What Are the Popular Trends in Facilities Management?

The trend is the way in which old ways are changed and new ways are formed so that processes and operations become more efficient.

When an organization seeks for saving expenses then effective facility management is very important. It can save a huge amount of money on maintenance.

Facility management is mainly done in sectors such as logistics, manufacturing, locomotive, transport, retail, and all those warehouses where inventory is filled! For organizations saving expenses is equally important as business growth.

What is Facility Management?

To ensure the accessibility, comfort, protection, and performance of a designed environment, building grounds, utilities, and real estate, facilities management is a must! It includes a variety of disciplines and services.

Facility management is the process of making sure that all the equipment, gadgets, etc. inside a building or facility works fine and ensuring everyone is safe and sound. It improves the quality of life as well as productivity. It can be divided into two basic areas:

Hard Facilities Management - Hard Facilities management deals with physical infrastructures, such as plumbing, elevators, heating, and cooling. The hard facility management ensures that an organization complies with the rules and regulations for the health and safety of each employee.

Soft Facilities Management - It is done to make office and organization more comfortable place. Most organizations believe it is not necessary but it is important. Soft facilities focus on individual tasks such as custodial services, lease accounting catering, maintenance of grounds.

Also Read: 5 Most Common Maintenance Issues & How to Overcome Them

Popular Trends for Effective Facility Management

1. Integrated Facility Management

It means all the tasks and activities are merged and performed by a single team. Integrated Facility management includes real estate planning, vendor management, space management, maintenance management, etc.

It means instead of having several service providers for several purposes, you get one integrated solution that will look after all your needs and requirement.

For better integration facility management organizations utilizes IoT (Internet of Things). This advanced technology can make your building smarter and efficient. They have sensors that keep you updated about the environment (office and infrastructure).

Advantages of integrated facility management:

• Single point of communication
• Can be cost-effective if used properly
• Efficient management
• Provide a better solution

Disadvantages of integrated facility management:

• Required high skilled & experienced team
• Organization dependent on the vendor
• Contract price increases every year

2. In-house Facility Management

When an organization does facility management by itself then the organization must provide training to employees before they start working. Otherwise, things can go wrong. Moreover, it makes you independent and you do not have to depend on other service organizations.

Facility management is an inevitable activity that all organizations have to perform. For example, if there is a problem with HVAC (Heating ventilation air conditioning) then it will impact the whole facility environment. So, equipment such as HVAC shall be working properly.

When the maintenance staff is yours then they can work quickly on the issue and resolve it sooner. You will not have to wait for the maintenance team to arrive! Most importantly you do not have to wait for equipment failure, at the first sign is noticed maintenance team can start working on the issue.

Advantages of In-house facility management:

• Independent
• Ad-hoc maintenance can be performed
• Organization do not have to wait for resources
• Opportunity for a maintenance worker to learn new skills

Disadvantages of In-house facility management:

• Skilled employees are required
• More maintenance staff needed
• Training is necessary

Also Read: How CMMS Reports Can Boost the Productivity of an Organization?

3. Outsourced Facility Management

Outsourcing facility management is helpful to organizations that already have a lot on their plate, who want to focus on other things such as business growth. Another benefit that you do not have to hire employees for facility management. Facility management will be the responsibility of the hired company. This means that you do not have to worry about the facility anymore!

Advantages of outsourcing facility management:

• Reduced expenses spiraling out
• Risk management
• Employees can do more productive work
• Better service to equipment

Disadvantages of outsourcing facility management:

• Lots of resources including employees are required
• Work needs to be done quickly
• The pressure to resolve quickly

These are the strategies for facility management. According to Statista,  “In that year 2017, the in-house facility management market in the U.S. amounted to just under 143 billion U.S. dollars.”

Conclusion

All these approaches are done for the main purpose that is cost management. When facility managers are aware of what is trending in the market then they can stay ahead of the curve! Facility management is important because infrastructure needs an update & renovation from time to time.

However, you can take care of your facility with the asset management software it is can play a crucial role in facility management as it takes the assistance of asset tracking techniques such as IoT.

Other than this it provides several other benefits as well. This software has the potential to take care of all your assets, equipment, and machines as well. Undoubtedly it can help you save a lot of expenses.

Also Read: What Are the Benefits of CMMS Mobile App in Business?

Frequently Asked Question (FAQs)

1. What is the facility?‍

A facility is a place where employees work and this place has lots of machines and equipment such as elevators, lift, HVAC, etc. This place needs to be maintained for employee safety.

2. What is the role of the facility manager?‍

The role of the facility manager is to keep the facility maintained inspecting the equipment and the whole facility to check if there is any type of issue or maintenance required! In short, the manager ensures that equipment is maintained and works efficiently & ensuring employee safety as well. Managers can make maintenance reports and required inventory or product.

3. What is the objective of facility management?‍

The objective of facility management is given below:
1. Providing a safe environment
2. Minimizing cost expenses
3. Ensuring everything in the facility is working properly
4. Avoid energy wastage