Behind the scenes with the ops team
The people and processes making wholesale networks as effortless as they should be
Your experience with us should be seamless. That’s exactly the point. But when everything runs smoothly, it’s easy to overlook the work and coordination that goes on behind the scenes.
It takes planning, precision and a dedicated team working across multiple functions to make every step feel effortless for our partners - and by extension, their customers.
One of the key people making this happen is Duane Smith, our Head of Field Operations. His team is responsible for the boots-on-the-ground work that connects our network to your customers and keeps everything running safely and securely, day in, day out.
We spoke to Duane to discuss what it takes to manage installations, rapid maintenance, and field support at scale, while maintaining the efficiency and quality our partners have come to expect.
How do you coordinate installations, maintenance, and support in the field?
It all starts with our Resource Manager, Mark Dillnutt. Once a work task is raised by our Service Delivery team, Mark uses our Diary Capacity Planning tool with Altlogic, to match jobs with available engineers. He considers skill set, location, and availability to schedule tasks efficiently.
For Rapid Response maintenance jobs, which often come with a four-hour SLA, we assign resources based on proximity to ensure fast, reliable service.
How do you ensure field teams are working safely and efficiently?
Our engineers use the Altlogic field app, which gives us real-time visibility on job progress and ETAs. Before anyone begins work on site, the app prompts key health and safety checks, including confirming they’ve reviewed their Risk Assessments and Method Statements.
We also run monthly EDP (Engineer Development Programme) checks. Our Field Operations Managers inspect vans, tools, PPE, and equipment to make sure everything’s compliant and safe.
Which tools are mission-critical for your team?
Two stand out. Altlogic, for real-time tracking, scheduling, and workflow updates. And SafetyCulture for site reporting, inspections, compliance checks, and analytics dashboards.
What’s it like managing such a dispersed team?
It definitely has its challenges, but again, Altlogic gives us excellent visibility. Our Field Ops Managers maintain daily contact with engineers across multiple channels, so support and communication are always there. They’re also closely in touch with our partner account team, so partners can be assured they’re getting proactive updates and get answers to any questions quickly.
What innovations have made the biggest impact recently?
The introduction of Safety Culture has been a real game changer for us. It allows us to interact with the Field workforce and lets them share job results in real time across various documents. The “As Built” document means we can send a finished document to the customer with real detail and images of the works that the engineer has undertaken. This tool also provides us with documentation and templates for all of our inspections and uploads the data and findings into an Analytical Dashboard that provides real data allowing us to manage improvements in the right direction - a great asset to Field Ops.
Keeping your customers seamlessly connected
Thanks to Duane and the Field Ops team, every installation or maintenance visit is carefully orchestrated to feel effortless for our partners, and their customers.
We provide hundreds of channel partners with access to our unique national wholesale fibre and rooftop wireless network, plus outsourced end-to-end network management, cyber security and unified communications. All competitively priced and expertly delivered by our in-house team of engineers. If you’d like to know more about the change we’re bringing to the channel and join our partner community, please get in touch.