3 Best Facility Management Software with Buyers Guide

EZOfficeInventory

Enables track maintenance costs Schedule services Manage vendors & Customize alerts for greater control Mobile app to Scan QR Code Barcode labels Full histories

Limble CMMS

Manufacturing Facility Equipment Hospitality Small Businesses Fleet Property Building Churches Non-Profits School Gym Simple-to-use Mobile first maintenance app

The Service Program

Proactive approach in keeping customer informed add-on Service Software Dispatch Routing, Work order tracking Maintenance schedules Customer call & GPS Tracking

Facility Management Software

Facility management software provides organizations plan and efficiently execute facility management processes like repairing & maintenance programs. It records all the layouts, assets, and employees to facilitate a group of functions like:

  1. Asset management
  2. Equipment information tracking
  3. Recurring task management
  4. Work order fulfillment
  5. Room scheduling
  6. Vendor management
  7. Maintenance workflow automation
  8. Maintenance cost management

Four Main Functions of Facilities Management

The larger scope of facilities management makes it a hard position to define. Sales Manager is directly responsible for managing the performance of sales department, the functions of facilities management go to the limit of “managing facilities.” 

To understand what a facility manager does,  and responsibility, and effect they have on a company, it is best to check out the scope of work. The four main pillars of facilities management are People, Processes, Building, and Technology.

Supporting people

The foremost objective of a facility manager is creating an accommodating work environment for employees. This serves many broader goals, including attracting and retaining top talent, improving efficiency and productivity, and creating a positive workplace culture. Facility managers provide employee support in many ways, including:

  1. Coordinating desk arrangements
  2. Managing employee directories
  3. Facilitating moves and space utilization
  4. Handling emergency planning

Facility managers serve as a bridge between place of work and working employees in the facility. Whenever questions of safety, accommodation, or comfort come up, it is the facility manager who deals with them.

Establishing processes

Establishing processes to provide order to the workplace. Order creation is a system of expectations, which breeds organization that positively helps how the people utilize the workplace. The workplace works on a many side-by-side running of processes, including:

  1. Submitting a work order request
  2. Reserving space within the facility
  3. Checking in guests and visitors
  4. Emergency action planning

Facility managers works as in dual role of identifying governance strategies and dealing with processes to cover them. Whenever a new scenario arises, it’s the facility manager to make peace with the found chaos and building a framework for handling that strategically in the future.

Developing processes is the range of facility management that also expands its position. New businesses involve different departments, employees, assets, fixtures, and spaces which connect with each other in various ways.

Facilities upkeep and improvement

The most robust scope is for facility managers. It involves maintaining the building, inculcating partnerships, future planning, and asset management.

Range of responsibilities are:

  1. Finding and maintaining vendor contracts
  2. Repair, maintenance, and building improvement
  3. Workplace cleaning and décor
  4. On- and off-site property management

If it has to do with the physical positioning in the building, it remains within the facilities manager’s sphere of works. Facilities are the second largest expense behind the workforce—it’s the job of a facility manager to turn the workplace into a competitive advantage, instead of a cost center. It’s about ensuring facilities meet the needs of the people using them.

Technology integration

The need for facilities is very much required for managers to understand and use technology. Workplace management systems aggregate data, which drives crucial decisions about how to run the business and shape the workplace. Identifying and implementing the right technology is a chief responsibility of facility managers.

Integrating physical technology typically falls on the IT department. However, facilities managers are the first and last word on how they’re selected, used, and leveraged. Some examples of what this looks like in a modern setting include:

  1. Researching IoT devices based on data collection needs
  2. Integrating IoT devices into everyday facilities processes
  3. Determining the cost, ROI, and advantage of smart technologies
  4. Using aggregated data to better understand the workplace
  5. Using an Integrated Workplace Management System 

The facility managers can collect and analyze the data.

It’s important to note that not all office tech relies on data collection. Access control systems support safety, while automation tech streamlines processes. And while there’s a data component to any networked device or software, the true benefit of most tech is in its function. It’s up to facility managers to understand and leverage this function for optimal ROI.

Putting it all together for facilities management

Facility managers support workers directly and indirectly. They establish processes for order and organization. They’re charged with upkeep and improvement of the facilities themselves. They make complex integrations to coordinated data for success.

When managers put these four functions together, they paint a canvas of what facility managers really do. Broadly commenting on the idea, their focus is on optimizing the workplace to help each and every aspect of the company it touches. But on a in-depth level, it’s about providing the business a firm foundation for success.

Benefits of Facility Management Software

Decreases downtime and increases operations: Facility management software provides tracking of past, present, and future maintenance services. This all-round approach to supervising  the maintenance workflow reduces asset downtime and optimizes operations. 

Affirms regulatory compliance: There are a range of multiple regulations that apply to facilities in every industry. The software provides companies to comply with regulations by allowing processes, preserving supporting documents, creating reports, and positive adherence to regulations.

Decreases document hassles: Paper-based approaches are difficult to organize because of the bulk of physical documents created; the huge volume of manual work needed to track data on physical documents also enhances the chances for human error. Facility management software eliminates or significantly reduces the need for physical documents to capture and report data.

Centralizes operations: With a centralized system, managers can supervise tasks of whole of the facility from one place. A centralized system brings transparency into processes which saves time, increases productivity, and decreases costs through best possible equipment use and futuristic investment decisions.

Features of Facility Management Software

Maintenance management: Creating and tracking work orders for maintenance activities. Planning  maintenance operations to increase the longevity of physical assets.

Reporting: Recording and reporting audit reports in the form of statistical data, visual charts, or standard text content.

Space management: Supervising, controlling, and managing the occupancy of physical space in facility.

Equipment management: Monitoring and maintaining equipment; reallocating equipment as per the requirements in the facility.

Facility scheduling: Scheduling events or reserving venues and assets in the facilities.

Fixed asset management: Tracking details of fixed assets with a centralized database.

Incident management: Identifying and resolving service/equipment failures or disruptions.

Preventive maintenance: Planning preemptive maintenance, avoiding equipment breakdown or unscheduled downtime.

Vendor management: Tracking and storing all vendor-related information like contacts and services/products offered.

Work order management: Creating work orders and tracking the status to completion.

Cost of Facility Management Software

Most facility management software products are priced on a per-month, per-user basis and can be divided into three pricing tiers based on their starting price. A professional product is priced higher and have additional features like advanced cost tracking, advanced time tracking, vendor portals, account management, and custom reports.

Considerations while purchasing Facility Management Software

Mobile compatibility: Mobility has become an indispensable part of day-to-day lives, not just for personal use but for business needs as well. Mobile-ready facility management software provides managers get into the systems using mobile phones and permits teams to stay connected when traveling. It offers team members in communicating, sharing data, and staying updated on different developments in work order processing from any location.

Coordinating capabilities and associated cost: For better visibility and efficiency, the software users are purchasing should be able to integrate with their existing tools like building management or computer-aided design (CAD) systems. While some sellers might offer some or all integration options for free, others may charge for the application programming interfaces (APIs) required for integration.

Facility Management Software Trends

The Internet of Things (IoT) is bringing business automation to facility management: Organizations are increasingly using internet-connected devices to support and streamline operations. This is bringing automation into commercial buildings, eliminating manual efforts for tasks like monitoring temperature levels, security alarms, and lights.

Drones are taking flight to assess facilities: Drones are unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) that can offer facility owners and operators monitor asset conditions. Roof and exterior inspections of high-rise buildings can be done remotely by camera-enabled drones. Artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms can also be provided to program drones to fly autonomously on predefined paths.

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