer Experience

For any business the customer satisfaction is the prime goal, it assures long term success, stability and growth. Businesses operating in service sector understand the importance of customer flow optimization and customer journey management. Especially in Dubai and anywhere in UAE the markets are very competitive, the customers have too many options available and people usually tend to switch after getting even only a single bad experience. That is why queue management is crucial for a business’s success. Long queues, poorly managed waiting lines and crowded lobbies are a great dissatisfaction for the customers, which not only raise customer churn but also harm business’s brand image and reputation. There are several challenges that customer facing environment have, one of the biggest is delay in service and long waiting time, furthermore the management of customer service center is also complicated and collectively everything impacts the customer experience. A queue management system not only reduce wait time it also streamline customer flow, provide real-time monitoring and it is very helpful for the management and staff which results in higher efficiency and raise customer satisfaction.

What is a Modern Queue Management System?

A modern queue management system is a digital solution which includes both software and hardware components. The software is designed with AI based smart technologies which enables it to collect data in real-time, take decisions at its own to improve customer flow and it improves management. A queue management system allow to monitor, track and improve customer movement within the premises and help improving customer waiting experience and customer journey. It automates several queuing processes and capture business intelligence data from each and every customer touch point. This ability allows it to take decisions at its own to ensure a smoother customer flow. Queue management system helps both service agents and the management to effectively improve the queuing process. It not only eliminates the inefficient and manual queuing practices but it also collects valuable business intelligence data insights which can be integrated in decision making and strategy building processes to further improve the customer flow management policy and practices. In this blog we will discuss how a modern queue management system can greatly enhance customer experience to achieve higher satisfaction.

Customer Experience: Long Wait Time

Long wait time has the most impact on the customer experience than anything else. No matter how good your office or facility is, how well your staff is trained, if your customers will have to face long wait time they will eventually end up unhappy. According to several studies on an average a customer could tolerate around 9 minutes of wait time, and any minute adding to that will have toll on customer experience, so much so that a time will come when your customers will become annoyed enough that they will decide to leave without even getting the service. This is called customer churn and keeping it at the lowest possible value is crucial for your business’s success. Longer wait time doesn’t only bother your customers but there is a phenomenon known as perceived wait time, which even worsen the conditions for both businesses and customers. The perceived wait time is the wait time our brain perceived instead of tracking the real-time. The perceived time is always higher than the actual time, for example, your customers have waited for let say 20 minutes however their mind perceive it longer than that maybe 30 or even 40 minutes.

Longer wait time means even longer perceived wait time which results in bad customer experience and cause frustration. That is why it is important to control, reduce and efficiently manage both wait times. A modern queue management system not only help minimizing the wait time but it also offer features which help reducing the perceived wait time’s impact by increasing customer engagements. There is another psychological phenomenon into play which is the fear of unknown, if the customers have no clue of how long they will have to wait this will add to their fear and they think they might have to wait for long period of time. However, a queue management systems comes with a powerful software tools which is built on smart AI and advanced data processing algorithms. These features enable queue management system to monitor the live queuing situation, consider the historical data and measure the ongoing performance on the service counters and estimate the remaining time to service. Hence when the customers are given their token they are also provided with estimated time to their turn.

When the customer know how long they will have to wait, they tend to remain calm. Furthermore there are several other features which help improving customers’ waiting experience. A modern queue management system comes with a smart customer calling module. The modern queue management systems are integrated with digital signage displays and a multi-lingual audio calling system. The digital signage keep displaying the current token number at service counters, upcoming tokens and few more details which keep customers distracted from the waiting and minimize the impact of waiting. Furthermore the queue management system can automatically make audio announcement where it calls token number and the service counter allotted to that token number, usually the customer call is made in two or three languages followed by a short music tone. The digital signage screens are also not only used to display queuing information, but a modern queue management system comes with in-built digital signage management module as well. Which allow businesses to run marketing or promotional videos or any other entertaining content on the large displays along with the queuing information. The digital signage and speakers are installed at strategic locations with aim of ensuring every customer at any place in the waiting area can view the signage or listen to the audio announcement. All these features help greatly reduce the waiting stress and improve customers’ waiting experience.

