It’s not just for picking anymore. Voice technology has evolved into a performance management and process optimization tool. When employees at Awana don their voice headsets and begin their daily shifts, they’re doing much more than simply filling orders. They are experiencing a mature technology that has evolved well beyond its roots in order picking. Awana is a direct distributor of educational materials and products for church youth groups, serving more than 11,200 churches representing over 100 denominations. The Chicago-area company began its voice journey 11 years ago when it installed the Jennifer voice system from Lucas Systems to direct its order selection activities. Things quickly snowballed from there. "We started with picking and immediately saw that the payback was so significant that we added other functions within six months," recalls Steve Hale, director of distribution. Those functions included receiving, putaway, and returns. Awana’s history with voice mirrors the way the application of these systems has evolved. While picking has always been the sweet spot for voice, many users have successfully expanded the technology into other areas, including replenishment, cycle counting, load building, and shipping. In fact, just about any warehouse function can be voice-enabled, often with little, if any, incremental expense. Once a company has made the initial investment in hardware and software, there is little cost to extend voice to these other tasks. Awana recently upgraded to new voice software that allows workers to run their mobile voice applications on smartphones and to combine scanning and device displays with voice, leveraging one of the many developments that have taken place in voice-directed technology in recent years. But as game-changing as this and other hardware-related advancements may be, perhaps the biggest change going on in voice is its newfound ability to optimize processes and manage worker performance. NOT […]