Facility Management

Facility management is an interdisciplinary field devoted to the coordination of space, infrastructure, people and organization,often associated with the administration of office blocks, arenas, schools, convention centers, shopping complexes, hospitals, hotels, etc. to as non-core functions.

Facility management has become highly competitive, subject to continuous innovation and development, under pressure to reduce costs and to add value to the core business of the client organisation where possible.

Facility management is now widely supported with training and professional qualifications often co-ordinated by Facility management institutes or associations.

Role of the Facilities Manager

The discipline of facility management and the role of facility managers in particular are evolving to the extent that many managers have to operate at two levels: strategic-tactical and operational.

It is the role of a facility manager to ensure corporate and regulatory compliance plus the proper operation of all aspects of a building to create an optimal, safe and cost effective environment for the occupants to function.

Strategic Asset Management

• Fire safety – The threat from fire carries one of the highest risk to loss of life, and the potential to damage or shut down a business.
• Security – To any organisation is necessary to protect the employees and the business and this often comes under the control of the facilities management department, in particular the maintenance of the hardware.

Maintenance, testing and inspection

• Cleaning – Cleaning is scheduled as a series of „periodic“ tasks: daily, weekly, monthly, etc.
• Operational – The Facilities Management department has responsibilities for the day to day running of the building, these tasks may be outsourced or carried out by directly employed staff. This is a policy issue, but due to the immediacy of the response required in many of the activities involved the Facilities Manager will need to keep tight control, often requiring daily reports or an escalation procedure.
• Tendering – The facilities management team will seek to periodically re-tender their contracts, or at the very least bench mark them to ensure they are getting value for money. For this to happen it is necessary to have an up to date list of equipment or assets to send out with the tenders.

Commercial property management

• Business continuity planning- All organisations should have in place a continuity plan so that in the event of a fire or major failure the business can recover quickly. In large organisations it may be that the staff move to another site that has been set up to model the existing operation. The Facilities Management Department would be one of the key players should it be necessary to move the business to a recovery site.
• Space allocation and changes

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