Customer Experience: Quick Service Delivery

Let us just admit whenever we have to face a situation where we have to wait for some time in a queue or in waiting area, in such situation when we reach to the service counter we want to get the service as quickly as possible and leave. For any customer facing environment it is crucial to offer a quality service and in a timely manner. When the customers already waited for some time, they are in hurry and want to leave as quickly as possible. A modern queue management system help businesses minimize the service delivery time by offering specialized features to automatically manage the customer journey and to help the service staff in their tasks. A modern queue management system offers a dedicated dashboard for the service agents, it can integrate with central information center and other third-party tools to enable quick availability of the data and information for the service agents, and it monitors employee KPIs. All these features help reducing the service delivery time and ensure a smooth customer flow. A queue management system automates several customer journey steps, and internal processes which means the staff doesn’t have to worry about any such thing, in fact they can easily focus on their primary tasks which results in quicker service delivery as well as improved service quality.

For any customer facing environment it is crucial to offer a quality service and in a timely manner

Furthermore the queue management system also allow customers to sign-in using self-service ticket dispensing kiosk. Usually the ticket dispensing kiosk as the customers about what service they need this help the queue management system to route the customer to the right service counter and put them in the right queue. Most of the time customers end-up in the wrong queue which could cause a lot of problems and result in delays in service delivery. On top of that each business have its own queuing policies. Businesses always offer multiple services and apart form that there are different customer groups which are prioritized differently, for example, the VIP customers, people with special needs, elderly people, etc. All these customers are expecting a different treatment from the business, which is defined in the queuing policy. A modern queue management system help businesses effectively implement their queuing policies and provide better monitoring and control over customer flow. Some businesses also offer stepped services which means a customer is required to visit multiple or more than one service counter in order to get a complete service. All these variables can make queuing very complex for both businesses and customers and cause unnecessary delays in service delivery.

A queue management system automates several customer journey steps, and internal processes

Customer Experience: Better Service Quality

The service quality or the quality of the interaction a customer have with the service agent can greatly influence their opinion about your business. It is essential to ensure a customer have a happy and satisfactory experience with your service staff. A queue management system help reducing the workload of the service staff. With manual queuing the staff regularly have to engage in queue management tasks, which distract them from their primary tasks and result in poor quality service and more customer complaints. With the queue management system the entire queuing process is autonomous which means the service staff have more time to focus on their primary tasks, this increase their performance which improve service quality. Furthermore the queue management system also help service agents with their several other tasks which also result in quicker and better service delivery. The modern queue management system comes with advance employee performance monitoring tools which also help management track and monitor employee performance and collect valuable data which support HR decisions and help improving the workforce. All these features collectively help management improve the service quality and consequently the customer experience.

It is essential to ensure a customer have a happy and satisfactory experience with your service staff

Customer Experience: Business Intelligence Data

Data plays a crucial role in the success of any modern business, majorly due to the digital advancements, rise of online channels and customer preferences, the businesses are compelled to adopt to modern IT infrastructure in order to stay relevant and competitive. A modern queue management system can produce a wealth of highly accurate and valuable business intelligence data which can help businesses refine the customer experience by acquiring insight to customer behavior, detecting pain points and highlighting the areas of improvements. The business intelligence data covers a wide spectrum insight and information such as queue management system usage stats, customer preferences, customer footfall analytical data, employee performance data, and even the customer feedback data. The business intelligence data is collected autonomously and available in form of interactive reports. The management can customize these reports to align them with their goals and strategies. The business intelligence data can also be synchronized with central information center or any other third-party system via easy integration. When management have accurate data and insight they can make informed decisions. It also help evaluating business strategies, processes and practices and help businesses to make improvements which results in better operational performance and higher customer satisfaction.

