Barriers to participationEnabling technology shiftDisconnected workflows
In 2010 a painter, house cleaner or lawn-care owner with a few workers quoted, scheduled and billed jobs with paper forms, carbon copies, spreadsheets, word-processor invoice templates and a browser full of map tabs JB8 JB10. The owner did the field work by day and the office work at night, with no staff to share it JB8 JB10. Field-service software existed for large enterprises such as utilities, expensive and slow to configure; little was made for a 10- or 15-person landscaping or plumbing company JB7 JB10. Smartphones were spreading fast: by May 2011, 35% of American adults owned one, so a crew member could carry a connected device to the job JB41. For most of these owners the question was not which system to buy but whether to leave paper at all.