The Drive For FM Efficiency All Comes Down To Better Data
The key to helping FM’s improve efficiency often lies within data. In this article, Tiffany Argent, Customer Engagement Executive at SafetyCulture, talks about the importance of collecting and standardising data to help drive efficiencies.
Ensuring buildings and facilities are safe, functional, and comfortable for occupants can be extremely challenging. The upkeep of facilities involves a significant amount of resources, and for most FM bosses, there is one thing that - if achieved - can help alleviate all these challenges: improved efficiency.
Time efficiency, financial efficiencies, and energy efficiency are all critical to the future success of FM businesses - no matter their sector, region, or size. So how should you go about chasing these efficiencies? In my opinion, improving requires one thing above all else: good data.
Standardisation Through Innovation
The number of facilities businesses with good visibility of data is still not where it should be - for many reasons, including the geographical distance between buildings under one facilities manager, and the lack of investment in the right technologies. However, what FM bosses need more than anything is data standardisation to make well-informed strategic decisions.
Unfortunately, the majority of facilities managers don’t have the necessary data visibility to begin with. If you can’t see how each site operates, then you cannot standardise across each site.
The right technology can help FM managers get their hands on better data – and help empower their teams, contractors and suppliers to work smarter, It can also help ensure better integration between sites and increase the level of overall control an FM has.
Mobile-first operations platforms, for example, can empower workers by giving them a quick and convenient way to file reports, process checklists, and generally do their job more effectively, without the burden of paperwork. Cleaning audits and maintenance checks are two examples, whereby workers can quickly tick off sub-tasks as they go, which then automatically updates facility teams.
Managers are then able to pull in this data from workers across buildings, sites, and estates, helping them to see critical data in an instant. This might include how many audits have been performed and when, which issues have surfaced and where, and even the data they need to help teams come up with improvement actions and robust action plans on the spot. This level of insight from on-the-job data means that facilities leaders can have eyes and ears on their clients’ sites at all times.
The company I work for has even recently gone as far as to add functionality to our mobile-first platform and enable FM providers to add their clients into the system too, so that both FMs and clients can have live access to data. This won’t be for everyone, but it means that rather than relying on exporting data ad-hoc at the client’s request, facilities managers can enable live (and limited) visibility to clients.
By giving facilities managers and their clients the transparency they need and the real-time, easy-access view of how things are running, decisions can be made on the fly, for the good of the business and their clients’ businesses - no matter what challenges arise.
Driving Long-Term Efficiency
Instant updates on issues are critical to ensuring facilities are well-maintained and operating as effectively as possible, which can then prevent further problems or disruptions from occurring. In the current environment, where labour shortages are rife and economic challenges are constantly evolving, it’s critical that FM bosses have as much control as possible.
Optimised facilities management not only improves processes and workflows but can also help to ensure employees and occupants are happy and healthy, which is vital to business continuity and success.
FM businesses will have no choice but to start embracing innovative technologies - and mobile-first operations platforms are often the most effective place to start.