Business Intelligence Data plays a crucial role in the success of any modern business

Conclusion

Queue management system offer a variety of features and tools which help management improve the customer experience, optimize the operational cost, improve employee performance and achieve higher profitability. A good customer experience is crucial for a business to build a good brand image. The competition is tough in Dubai and other parts of UAE, businesses proactively improve their offerings to delight their customers. The customers are also very demanding and the market trends are subjected to subtle and monumental changes. It could be very difficult for a business to keep up with these changes without having right tools in their arsenal. A queue management system is the perfect companion for any customer facing environment. It help reducing the wait time, have positive impact on employee performance, and it significantly improves the customer experience. A queue management system offers a centralized management mechanisms which enables businesses to monitor all connected branches in real-time and make sure right actions are taken and in timely manners to avoid any disruption or unwanted delay in customer flow. In this blog we have discussed how a modern queue management system can help businesses enhance the customer experience and leverage the technology to achieve their long term goals and success. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want us to help you implementing a tailor-made queue management system solution for your business, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

July 12, 2023July 12, 2023

Best Features of a Digital Queue Management System for Banks

Banks offer crucial financial services for individuals and businesses which are essential for our modern societies. If you are living in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi or anywhere else in UAE, you must have visited a bank either for account opening or for business purposes. If you recall your last interaction with a bank, how was your experience at the branch? I am sure it was not as pleasing as it should be. The biggest problems at banks is the large customer influx, a customer might have to wait for 30 to 45 minutes for a service which can be delivered in 5 minutes. Obviously your appointment at bank is not something which you should expect to be enjoyable or entertaining but at least it should be comfortable, convenient and friction-less. This means that there are still some flaws and problems with the banking sector which are impacting customer experience. The average wait time for a typical bank service is around 20 minutes or in some cases even more than that, which cause stress and frustration. A digital queue management system solve all those problems and it also helps improving customer experience.

What is a Digital Queue Management System?

A queue management system is a combination of tools and strategy to improve customer flow and maximize the performance of the customer service centers. The early form of queue management systems was first-come-first-serve based waiting line. Then businesses started sorting them in multiple waiting lines. Later on technology is introduced to the queuing systems. The digital queue management system is the latest form of customer flow management systems. A digital queue management system also consists of some digital tools (software and hardware) and a queuing strategy which help banks to significantly improve the customer experience, maximize their branch productivity and profitability and it also help improving staff performance. A digital queue management system also help businesses meet the ever-increasing customer expectations and it also collects valuable business intelligence data which is very helpful for businesses.

Here are the key features of a digital queue management system for a bank:

Digital Queue Management System: Reduction in Customer Wait Time

Customer wait time is one of the major cause of customer dissatisfaction. A digital queue management system is a very capable tool which can greatly reduce customer wait time and it also help improving customers’ waiting experience. Customers can sign-in using multiple methods which makes it very easy and convenience. Once customers are singed-in they are issued a ticket number which is their position in the queue. The customers are allowed to wait freely either in the waiting areas or even outside of the bank premises. The queue management system can also communicate with customers using SMS or WhatsApp or any other channel. It sends them live queuing information, alerts and notifications which prevent customers from missing out their turn in the queue. Furthermore the digital queue management system also have a digital signage screen, usually more than one screens are placed on strategic locations to ensure every customers can easily view information on these screens. Along with queuing information, multimedia content can also be played which help diverting customer’s focus form waiting time. The frequent audio announcements also keep customer engaged and reduce the stress of waiting.

Digital Queue Management System: Customer Journey Transformation

A digital queue management system has an AI (artificial intelligence) based very powerful software engine which make it more effective and efficient. A digital queue management system is a customer journey transformation tool. It can enhance customer’s entire visit even from pre-arrival to post-service activities, a digital queue management system effectively improves the entire customer journey. Furthermore a digital queue management system is capable of collecting customer behavioral, statistical and performance data which enables it to take instant decisions on the bases of real-time queuing situation. A typical bank have multiple services which they are offering at their branches, some service counters are exclusive for certain services some are for general services and furthermore there are also customer classifications and priority levels that the bank has to accommodate. It means that the bank has a very complex queuing strategy. A digital queue management system not only help banks implement their strategy but it also improving it. It can automatically route customers to the right service counter and as per their priority level or any other parameter that is applicable it manages the entire customer journey and ensure maximum efficiency, smooth customer flow and less wait time.

