Facility Management Questions & Answers

4 Ways to Reduce Facility Costs With Lean Maintenance

"Lean" applies to many aspects of facility management. It aims to trim away the unnecessary portions of your usual activities. The result is a more cost-effective program without sacrificing quality.

What are some of the future innovations in facility management?

Here are some cool trends that are already being adopted by the leaders in the facility mangement industry - Virtual Reality, Robotics, Internet Of Things.

What is a Facility Condition Assessment?

How do you successfully unify a vendor maintenance team and your facility's maintenance team?

In the worst cases the maintenance efforts can be jeopardized as there can be a lot of differences in regard to "proper" maintenance practices

What are Hard and Soft Service Facilities Management?

The primary difference between hard and soft Facilities Management services in faciities is that hard services are non-negotiable.

What are the major trends in facility management?

Most of the big trends we see in facility management center around advances in technology. These trends include the following:

How do I get a job as a facility manager?

There are a few paths you could take to get a job as a facility manager. Management positions require familiarity with the industry.

What are the different types of maintenance costs for facilities?

Although measuring costs may be challenging, it’s important to understand the different categories so you have a good starting point.

How do you implement a facility renewal program?

Once you start thinking about all the equipment, machinery, and systems in every nook and cranny of your facility, it can be hard to know where to begin.

How many managers do I need for a group of 20 technicians?

Many factors affect the ideal manager-to-technician ratio. Here are some questions you can think about when making this decision for your organization.

Facility Management Companies: Should You Hire One?

When it comes to finding new customers, a facilities management company must approach the challenge like most other service providers.

What You Need to Know About ISO 41001 Certification and Compliance

ISO 41001:2018 covers facility management standards, and compliance with it can help your organization become more efficient and reliable.

Why do you need a facility conditions assessment?

5 Tips for Forklift Maintenance and Safety

The top five tips for maintaining your forklifts and overall safety include inspecting your forklifts on a daily basis, checking the tires, and more.

What are the best websites and blogs for facility management?

If you want to increase your facility management knowledge or skill base, the best blogs for you to read are these top five!

How do you approach maintenance planning and scheduling?

Before a maintenance plan is even implemented, it's critical to understand metrics: How much emergency/reactive maintenance, schedule compliance, etc

Should I measure wrench time at our facility?

If there are obstacles in the way of your technicians actually working with their tools and completing tasks, tracking wrench time can help you find them.

How do I make a plan for disaster recovery maintenance?

Create a disaster recovery maintenance plan with forethought, duplication of power sources, and preventive maintenance testing.

What are common maintenance programs needed for managing a large cemetery?

Cemetery maintenance is a very specific subset of the wider maintenance industry. It involves the general upkeep of cemeteries.

How does facilities management support compliance in health care facilities?

Facilities management can help health care facilities track data that affects the organization’s emergency preparedness, infection control, and more.

What is MRO (Maintenance Repairs and Operations)?

MRO stands for Maintenance, Repairs, and Operations. It refers to any equipment or process used to keep a facility running and avoid unplanned equipment downtime.

Why should I implement a remote monitoring system?

A remote monitoring system gives you multiple sets of eyes throughout your facility - improving productivity, reducing costs, higher quality data, etc.

What trends do I need to watch in healthcare that will affect maintenance?

ome of the top trends in healthcare today are mergers, micro-hospitals, rising costs, and infection concerns. All of these have implications for facilities maintenance departments.

How do I build a network as a maintenance professional?

The best way to build a network as a maintenance professional is to join a professional organization such as IFMA or APPA.

How do I achieve world-class planned maintenance percentage (PMP)?

Achieving world-class PMP requires reducing your need for reactive maintenance and improving your team’s ability to prevent equipment breakdowns.

What are five habits of great facility managers?

The best facilities managers are proactive, seek automation, study data regularly, work efficiently with outside vendors, and prioritize their workloads.

What is Facility Management?

How can my facility use infrared analysis?

Like many other parts of the predictive maintenance (PdM) toolkit, infrared analysis can be applied to any assets or pieces of equipment that give off heat.

What are the different career paths in facilities management?

Career paths in facilities management can be divided by discipline and by industry. Opportunities span across business, nonprofit, and government sectors.

What is GASB 34? Guide to GASB 34 Compliance | UpKeep

GASB 34 is a set of standards for state and local government financial reports. It was established by a private, non-profit organization.

What is production efficiency? Calculations & Tips]

Production efficiency is a useful guideline for facility managers to ensure that costs are optimized, without sacrificing the quality of products.

What are ADA Building Regulations?

