In line with the function of facilities management (FM) as a profession that integrates people, places, and processes within the working environment, the professionals normally work to optimize workplace efficiency and productivity. They also work to improve the quality of life of the people and the productivity of the business environment.
In recent time, FM has become the cornerstone for optimizing workplace efficiency by ensuring safety and also augmenting overall business productivity and, for the professionals to carry out these services efficiently, they classify the services they carry out into hard and soft.
“To enable us to carry out these two services, we need a blend of managerial and technical skills,” Kinsley Opara, head of facility management at Ubosi Eleh & Co, revealed at the company’s monthly webinar that provides real estate market insights.
Opara explained that hard services refer to non-moveable physical assets that are essential to the business, including the physical structure, the plumbing system, and the HVAC system, which means the heating and air conditioning unit system, the elevators, the fire safety, lighting and electrical systems.
According to him, the soft services involve the management of people and the organizational landscape, adding that those catering services are carried out within the organization to ensure that the working environment is conducive and pleasant.
He cited example of soft services as security, health, waste management, space planning and pest control. “These are the services carried out by facility managers within the working environment to bring about a pleasant environment and pleasant working conditions for the people,” Opara said.
He stressed the need for a facilities management professional to have a blend of managerial and technical skills, listing those skills as leadership and strategic skills, communication skills, and financial management skills.
He added that the professional also needs skill to carry out project management, and stakeholder management which he needs because there are various interests making use of the facilities. “How you manage those biggest interests matters a lot as a facility manager,” he said
Continuing, Opara emphasized that the technical skills which the facility manager needs encompasses understanding the system, the building and its components, and the maintenance plan for carrying out the maintenance procedures and ensuring safety and compliance. It also includes the technology used to integrate the process.
The role of facility management in the organization centres on four pillars which make up the elements of facility management. The first of the pillars, according to Opara, is the people, explaining that as a facility manager, the priority is to ensure that the well-being of the people is put into consideration.
This, he said, could be achieved through effective communication and interpersonal relationship skills. “People management in facility management is one of the most difficult tasks among all the elements we manage in the facility. “Management of the people forms one of the basic priorities because one has to understand that facility management is a thankless job. But you should have it in mind as a facility manager, that the people form the basis for which your success is determined,” he advised.
“As a facility manager, you should ensure that you have managerial skills, looking at the people who come from different cultural backgrounds, they have different belief systems and you are trying to align them to standard in a facility.
You are trying to make them understand that irrespective of where you come from, irrespective of your status, when you come to this facility, this is the standard we are putting and that is where you need to align the interest. And this has to do more with managerial skills,” he noted.
“The second pillar of facility management is the working environment and how functional the environment is, and how conducive it is for people to leave their homes and come into the environment and spend their time there is a measure of the facility manager’s skill,” he said.
On the average, he noted, people work for a minimum of eight hours, arguing that if someone spends eight hours in a working environment, he should not go home sick because of the obsolete nature of the building
The facility manager has to ensure that the building and the components of the facilities are functional. And that they are conducive for the people to achieve the goal for which they come into the working environment.
The third pillar is the process which is the standard that the supervisory role the facility manager plays to ensure that his maintenance plan is well scheduled and proactive.
Technology is the last pillar and it is the tool or software used in optimizing the operations of facilities.
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