Wikipedia defines choreography as “The art of designing sequences of movements in which motion, form, or both are specified.” Imagine choreographing a ballet in which the performers are wearing blinders, unable to see their partners until each moves within their narrow fields of view. They have no advance peripheral clues that help them anticipate and time complex sequential interactions. Now imagine that you must direct these same performers amid ever-changing scenes, denying you and them the luxury of practicing the steps and timing of any specific sequence. Then, imagine that you, the director, are also wearing blinders, unable to see all of your performers at any given time. It would be very hard to direct the split-second timing required to optimize each sequence. You’d be one frustrated director. Worse, leaping ballerinas would be falling like wounded ducks!
Yet this is essentially the challenge faced 24/7 on flight lines worldwide (sans leaping ballerinas, of course). Without real-time visibility of all available personnel and assets, flight-line managers may as well be wearing blinders. Fortunately, there is a cost-effective solution to complete visibility: Zebra Technologies’ Real-Time Locating Systems (RTLS). Equipment fitted with Zebra’s RTLS solutions enable:
- Visibility of Equipment Location: Team members always know the location and status of all critical equipment – in real time!
- Efficiency of Equipment Movement: Knowing the real-time location of all assets allows teams to deploy the appropriate equipment that is closest to the required point of use. Travel time is reduced, and equipment wear is minimized.
- Prevention of Asset Losses: If equipment is removed from specified areas, managers can be alerted – immediately!
- Minimization of Maintenance Downtime: Knowing the real-time location and status of all equipment allows teams to avoid unnecessary pre-staging of equipment for scheduled maintenance. Historical RTLS data allows teams to better balance asset wear across their entire fleets.
- Informed Decisions: That historical RTLS data also allows teams to accurately anticipate and plan for peaks and valleys in use demand for every class of asset.
- Increased Mission Effectiveness: Eliminating time-wasting searches for equipment and reducing maintenance downtime helps keep team members focused and on task.
- Increased Job Satisfaction: Eliminating wasted effort can dramatically increase team members’ job satisfaction.
Zebra Technologies is an industry leader in RTLS technology, delivering the coordinated portfolios of barcode, RFID, GPS and sensor solutions required to bring real-time digital visibility to your most opaque flight-line challenges. If the ballerina’s partner mistimes his steps in the slightest, she may endure a painful spill. If your flight-line assets miss their cues by even minutes, the chain-reaction of delays can disrupt the movement of entire ballet companies, plus inconveniencing thousands of other customers. For more on Zebra Technologies’ flight-line tracking solutions, read their white paper: Best Practices in Flight Line Equipment Tracking.