ADA building regulations are a set of US standards for all areas of public life that prevent discrimination against people with disabilities.

What are the best ways to maximize the lifetime of my equipment?

If you want to maximize the use of your critical equipment, you have to be able to identify the areas with the most inefficiency.

How Electrical Maintenance Keeps Business Running

With the broad range of devices depending on electricity, electrical maintenance needs to be a mandatory part of your maintenance strategy.

What are some maintenance planning best practices?

Some of the best practices your maintenance planners should use include basing decisions on data, prioritizing tasks with reliability in mind, and more.

How Do I Improve Lean Reliability for My Facility?

Through a combination of record keeping, accountability, and workflow management, facilities managers can transform organizations with lean reliability. 

9 Best Online Facilities Management Courses

If you’re looking for a way to advance in your career at your own pace, consider signing up for one of these online facility management courses.

Which root cause analysis (RCA) method should I use?

Of the numerous RCA methods used, the one you choose depends on the depth and nature of the problem, as well as the number of contributing causes.

Maintenance Costs in Facilities Management

Justifying maintenance costs may be difficult, but it's doable if we can make stakeholders understand the end value of maintenance work.

How do I know if I'm scheduling enough work for my maintenance technicians?

If you’re not sure whether your technicians have enough to do, you’ll want to look at your schedule compliance, wrench time, and planner productivity.

What is the best way to approach deferred maintenance?

The best way to approach deferred maintenance is through rigorous planning. Deferred maintenance includes repairs and inspections that are backlogged.

How do I measure my facility's overall equipment efficiency (OEE)?

There are two ways to calculate OEE: a simple way and a more involved way. OEE is a measure of how much a facility makes during its planned productive time.

What are the best technical schools for facility management?

Several technical schools around the country offer certificates and degree programs for facility management. Here are the top ten.

What are OSHA Regulations?

OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) regulations are a set of standards that, when followed, create a safe and healthy workplace for all.

What are the best ways to document my maintenance process to avoid siloed knowledge

Siloed knowledge is the knowledge that is passed around a facility by word of mouth alone.This can be fixed by implementing better documentation practices.

What are the qualities of an effective maintenance planner?

An effective maintenance planner has clear communication skills, a sound knowledge of maintenance and workflow processes, and strong technology skills.

How do I reduce my facilities need for maintenance rework?

To reduce the amount of reworked maintenance you’re redoing, you’d first have to look at what’s causing it such as skills gaps or poor practices.

How do I organize my parts storeroom?

Maintenance managers must organize facility storerooms using the 5S methodology or a similar system that allows parts to be found quickly and efficiently.

How can effective safety management actually save money?

 For the employer, effective safety management can be seen as an investment to increase productivity and reduce accidents and injuries.

How do you justify the cost of purchasing a new CMMS system?

Justifying the cost of purchasing a new CMMS system can be done by comparing the value that the CMMS adds to the company, to the total cost of the CMMS system.

What's the difference between a maintenance work request and a work order?

When a work request is submitted, management determines whether to approve them. Some of the considerations that may come up when approving include:

What are the best ways to prioritize and organize work orders?

Prioritize based on: [1] Criticality, or how important it is to your process [2] Risks of delaying work, such as safety hazards [3] Available resources

What is a standing work order?

A standing work order is a “work order opened for a specific period of time for work that is not associated with a specific piece of equipment.”

4 Ways to improve productivity for maintenance teams

In most cases, poor productivity is the result of subpar planning practices. Start by improving your maintenance planning.

How do I best structure my maintenance weekly team meetings?

Weekly maintenance meetings must have clear goals and an agenda going in, and assigned, measurable action items coming out. They should be short!

How much should I be budgeting on maintenance at my facility?

There are a few different ways to estimate maintenance budgeting - replacement value of the facility and the maintenance cost.

What Is On-Demand Facilities Management and What Role Can It Play?

On-demand facilities management is focused on delivering facilities management support and services in temporary and unusual circumstances

How much should I be spending on training for my maintenance team?

If you’re looking for a world-class benchmark, you can shoot for 4 percent of your total labor costs, which can be dedicated to training.

What are the top 4 construction companies that prioritize preventive maintenance?

The top four construction companies that prioritize preventive maintenance are EMCOR Group, Inc., Bechtel Corporation, Jacobs Engineering Group, and Skanska

How viable is facility management as a career choice?

The answer to this question is a resounding, “YES!” The facility management field is changing rapidly, creating amazing opportunities for young people

How do you hire and interview maintenance technicians?

You’ll want to find individuals who have a combination of technical skills, a desire to learn and grow, and the ability to work on a team.

