myfacilitiesnet

It’s often said that the devil is in the details. I’d like to propose a revision: The answer is in the details. The question, in this case, concerns the proliferation of smart technology for facilities. These days, smart technology isn’t just coming from building automation companies that have been talking about smart buildings for years, even though BAS vendors have improved their own usability and...

Some ideas are just born to be buzz words, and big data — or Big Data — is certainly one of them. While no one would deny that vastly more data is now available than ever before, the phrase “big data” is sometimes used in a way that suggests vast amounts of data exist in readily usable form. As facility managers are only too well aware, the quantity of data is no guarantee of its being helpful...

Testing and Inspections have become big business. Fire alarms are a highly regulated and closely watched part of our everyday lives. The National Fire Protection Association (nfpa.org), International Building Code (iccsafe.org) and countless other code writing bodies have always included the mandatory annual testing of fire alarm systems as a means of good and proper Life Safety living. In the latest NFPA National Fire...

Most companies have a process for reviewing the performance of employees, to gauge whether the individual is meeting the needs of the organization. Maybe it’s worth adding a twist to that end-of-the-year ritual: a beginning-of-the-year review of the organization, to see if it’s meeting the needs of the individual (i.e., you). Take one common topic for a review: productivity. The question for an individual...

In the wake of the most recent presidential election, now might not be the best time to put a lot of faith in polling data, but I think it’s worth noting that three broad indicators in our annual FM Pulse salary survey are all pointing in the same direction: up. The FM Pulse survey aims to do what its name suggests: take the pulse of the field of facility management. To do that, we ask not only about salaries...