DiCAN continues providing top-notch customer experiences through 20 years of growth
Even with focused expansion in recent years, DiCAN has never lost sight of the guiding principles that created the business more than 20 years ago. Their focus remains firmly set on providing a topnotch customer experience – every time. In fact, strong relationships are at the heart of everything they do.
“If it’s not right for the customer it’s not right for us,” confirms founding director Diane Shirchenko. “We place importance on listening and collaborating with our customers. We don’t just sell them products; we take the time to invest in their success or solutions.”
Their commitment encourages clients to consult with DiCAN on their fleet safety decisions and then collaborate to find acceptable solutions for unacceptable challenges, many of which could have serious and possibly life-threatening consequences.
Michael and Diane Shirchenko, in partnership with Diane’s late brother John started DiCAN capitalizing on their varied experiences in different marketplace verticals, discovering and focusing on customer needs and relationships. “It’s our commitment to always being there for partners and customers, working through solutions based on product integrity and trust consistently – in the boardroom, on the tradeshow floor, even in the vehicle service bay. With this footprint we hope to stand out,” Diane Shirchenko said. “Working together with customers at all levels is key to our success and it’s a commitment from everyone here – management to technicians in the shop, fleet supervisors to equipment operators in the field,” Shirchenko explained. Their business continues to grow by establishing more private enterprise customers, service contractors, and through expansion into new industry sectors.
While COVID-19 has impacted businesses with delays in some sectors, Shirchenko says these delays provide time to continually develop our tools and ability to serve. “It may look like summer has arrived, but winter operations planning is always a consideration,” Shirchenko said, adding that the COVID-19 pandemic may have strengthened the need for more transparency and accountability with government spending at all levels.
For many years, the founding directors sold products by day and provided service/installations by afternoon and night, allowing the company to build market trust and accountability. “When you can count on a team to stand by you, from problem to best practice solutions, customers grow to value and depend on our partnership,” Shirchenko said.
At the same time, education and networking are still major part of industry – and a strong focus for DiCAN. The need for transparency and accountability in government and private-sector companies drives many decisions and that means photos and data driven-info are needed for reliable and consistent claims support, proof of work competition.
DiCAN is proud of its product portfolio which offers value and innovation. In addition to their own patented products, they partner with world-recognized brands offering high quality solutions for collision avoidance and fleet management, including camera systems, telematics, and safety alarms.
For example, DiCAN’s Good to Go™ Extendable Component Warning System is currently “the most innovative technology available in the marketplace to continuously monitor and alert unsafe position of any vehicle’s extendable component, such as a raised dump truck box, utility vehicle lift bucket, even the front forks on a garbage truck” explains Michael Shirchenko, president and technical director. He goes on to say, “essentially, if it sticks out from a vehicle our Good to Go device can alarm it. The device is constantly monitoring, so if it’s unsafe to proceed, the operator inside the cab will be instantly alerted with lights and sounds, it can even send a real-time alert to fleet operations back at the office.”
DiCAN has been providing the construction industry with box-up alarms for almost ten years. The proprietary smart-software inside Good to Go’s™ patent-protected technology is configured to signal when armed components are not safety in their home positions.
When a truck’s dump box is raised, the two-stage light and sound alarm is configured to emit pulsed or continuous signals relative to a vehicle’s road speed – possibly preventing disasters like the Skyway Bridge crash in July 2014. In that incident, the raised box of a red dump truck smashed into an overhead truss and construction scaffolding on the top of the bridge about five metres above the road. It cost the province over $1.2 million and required eight months to repair – accidents like this can be avoided if such vehicles are equipped with a Good to Go™ system.
The future is bright for DiCAN and its fleet safety technology, as provinces recognize the importance of collision avoidance warning systems. Quebec is the first province to make such systems mandatory for raised bed vehicles with revisions to the province’s Highway Safety Code last April.
“As the world gets busier and more distracted by technology, safety has come to the forefront of Vision Zero mandates,” Shirchenko concluded “Technology and automation can make it easier for fleet supervisors/owners to plan and manage their operations.”
As published in the Ontario Construction News - May 27, 2020
