Faces of the Frontline: Scott and Charles from Sunrun share their Skedulo story
Sunrun is a leading solar energy provider in the United States. The company operates all across the country, helping home owners make the move to clean energy with the installation of high quality solar panels and batteries.
Scott is a Retail Sales Supervisor for the Northern Connecticut region. He has been with Sunrun for almost 5 years and started on the frontline as an in-store sales rep before accepting a management position 2 years ago.
Charles has been with Sunrun for 5 years and is a Retail Program Specialist on the retail channel partnership team. He oversees Sunrun’s sales managers to ensure effective scheduling of 800+ staff across hundreds of retail stores.
Life on the job before Skedulo
Charles and Scott both remember the days when scheduling Sunrun’s retail salesforce involved emails, spreadsheets and online forms.
“It felt like the movie A Beautiful Mind where you’re writing on a window wondering how to organize all these people,” remembers Charles. “With hundreds of different retailers, staff and schedules it’s a monster to make sure everyone will be in the right place at the right time.”
As a Retail Sales Supervisor, Scott manages a team of 12 sales reps who work between 15 retail stores.
“Before we started using Skedulo, scheduling was very stressful and time consuming. When you’re using spreadsheets and online forms to manage daily check-ins and checkouts it’s also a real struggle to ensure compliance without full visibility.”
“Managing a team of reps means I’m always putting out fires and handling scheduling issues each week, and this was a definite challenge before Skedulo.”
For Scott – who had the unique experience of using Skedulo as a sales rep and now as a manager – the change has been remarkable.
“Skedulo is a great tool compared to what we used in the past. Piecing together a consistent weekly schedule is a delicate balancing act, and Skedulo makes it easy to plan that out even as far as 3 months in advance.”
“Having that visibility on where everybody is at, and the ability to make quick adjustments, is fantastic. For example, a rep may say they have a transport issue and can’t make it to a store 40 minutes away but can get to a closer one. With Skedulo, I can change shifts on the fly and have it show up in real time on the rep’s mobiles which has been invaluable.”
Scott says transparency and accountability have been the biggest impacts of using Skedulo.
“Since Skedulo, there’s been greater transparency for myself as a manager and for staff in knowing where they need to be every day. Being a remotely managed organization – which is especially true in COVID – means I’m not in the field every second. I also can’t be at every store at the same time. So the biggest impact has been helping to drive accountability: ensuring reps are instore when they’re supposed to be and giving me visibility as a manager knowing they are there.”
“Before Skedulo I would spend 5 to 6 hours a week scheduling. Skedulo has shaved that in half. It’s given me so much time back.”
“On a personal level Skedulo gives me more time to do what I love, such as hiking or reading a good book. It’s taken my role closer to a 40 hour workweek which is great.”