How do you retain excellent technicians?

Keeping a talented team of maintenance technicians requires a positive work environment and a culture focused on meaningful training and development.

What's the best way to hold a 1-1 for my maintenance team?

Have some standing agenda items such as progress toward KPIs or goals, career development progress, issues and problems, and so forth.

What is facility management sustainability and why care about it?

As the government implements a growing number of environmentally focused policies and regulations, facility managers must stand up and take notice.

What are the different procurement methods in construction?

The five different procurement methods in construction are contracting, design, construction management, joint venture, and private financing

What are the best KPIs to track the performance of my maintenance team?

With the multiple KPIs and measures that can be measured,  check that you have some in place to address the performance of the maintenance team.

What questions do I ask a maintenance technician during an interview?

The questions you ask maintenance technicians during hiring interviews should cover these skill sets: Technical knowledge of mechanical principles

How do I reduce facility operating costs?

Reduce facility operating costs by looking at seemingly mundane things like lighting, heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) systems, and more.

What are some tips for balancing maintenance workload at my facility?

Approaching scheduling from a holistic point of view, where you consider all aspects of the technician and task, is vital to balancing maintenance workload.

Maintenance Training | Industrial & Facilities Maintenance

Training is a huge part of how technicians perform their work, and without sufficient skills training, a facility can be stuck in permanent reactive mode

What's an MOC (management of change) and what do I use it for?

Management of change (MOC) is a policy companies use to manage health, safety or risks when facilities, employees, or operations are changed.

What are the best books to read for facility managers?

Here are my top choices for comprehensive and well-researched books on maintenance, reliability, and facility management.

When is it time to create a night shift for my maintenance team?

The type of business you’re in will determine how heavily you need to staff that night shift on a regular basis. Here are some examples:

How to Manage Facility Maintenance Contracts

Although contract or file management software systems are available on the market today, they might not be the best solution.

What is the difference between facility management and facility maintenance?

Management typically means organizing, or coordinating something from a top level. Maintenance involves the caring for and upkeep of a property, or equipment.

What questions should I ask a facility manager during an interview?

Asking the right questions during the interview process can also help you determine fit. Here are some types of questions to consider:

Who are the thought leaders in reliability centered maintenance?

In our corner of the world, several stand-out individuals have made significant strides in reliability-centered maintenance.

How much should you spend on maintenance for your facility?

Maintenance costs for an apartment complex will be much different than maintenance requirements for a high-production manufacturing facility.

How can you tell if your facility manager is doing a good job?

A facility manager should have the ability to listen and communicate well, to challenge the status quo and foster continuous improvement.

How does facility management work in the retail industry?

If you’re in the retail industry, facilities management will be focused on keeping customer-facing areas up to par.

How many technicians are needed per unit in apartment management?

If you’re creating your initial staff for a new apartment, I suggest starting with one technician per 150 to 200 units in addition to your manager.

Should I use a contracted facility maintenance company or hire onsite staff?

Here are some tips to help you strike the right balance between onsite maintenance staff and outside contractors for your own organization.

What is the daily routine of a facility maintenance manager?

A day in the life of a facility maintenance manager include meetings, planning, and problem solving. Learn more in this Q&A.

What does a facility maintenance technician do?

Facilities maintenance technicians help keep a building, plant, or complex up and running smoothly. Learn more in this Q&A.

How many technicians do I need per square foot of space?

Facilities employ a median of one full time maintenance worker per 50,000 square feet. Learn more in this Q&A. Learn more here!

What are the biggest mistakes facility managers make?

The three biggest mistakes facility managers make are related to being overfocused on budget, not listening to employees, and inventory maitenance.

How Can My Plant Improve Equipment Reliability?

Codes and policies can dramatically improve a broken run-to-failure approach, to the point where equipment reliability can become a reality. 

Checking for Fever: A Comprehensive Guide to Implementing a Temperature Screening System

Fever screening with infrared thermography isn’t new, and it’s an effective method. With so many options available, it's important to know the ins and outs.

What are the top 4 construction companies that prioritize preventive maintenance?

The top four construction companies that prioritize preventive maintenance are EMCOR Group, Inc., Bechtel Corporation, Jacobs Engineering Group, and Skanska

How do I make a plan for disaster recovery maintenance?

Create a disaster recovery maintenance plan with forethought, duplication of power sources, and preventive maintenance testing.

What trends do I need to watch in healthcare that will affect maintenance?

ome of the top trends in healthcare today are mergers, micro-hospitals, rising costs, and infection concerns. All of these have implications for facilities maintenance departments.