Digital Queue Management System: Boost Branch Efficiency

A digital queue management system is not just designed to reduce the customer wait time. It is a very powerful tool which can help improving several processes and have huge impact on the overall efficiency and performance of the entire bank branch. The digital queue management system automates several processes and customer journey steps. For example, the customer sing-in is completely automated, customers can utilize the interactive kiosk to sign-in and get the token number or they can utilize any supported virtual channel to sign-in and get a digital token or e-ticket. Furthermore everyone is served only at their turn, there is no chance of staff giving importance to any customer, this not only help improving the customer flow but it also help gaining customer trust. Furthermore there are no disputes, line jumping or any such problem that is associated with manual queuing. This means that the customer flow is entirely managed by the queue management system and the staff doesn’t have to involve at any stage. This not only speed up everything but it also help reducing the employees’ workload. When the staff works under balanced workload they tend to perform well and deliver high-quality service which improve branch performance. The employee have more time to focus on their primary tasks and they don’t have to worry about queuing problems which save a lot of time and also help reducing the service delivery time and resultantly customer wait time. All these improvements help boosting branch efficiency, employee performance, reduce human resource cost and ensure satisfactory service delivery.

Digital Queue Management System: Collects Business Intelligence Data

A digital queue management system is capable of collecting highly valuable business intelligence data from each and every customer touch point throughout the customer journey. Since the entire customer interaction digitally managed, collecting statistical data is much easier. For example, the queue management system can provide comprehensive insight to the customer flow such as which services most customer are choosing, what is average customer wait time, what is average service time and which employee is performing better and at which stage the customers are waiting longer than expected, etc. A digital queue management system is also capable of collecting customers’ behavioral data and compile it in form of easy-to-understand reports which help management understand customer behavior trend, performance trends, footfall trends and many more useful insights. A digital queue management system can collects a wealth of business intelligence data which can be very useful in decision making processes and help management evaluate their queuing strategy, customer journey and various other processes that can directly impact the customer experience. Furthermore a digital queue management system can also facilitate customer feedback collection and help banks collecting valuable customer feedback.

Conclusion

Banks offer most important financial services which are integral for our society and businesses to work. Whether you visit a bank in individual capacity or for your business, visit to a bank is inevitable. Banks also know that very well, hence they are always investing in innovative solutions and technologies to ensure their customers and visitors have an excellent customer experience. The overall UAE market in general is very dynamic, vibrant and versatile, for customers there are so many options to choose from. This is what makes customer satisfaction crucial for banks. If a bank wants to obtain customer loyalty then they must have to level up their game at customer experience and customer service. A digital queue management system is a perfect companion for banks who want to improve their customer experience. It help banks automate several customer journey processes and improve employees’ performance without compromising the customer satisfaction. In fact queue management systems are known for delivering highest customer satisfaction in all customer-facing environments. In this blog we discussed what a queue management system is and what features it offer which can help banks achieve maximum productivity, performance and customer satisfaction. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to transform your bank branch with our customized queue management system solution, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

July 11, 2023

Characteristics of a Good Employee Appraisal System

The employee appraisal is the most important aspect of performance management. Every business wants to increase its performance, with the limited resources in hand every business wants to generate more outcome with limited inputs. That is why business adopt various workforce optimization methods and implement performance management strategies to improve the outcome and minimize the operational cost. This can provide businesses with a great competitive advantage and help them grow and achieve its goals. The employee appraisals are extremely important as it will help businesses identifying any areas of improvement by evaluating employee performance and measuring the effectiveness of the employee. The employee appraisal system is a great tool for workforce optimization and performance management it help businesses implement their performance management strategy and align employees with the mission of the business by leveraging the employee performance data and various techniques that are designed to evaluate employee performance.

What is Employee Appraisal System?

