by Rebecca Walker — February 21, 2011—CAD Management Limited (CADM) a British software company, has expanded its range of Accordant add-on apps for smartphone platforms to include an occupancy survey tool. This shows phone users a graphical floor plan of the area around which they are standing and allows them to tap in observed occupancy (“empty”, “signs of life”, “occupied” etc).
For clients who do not use desk activity monitoring hardware or data from IT/phone networks, the only realistic choice is to “walk the floors” on a regular basis. With a clipboard and pencil this is not only error-prone and time consuming, it involves the additional chore of inputting raw data for analysis after the survey is complete.
Accordant users can set up survey details on-line including the floors (and types of desks) to be checked and allocate these to mobile users. When a user identifies their location via Indoor Positioning System (IPS) or simply using the built-in bar code app to scan a desk/location, the items around them that need checking are clearly displayed and can be altered using the phone.
Results are passed straight to the central database and available immediately with survey users shown a “score-card” displaying the number of desks surveyed against those yet to check. Managers can track progress in real time, and the Web site provides analysis used to process the data. The whole task becomes simpler, faster and much less error prone, according to the company.
CADM’s survey app is free of charge to Accordant users. For more information, see the Web site.
