What is the Future for Facilities Management?
The profession of Facilities Management grows stronger each day with more and more Corporate Boards and Senior Management Teams in public sector organisations realising how powerful the FM tool is. This applies to achieving maximum productivity and profit and therefore it is important to communicate and share Corporate Operating Plans with the Facilities Manager.
There is a reciprocal responsibility on the Facilities Manager to generate a Facilities Management Strategy that is complimentary to the Corporate Operating Plan. Whereas Surveyors will talk about the creation of a property strategy, Facilities Managers are in a far better position, because of their knowledge of the business operations within the organisation and the way each links to and affects others, to draw up comprehensive operational strategies that use all resources - staff, accommodation and property, equipment, floor plans and production flows.
The introduction of much bigger contracts through the use of Private Finance Initiative projects as those currently being created in the public sector and global contract arrangements as are being negotiated by the big multinational organisations have changed the face of traditional facilities management approaches. Although there are a few success stories there are also some alarming lessons to be learned from these approaches.
Not all outsourced arrangements are successful and to make sure we make them succeed in the future facilities management must become more professional.
There are a number of steps that must be taken, first to ensure there is a well-structured career path that will develop professionals with all the right skill sets, second to make absolutely sure that all providers, are properly qualified to deliver FM services through employing qualified facilities professionals, use honest pricing that reflects true costs and savings in comprehensive contract agreements and operate their contracts without extra charges. The third step is that all organisations adopt a committed approach to facilities by running their operations with a properly constructed strategy, a professional in-house facilities management team and through the use of performance specifications for all services whether in-house or contract.
A further important step that must be taken is that of ensuring that we achieve effective and comprehensive transfer of knowledge. An example that can be used to illustrate the importance of this factor is that of the organisation operating facilities.
Strong boardroom relations are being forged with the Facilities Management Teams in organisations and these will proliferate provided Facilities Managers continue to publicise their presence, success and contribution to the financial bottom line.
We believe more Private Finance Initiatives and bigger contract structures are inevitable although we do not believe this is necessarily conducive to better services nor improved productivity unless there are dramatic improvements to specifying, selection and management processes.
Major expansions of the main providers of FM services are continuing and this will ultimately create a vacuum in the marketplace with fewer small to medium sized providers bring available. This could be a disadvantage for the small to medium sized employers who are seeking to outsource in the future. We believe there is a significant opportunity for those aspiring to become small FM providers to start up successful businesses provided they are prepared to be ‘Best in Class’, the industry certainly does not need poor performers at present.
With the growth of the British Institute of Facilities Management, the strong developmental processes taking place in the training and education fields and the improved emphasis on FM in boardrooms there will be a promising future for the industry and those employed within it.