The employee appraisal system is a combination of tools, strategies and methodologies which are used to measure the employee performance against a pre-set goal, and employee appraisal help setting up the goals for future and provide guidance for employee development and training programs. The employee performance appraisal provides a framework for the mangers to identify the areas of improvement, highlight the causes of failure and success and from future performance strategy. Businesses and organizations in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and everywhere in UAE are investing heavily in employee performance management solutions such as employee appraisal systems. We have witnessed this trend increasing since past five years. The actual reason of deploying an employee performance appraisal system is to unlock the true potential of the employees, enable them to perform at their best and achieve the highest organizational efficiency which drive growth and long term success.

Here are the characteristics of a good employee appraisal system:

Employee Appraisal System: Objectives

For any employee performance management strategy the most important point is to clearly define and communicate the objectives to the employees. An employee performance appraisal system does the same. It help management clearly define objectives which aligns with the organizational high-level goals and objectives. The employee performance appraisal system provide specialized tools which help management create objectives that are well-defined, aligned with mission, easy-to-understand, achievable in timely manner, and can be communicated to the employees. The employee can easily understand what success will look like, it help them understand what business/employer is expecting from them and what has to be done from their side to create valuable outcome. The employee appraisal system not only help making objectives quantifiable but also help managers to correlate the objectives with the employee’s skills, experience, capabilities, and resources they have along with a complete historic background of past performances which is a great way to set goals and expectations for future. The systematic approach and specialized tools of employee appraisal system increase the success rate.

Employee Appraisal System: Reliability

The trust and fairness is the main driver of the performance, if the employees think that the appraisal process is not fair or if the think the employee appraisal system is not reliable they will lose morale which can kill the performance and productivity. The employee appraisal system ensures transparency and fairness in the process and help gaining employees’ trust. The reliability is the key component to introduce transparency and gain employees’ trust. The employee appraisal system is a digital tool which offer intuitive features and empower both employees and the managers. It ensures that the performance metrics and data used for appraisal are valid, reliable and accurate. Usually the data is related to the employee’s progress toward the assigned goal, how much time it took them to accomplish the goal, and the status of the goal, all this data is stored in the system along with complete historic accomplishments of the questioned employee. The employee appraisal system can also provide contextual data which also help managers understand employees’ certain behavior and decisions they take during the performance cycle. Employees and managers trust the system when they have access to accurate and reliable data.

Employee Appraisal System: Standardization

Standardization is one of the most important characteristic of employee appraisal system. Obviously every business and organization is different from each other, even two businesses who operate in same domain, have same products and services and same targeted audience could have greatly different internal processes, procedures, strategies and methodologies. However, when it comes to employee appraisal the main difference occurs when the managers took two different employees to assess who belongs to a same employee set/class or category. For example if the assessment is required for two computer programmers who work on Native Application Development within the team, the assessment process, methods and criteria should be exactly the same for both of them. In manual practices and traditional appraisal methods, the managers have too much influence on the process hence the personal bias or emotions can hamper the quality of the assessments made by the same manager. The employee appraisal system completely remove this from equation, it standardize the evaluation criteria, performance metrics. Furthermore it provides a comprehensive framework which make employee fully aware of appraisal standards, process, and decisions hence everyone knows how their success is being evaluated. The standardization can greatly increase employee trust on the appraisal process.

Employee Appraisal System: Communication

The communication is the backbone of any performance optimization or workforce optimization campaign. For the employee appraisal the communication is most crucial component of the process. The employee appraisal system help businesses and organizations to enhance communication between the employees and managers using specialized tools and unconventional methods. The managers must communicate the goals, objectives, mission and vision and the criteria of appraisal to each and every individual employee. If the employee doesn’t know about the system or doesn’t have clear information about any process or step, they will lose trust form the appraisal process which can easily kill productivity. The employee appraisal system help integrating employee feedback at various stages, especially in goal setting process. When the employee and managers have shared vision about a particular goal the employees tend to perform well and their motivations and morale raises. The employee appraisal system strengthen the communication between the managers and the employees with more frequent feedbacks, discussions and interactions which help identifying and rectifying problems that employee might be facing and also help managers to correct course in order to ensure success by the end of the appraisal cycle.

