Tenant / Building User Relationship Management

Tenant / Building User Relationship Management – FM Metric #1?

How well facility managers support their tenants and/or building uses with respect to their respective organizational missions is a critical performance metric for any real property owner.

Responsiveness, Quality, and Budgetary/Financial Performance represent key areas in which facility management professionals are judged.

The ability of real property owners, in their role as facility managers/stewards  to collaborate with and understand the needs of building users as well as services providers such as architects, engineers, and construction contractors  determines their effectiveness with respect to improved service delivery, mitigating risk, and overall life-cycle management of built structures.

The ability of an owner/facility manager to efficiently manage their numerous renovation, repair, and maintenance projects encountered on a daily basis, as well as strategically deal with capital renewal and deferred maintenance determines ultimate short and longer term success or failure.

Collaboration, transparency, mutual trust & respects, and shared goals are critical to the achievement of superior facility management outcomes.   Understanding user/tenant requirements is step one, and sharing this information with all project participants from concept through ongoing life-cycle management is necessary in order to improve overall satisfaction as well as return on financial investment.

Use of LEAN collaborative construction delivery is the single most important element in improving overall outcomes.  Whether adopting Job Order Contracting – JOC, for renovation, repair, and maintenance, or Integrated Project Delivery – IPD, for major new construction, the results of proper adoption and implementation with be a high number of quality projects delivered on-time and on-budget, to the satisfaction of all involved parties.

Most Owner (approximately 73%) either lack confidence, or are only somewhat confident of the satisfaction levels of their tenants/building users.  When combined with the fact that the construction sector as a whole remains highly unproductive versus virtually every other industry, the need for cultural and operational change is clear.

Isn’t it time to move beyond ad-hoc business procedures and workflows, lack of standardized information, and limited financial transparency?

LEAN FM and Construction practices deliver…

A focus upon outcomes…

Early and ongoing collaboration…

Financial transparency…

Mutual respect & trust…

Common goal & objectives…

Shared risk/reward…

More projects on-time & on-budget…

Higher quality…

Significant productivity gains…

Standardized data for information-based decision support…

BIM Strategy – Technology is not the issue – 2014 – Building life-cycle management

Forget 3D visualization,  life-cycle management of the built environment supported by digital technology, BIM, is all about  people, process, and competency-centric technologies.

If your organization is serious about BIM, here are some areas to consider!

– Change management

– Collaborative, efficient, integrated construction project delivery methods – integrated project delivery, IPD, job order contracting, JOC

– Life-cycle strategy vs. first-cost

– Leveraging best-practices, standards, ontologies

– Shared risk-reward

BIM For Facility Managment – FM

First and foremost “BIM” is the life-cycle management of the built environment supported by digital technology. 3D visualization tools, such as Revit, Archicad, Bentley, etc. represent only one of several technologies and business processes/competencies required for efficient life-cycle management of the built environment.

There are far more important considerations, such as CPMS, efficient project delivery methods such as IPD and JOC, CMMS, BAS, CAFM, Portfolio Management, Property Management, life-cycle costing,  etc. etc.

Leveraging a robust ontology and quantitatively measuring physical and functional building levels and actively managing capital reinvestment over time.. with a focus upon life-cycle costs and impacts vs. first costs are the most important considerations to a successful strategy.

BIM Basics 2014 – Building Information Modeling, Models, and Management

BIM is the life-cycle management of the built environment supported by technology.  As such, its ultimate purpose is to manage total cost of ownership (TCO).

Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)/Lifecycle Cost :Total cost of ownership (TCO) is a dollar per square foot value ($#/square foot) associated with a facility. It is a calculation of all facilities-specific costs (not including furnishings or non-facility specific equipment) divided by estimated lifespan of the building (30 or 50 years), and the total gross area. Facilities specific costs include all construction, preservation, maintenance, and operations costs. A strategic asset management practice that considers all costs of operations and maintenance, and other costs, in addition to acquisition costs. TCO, therefore includes the representation of the sum total of the present value of all direct, indirect, recurring and non-recurring costs incurred or estimated to be incurred in the design, development, production, operation, maintenance of an facility/structure/asset over its anticipated lifespan. (Inclusive of site/utilities, new construction, deferred maintenance, preventive/routine maintenance, renovation, compliance, capital renewal,and occupancy costs.) Again, note that land values are specifically excluded.

