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Longford Exploration Services is a Vancouver, Canada-based mineral exploration consultancy that works with clients over the world to provide pre-field, targeting & research as well as project acquisition, project development, and field exploration services.
How did Grid & Longford Exploration collaboration come about?
Longford Exploration Services started working with Grid to digitize their Timesheet and Daily Reporting processes. However, within a few months, Grid was powering their entire sampling and surveying processes as well!
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Who's using Grid @ Longford Exploration?
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Longford Exploration Services used to rely on a number of independent software solutions that had to be patched together to achieve a somewhat workable solution. Grid combines and makes available all those separate functionalities in a single powerful and flexible tool:
Usage: Used for a variety of data collection efforts, especially timesheets and the digitization of paper logs created during sampling exercises.
Issues: Version control is difficult (with multiple versions of a spreadsheet file available, determining a single source of truth is difficult), spreadsheets are time consuming to create and update, needs Internet to work (in the case of Google Sheets).
Since MS Excel is not a collaborative tool, version control and synchronization of data was also a concern.
Usage: Longford Exploration Services used to conduct their Daily Progress Reports (DPRs) and Timesheet management using WhatsApp to receive individual employee reports which would then be collated by hand into spreadsheets.
Issues: WhatsApp chats need to be manually processed into a DPR format, are prone to errors, and don’t preserve a permanent record of all chats.
Using Grid’s companion mobile app, this process is now complete in a fraction of the time, and there’s no need for any manual collation!
Usage: Longford Exploration Services used paper logs to record the results of their sampling surveys, prior to Grid.
Issues: Paper logs take time to digitize into spreadsheets, handwriting and other factors can cause further delays. Paper is an impermanent record and usually the original submitted sample report is not filed, which means there is the possibility of loss of data if it was improperly / incorrectly transcribed.
Grid’s mobile app and its linked worksheets do away with the need for any paper logging, allowing users to enter data directly into the database via Grid’s mobile app, which works even in areas with low / no internet access.
Managing timesheets and Daily Project Reports (DPRs) is a key need for Longford Exploration Services, since they provide turnkey services to their clients for everything from surveying to drilling and tenement + mine management. This is the initial use case upon which Longford and Grid started their partnership.
Real time view into what areas and processes are occupying the most staff time, allowing process changes to be more efficient.
Technical Libraries based on various international standards are maintained and referenced from Grid for all programs. This ensures that any fields or values used are standard across the company, completely eliminating the need to sanitize the data that’s uploaded into the Grid application.
The ability to create, upload and edit a master sheet of reference terms and terminology which can be imported into any end user application created for Longford Explorations, thus saving time and effort,
Geologists use the Grid mobile application to collect and manage data on rocks, vegetation, outcrops, archeology etc. as a part of field work.
The Grid mobile application works completely offline, on any mobile device, enabling geologists to quickly add data en masse from the field, without expensive hardware, thus saving costs.
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Since Longford Exploration Services does a lot of work on behalf of clients who engage their services to run turnkey mapping, surveying and even drilling operations, coordinating the record-keeping of all time that is spent on these projects is critical. Since Grid comes with inbuilt time-tracking options, this is the function that Longford Exploration Services initially started using with Grid.
The data from this process was instrumental in Longford Exploration Services’ decision to expand their usage of Grid, since the time tracking process revealed that a bulk of the geologists’ time was spent filling out paper forms and sanitizing data, which could be eliminated via Grid
Over 45% time saved in projects executed on Grid
Regular time sheets and DPRs with more than 5000+ records
20+ worksheets for various activities
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Sampling is performed to ascertain the likely composition of mineral deposits underground, based on evidence on and beneath the surface of the Earth. Here’s how Grid helps Longford Exploration Services perform their various sampling processes:
Total Samples collected In Grid: 2000+
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The tailings process at Longford Exploration Services involves drilling into areas where mineral extraction has already taken place, and evaluating the remaining material (called tailings) for any secondary uses, or any ore or mineral content that might have been left behind. Core samples are extracted from much shallower drill holes and then analyzed for content. Grid speeds up this process immensely:
Tailings project with 700+ samples
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1. Increase the number of processes being powered by Grid.
2. Use the power of no code to develop custom worksheets that staff at Longford Explorations will use to manage and monitor all operations.
Grid’s biggest impact on Longford Exploration Services is the realization that they could save an enormous amount of time and gain a huge visibility into their operations, by using Grid to track and manage their operations.
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