Employee Appraisal System: Development

The employee development is most important aspect of any employee appraisal system. Businesses and organization always want to minimize the employee turnover rate. This is essential in order to develop a highly skilled and experienced workforce. But if your employee keep leaving the organization, then you must have to bear the additional training costs, onboarding costs, time wasted in integrating a new employee and obviously the delay in the work, sometimes when the employees from key position left they could hinder the performance of the entire team or department, especially in startups, SMEs and very specific businesses. Every employee wants to grow, everyone wants to improve their professional skills and every single employee wants to learn new things which add value and increase their worth as an employee. However, most of the time the employees are confused about selecting a right career path and the managers too rely on guessing while selecting a career path for an employee or designing a personal development plan .However, the employee appraisal system provides in-depth understanding of the employee performance, their capabilities, skills and ability to grow. That is why with the employee appraisal system managers can design more effective and attractive employee development plans which help them raise employee satisfaction and reduce the employee turnover.

Employee Appraisal System: Training

When it comes to training, businesses often focus on the employee training. However, the managers’ or evaluators’ training is also very important. The evaluator and managers who are conducting the appraisal should also be well-trained in principles and processes of the appraisal along with the employee appraisal system tools. The evaluators and managers should be trained and provided with sufficient knowledge which enable them to effectively design and conduct appraisals. Conducting appraisal interview is a very crucial part of employee appraisal process, the evaluator or manager must have proper training to be able to conduct those interviews. Apart from that the employee training is the core of the employee appraisal process. Every business or organization have such employees who just need a little training or polishing in order to unlock their true potential. But the question is how to identify those employees and how to design the training programs for them. The employee appraisal system provide insight to employee behavior, it provide highly accurate employee performance data and provide a greater understanding of employee’s skills and capabilities which are essential to design effective training programs. Effective training will help businesses achieve higher productivity and it also help gaining employee trust and loyalty.

Conclusion

Performance management, workforce optimization, employee appraisals, training programs and various such activities are a part of any growing organization. Every business wants to generate as much outcome as possible with the limited resources and inputs. High performing teams and employees are a great asset of a business and can provide a much needed competitive advantage as well as help boosting performance, profitability and growth of the business. That is why businesses conduct employee performance appraisals. However, when it comes to employee appraisals, it is a very sophisticated and crucial process. That is why businesses in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and all around the UAE uses specialized tools such as employee appraisal system in order to make the appraisal process more effective and efficient. The employee appraisal system helps setting and communicating goals and objectives, it improves communication, it increases transparency and help businesses gain employee trust and satisfaction. In this blog we have listed some key characteristics of employee appraisal system, if you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to design and implement and customized employee appraisal system for your business, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

July 5, 2023

Custom Software Development Progressive Web Apps – Beginner’s Guide

The technology is transforming our lives, whether it is personal or work, the technology is integrated to everything. For example, the laptop or smartphone you are using right now to read this article is a technology. The software is the epicenter of all modern days’ technologies, whether it is for personal use or for business use. Businesses in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi, or any other part of UAE knows the importance of technology, this is the reason why businesses are investing big time in technological solutions and resources. When it comes to software there are two major types, some of the software are installed locally and some are online, for example, you install Microsoft Office in your computer, and you use your ERP or Intranet system via online with help of a web browser. We have also witnessed huge increase in the use of internet over the past decade, and according to studies there are 6.8 Billion people around the globe who have access to the internet and out of that 4.32 Billion people are preferring to use their smartphones to accessing the internet. Those figures are staggering, and that is what compelled businesses to focus on the mobile technologies and solutions even more.