Is this an appropriate metric?  Are there others?

via http://www.4Clicks.com – Premier cost estimating and efficient project delivery software solutions for JOC, SABER, IDIQ, MATOC, SATOC, MACC, POCA, BOA, BOS … featuring an exclusively enhanced 400,000 line item RSMeans Cost Database, visual estimating/automatic quantity take off ( QTO), and collaborative contract/project/document management, all in one application. Our technology is currently serving over 85% of United States Air Force bases and rapidly growing numbers of other DOD and non-DOD (United States Army Corps of Engineers, Army, GSA, Homeland Security, VA..) federal departments/agencies, as well as state/county/local governments, colleges/universities, healthcare, and airports/transportation. RSMeans Strategic Partner

Construction Cost Estimating Software vs. Spreadsheets – State of the Nation 2012

While accurate, timely, and transparent cost estimating is critical to the success of any renovation, repair, sustainability, or new construction project, most construction cost estimators (over 55%) continue to rely primarily upon manual methods, hard copy documents, or electronic spreadsheets such as Microsoft Excel.

Lack of robust business processes, management practices, proper education and training, and some degree of technophobia endemic to our AECOO industry (Architecture, Engineering, Construction, Operations, Owner) may well be responsible for this “state of the nation”.   Negative impacts of ‘ad hoc’ methods and the failure to adopt robust construction delivery methods and associated supporting software include:  loss of business revenue and lower profit margins, poor productivity, spreadsheet and formula errors, lost information, and poor business decisions.

Construction estimating involves the estimating of material, labor, equipment, overhead/profit and contingencies. Spreadsheets, most commonly Microsoft Excel, are used by more estimators for this purpose (over 40%) than any method, although as many as ten (10) percent or more of construction cost estimators may still rely exclusively upon hand written estimates.  While spreadsheets are relatively easy to master and provide a means to create and report a construction cost estimate and or cost models, their benefit comes largely from their ability to partially relieve estimators of mundane calculations.  Accuracy, however, is not necessarily improved and productivity is not maximized.   For example, data entry remains tedious and prone to error, formula error are common, and collaboration and information sharing are limited. (Christofferson, Jay. “Estimating with Microsoft Excel”, Brigham Young University. Nickols, Robert Duane. “Construction Estimating Using Excel” Lexington Technical Institute, University of Kentucky. Caulkins, Jonathan P., et al. “Do Spreadsheet Errors Lead to Bad Decisions” Carnegie Mellon University)

Sophisticated, Cost estimating and Efficient Project Delivery Software systems are now available, and have been proven over the past decade.  Growing numbers of cost estimators now have the need to work with multiple projects, multiple estimates, and multiple contracts (IDIQ, JOC, SABER…) simultaneously and securely.   These newer Cost estimating and Efficient Project Delivery Software systems, such as 4Clicks Project Estimator, provide these benefits, and more.    A ‘short list’ of additional capabilities includes the ability to work with multiple cost books/guides/UPBs, track project status, automatically compare estimates, easily copy/paste, clone, and reuse estimates, integrated sophisticated visual estimating and quantity take-off (QTO) tools, including pattern search, automatically link specifications to estimates ….
Owners, Contractors, and AEs are moving to advanced cost estimating and management systems, and many oversight groups such are beginning to require their use.

The level of collaboration, transparency, and information re-use enabled by Cost Estimating and Efficient Project Delivery Software drives 15-25%+ reductions in procurement cycles, six to ten times faster estimating, reduce overall project times, as a significant reduction in change orders and the virtual elimination of contract related legal disputes.

White Paper – Cost Estimating Evolution