The Wireless Coordinator – The Unsung Hero

In all my years working with large wireless fleets there has always been one common denominator; the Wireless Coordinator.

The term Wireless Coordinator is more a job description than an actual position or job title. I have come across thousands of wireless coordinators that have all held titles such as receptionist, regional manager, accountant, IT support, telecom coordinator, or even a CIO. Their skill sets and qualifications range drastically from one organization to the next.

Over the last 20 years, this job function has evolved drastically. The wireless ecosystem is complicated and comes with many stakeholders. These stakeholders include wireless carriers, dealers, IT departments, finance departments, and decision makers. Essentially every single person that is involved in the phone call, email, systems update, and delivery of all wireless services. Think about it; there is a lot, and it is expensive! It is your wireless coordinator that needs to manage this all.
The Wireless Coordinator is required to manage the relationships with each of these stakeholders and manage process directly with them. No two request they receive is the same. They need to know who to engage and how to engage each stakeholder depending on the ask. A wireless coordinator is necessary to ensure that things get done and make sure that wireless cost does not get out of control. Without a wireless coordinator, your wireless costs will undoubtedly balloon.

To track all the wireless activity, the wireless coordinator will manage it differently depending on your fleet size...

For smaller wireless fleets in the 100 – 1000 range it is as simple as an excel spreadsheet. Everything has to flow through that one wireless coordinator to track each process. They tend to hold this excel spreadsheet quite tightly.

For wireless accounts over 1000 subscriptions, you are already sunk if you are still using excel. I say this because there are still a lot that use excel. Large organizations tend to deploy an IT ticketing system to track purchases and changes. They are rigid and hard to change because they manage much more the just wireless services. On top of that, the Wireless Coordinator still has to use vendor procurement and TEM portals. It is all desk swivel process, phones calls and emails. It is expensive and very complicated to maintain an enterprise sized ecosystem.

Large organizations need to take a hard look at the term “wireless coordinator.” No longer can they get away with delegating these duties to staff that tends to add to 2- 10% of their daily duties. There is just too much to know and too much to do. Paying experts that do this 100% of the time has a much better cost-benefit. A Wireless Coordinator in time will evolve into a true profession, no different than a doctor or plumber. We are only just getting started in this technological revolution and IoT is going to significantly increase your wireless fleet size. Somebody and something is going to have to track it all.