Custom Software Development Progressive Web Apps 1 — Custom Software Development Progressive Web Apps

It is this trend of using smartphone for accessing the internet and deeper integration of smartphones in our daily life which results in the rise of progressive web apps (PWAs). The smartphones are getting more powerful and offering more features than ever before. Above all they are more convenient to use and wit the rise of social media and communication apps, the smartphone usage is significantly increased. In UAE almost 99% of population have access to the internet and also uses mobile phones, which is evident of the much deeper penetration of smartphone in our society than one can even imagine. That is why businesses started focusing on building smartphone apps and leveraging them to grow their revenue. Google is a key player in the internet and also in smartphones with its operating system Android used by majority of smartphone manufacturers. Google introduced Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) in 2015 with an aim to combine the features of a webpage and a mobile application to offer a better user experience with more accessibility, user-friendliness and technological superiority. According to Google the progressive web apps (PWAs) are more reliable, engaging and fast than traditional mobile applications. In this blog we will discuss what a progressive web app is and how businesses can leverage its advantages to grow their revenue and improve their customer experience.

Custom Software Development Progressive Web Apps

What is a Progressive Web App (PWA)?

By definition a progressive web app or PWA is a software application which is built using traditional web technologies and platforms such as CSS, HTML, and JavaScript but it offers a user experience similar to a native mobile application. The greatest advantage of a progressive web app or PWA is that it is not confined to a specific platform, it means a single codebase can be used for multiple platforms and the custom software or application will behave like the native application for that platform. Similarly like the websites the progressive web apps (PWAs) are compatible with multiple platforms but offers additional features such as it can be installed on local storage, it can run in the background, it works offline and it can be integrated with the software and hardware features of the device as well. In this context it truly surpassed both websites and the native mobile applications and that is also one of the major reason of their popularity all around the world. Furthermore the progressive web apps (PWAs) help empowering businesses and enable them to accelerate their technological adaptation processes and the custom software development using progressive web apps is much more cost effective and scalable than any other traditional application building method.

How Progressive Web Apps (WPAs) are Different?

With the rise of internet and digital marketing businesses started investing in their websites. Later on the digital experience and digital services are introduced to offer convenience, freedom and easy accessibility for the customers. This was the time when the websites have started evolving into highly functional web apps offering a wide range of features and functionalities. With the introduction of JavaScript, Ajax and continuous progress in web development technologies and platforms the web apps have become very useful for both customers and businesses. However, in parallel the smartphones and mobile application development platforms were also improving. A stage came when the native mobile applications have proved their superiority over the web apps. However, both the native mobile applications and web apps have certain limitations and there were features that were exclusive to both platforms and were not available at the counterpart. Therefore a new technology have emerged as progressive web apps (PWAs) which enable businesses to leverage the best out of both native and web apps. With the development of advanced web building tools and platforms and progress of mobile web browsers combined with ever increasing power of smartphones paved the way for the progressive web apps. The progressive web apps are websites who behave and work like a mobile apps and that is what made them different.

Why Progressive Web Apps are Better than Web Apps and Native Mobile Apps?

The first thing that made progressive web apps (PWAs) better than websites/web apps and native mobile apps are the development method, tools and techniques. For example, here are the Programming Languages that are used to build these customized software, apps or web pages:

Websites/Web Apps: HTML, CSS and JavaScript
Native Apps – Apple iOS: Objective-C and Swift
Native Apps – Google Android: JavaScript
Progressive Web Apps or PWAs: HTML, CSS and JavaScript

That is a major difference between these. Furthermore the development approach is also different. The Websites and Web Apps are intended for web browsers, the Native Apps are developed to run on their exclusive platform. For example the native app which is developed for Apple iOS will not run on Google Android and vice versa. However, the progressive web apps (PWAs) are developed to be run in a browser and doesn’t depend on the platform. In case of native apps you will have to develop two different apps using different programing tools and languages, hence you will develop one app for Android and one for iOS. The biggest advantage of progressive web apps is that only one codebase can effectively run on both iOS and Android and you will have to develop just one application. Furthermore a progressive web app is responsive and it can work on any screen size/form factor without requiring any change or modification in its source code. These are some key advantages which make progressive web apps (PWAs) better than a traditional website/web app or native mobile applications.

Why Progressive Web Apps are Better than Web Apps and Native Mobile Apps?

Why Businesses Should Chose Progressive Web Apps for Custom Software Development?

Businesses in Dubai and all around the UAE knows the importance of digital customer experience, hence businesses keep investing in software solutions and digital experience to ensure they remain ahead of their competition and obtain maximum customer loyalty. The custom software development is far superior than opting for a stock or off-the-shelf software solution. It offers exclusivity, which means your competitors can never have what you have. Custom software development offers high security and totally aligned solutions for your needs which make them more effective. However, when a business needs to offer a digital service or digital interaction via website/web app or mobile app, they tend to prefer native mobile application development. This is majorly due to the fact that the web experience and mobile app experience are two different things. What businesses want to accomplish is a seamless customer experience while offering them great features. The progressive web app development is the ideal solution, it offer the best of both web apps and native mobile apps which make them superior. Here are some key advantages of building a progressive web app:

Fast and Responsive: The progressive web apps are considered very light weight, hence they are fast and react quickly when a user interacts. Furthermore the PWAs are responsive and automatically adjust according to the device, hence the user can use them on any screen size and form factor without compromising on user experience.
Engaging: The progressive web apps are very engaging and for an ordinary user it is hard to tell difference between a native app and PWA. The progressive web apps offer similar experience as that of a native mobile application.
Offer Great Features: A progressive web app not just offer similar user experience but it can also offer similar features which are offered through native apps. Such as adding icon on the home screen, sending push notifications, running in the background, working offline, integration with other systems, etc.
Offer Better Security: In the modern day and age the data protection and security are among the most desired features of any software solution or application. The progressive web apps use HTTPS and SSL protection to ensure high-level data protection and user security.
Very Lightweight: Another great feature of progressive web apps is that they are very lightweight. If we build a progressive web app of a native mobile app with similar design, features and everything it would still be very smaller than the native, in some cases it could be 90% smaller than its native counterpart. This also help boosting the performance and speed by many times.
Easy Management: The progressive web apps are much easier to manage, as they are very lightweight, and need less programming the management and maintenance is relatively easier. The upgrades and updates are also much easier, as the developer will only have to upgrade one codebase.
Better Connectivity: The progressive web apps offer better connectivity than the native mobile apps. PWAs can also work perfectly in low-connectivity areas and with slower networks, as they communicate with the server in a different way which also enables them to work offline.
Uses URI/Linkable: The progressive web apps have another great feature of using URIs to track the current state of the application. It means that when a user close the app and reopen it the app allow them to continue from where they had left.
SEO Friendly: Building native mobile apps and marketing them in itself is a very time and resource consuming task. However, a progressive web app is very SEO friendly and the search engine can easily read their content and index them which help simplifying the digital marketing for it.
Low Cost/Better ROI: The custom software development process is very simple with progressive web apps, the developer will have to work only on one codebase, which reduce their work and cost too. The PWAs can be updated/upgraded easily which also help minimizing the cost. They are progressive in nature hence doesn’t require compatibility/update whenever a new platform arrives, which also lowers the operational cost and increase the lifecycle. These features make progressive web apps one of the best ROI offering custom software development method.

Why Businesses Should Chose Progressive Web Apps for Custom Software Development?

These features and advantages of a progressive web app or PWA make them the ideal custom software development method for the modern days’ needs. It is a lot easier to build and launch them, the operational and upgrade cost is also low, which results in better ROI over the long term.

Conclusion

This blog is designed to provide a basic understanding of Progressive Web Apps, with the intent of making it accessible and understandable for beginners. I tried to keep my language simple and avoid complex technical concepts and terminologies. This beginner’s guide can help you understand the difference between PWAs, traditional web apps, and native mobile apps. Custom software development is a very important process for any business, because businesses only goes for customized software solutions when they need to solve a very unique problem or they are trying to gain superiority over their competition. The rapid rise of progressive web apps is indicating that it is the future of custom software development. The progressive web apps are gaining more momentum in MENA, Asia and North American regions as they offer superior functionality, great user experience and excellent ROI. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you need our help in your custom software development project or if you need a progressive web app solution for your business, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.