2011-1-13 FM World

THE MAGAZINE FOR THE BRITISH INSTITUTE OF FACILITIES MANAGEMENT | 13 JANUARY 2011

FMWorld www.fm-world.co.uk

OFFICES:

Imagining the workspace of tomorrow SECURITY:

Reshaping the function to add value

How Yell’s new site comprises the best in FM thinking

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VOL 8 ISSUE 1 13 JANUARY 2011

CONTENTS

7 | Water crisis in NI

14 | Workplace Trends report

20 | Inside the Yell HQ

NEWS

OPINION

FEATURES

6 Government attacks PFI spending during credit crisis in new report 7 Age of austerity blamed for the decline in the office canteen 8 Security challenge for redesign of Bristol justice centre 9 FM 100 poll: how widespread is the practice of pay-to-play 10 Business news: Councils under pressure to innovate financially ahead of ‘Localism’ bill 12 Investigating the fuzzy practice of pay-to-play in FM by Dave Arminas 14 A report from the latest Workplace Trends conference by Cathy Hayward

18 Diary of a facilities manager: David Walker’s regular look at the daily challenges he faces in his working life 19 Five minutes with Karyn Lord, FM of Crown Bevcan 50 Felicity Messing

MONITOR

40 | BIFM news

20

Yell: The directory service provider’s new One Reading Central premises is a chocolate box of contemporary office design, finds Cathy Hayward

24

The security code: rethinking the security function adds value to a business, offering a key competitive edge in tough times, says Paul Harvey

28

Reimagining the Office: Adryan Bell visits the future of work to imagine how our workspaces will continue to shape our work patterns and vice versa

32 Legal: Oil spill legislation 35 Technical: Microwave radiation and Wi-Fi 36 How to: fit the VAT rise into your catering budget 38 Careers: competencybased interviews

REGULARS 40 BIFM news 44 Diary of events 45 People & jobs 46 Appointments

24

For exclusive online content including blogs, videos and daily news updates

Keeping safe The future of security

visit fm-world.co.uk FM World Jobs – the best place to find FM career opportunities online COVER IMAGE: Pete Searle

visit fm-world.co.uk/jobs FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 03

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Redactive Publishing Ltd 17 Britton Street, London EC1M 5TP 020 7880 6200 www.fm-world.co.uk EDITORIAL Tel: 020 7880 6229 email: editorial@fm-world.co.uk editor: Cathy Hayward ⁄ news editors: Louisa Roberts and David Arminas ⁄ sub editor: James Richards ⁄ assistant editor: Natalie Li ⁄art director: Mark Parry ⁄ art editor: Daniel Swainsbury ⁄ picture editor: Sam Kesteven

CATHY HAYWARD EDITOR COMMENT

LEADER

ADVERTISING AND MARKETING recruitment sales: 020 7880 6245 display sales: 020 7880 8543 email: sales@fm-world.co.uk display sales executives: Adam Potter (020 7880 8543) and John Nahar (020 7880 6230) ⁄ recruitment sales executive: Stephen Fontana PRODUCTION production manager: Jane Easterman production executive: Aysha Miah PUBLISHING publishing director: Cathy Hayward Forward features lists and media pack available at www.fm-world.co.uk/about-us SUBSCRIPTIONS BIFM members with FM World subscription or delivery queries should call the BIFM’s membership department on 0845 0581358 FM World is sent to all members of the British Institute of Facilities Management and is available on subscription to non-members.

Annual subscription rates are UK £110, rest of world £130. To subscribe call 020 8950 9117 or email fm@alliance-media.co.uk – alternatively, you can subscribe online at www.fm-world.co.uk/about-us/subscribe/ To order the BIFM good practice guides or the FM World Buyers’ Guide to FM Services call Natalie Li on 020 7880 6229.

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Simon Ball, business development manager, Interserve ⁄Jason Choy, director, Persus⁄ Ismena Clout, energy consultant, powerPerfector ⁄ Nick Cook, managing director, Haywards ⁄ Rob Greenfield, director for health, safety, environmental and quality, Sodexo ⁄ Anne Lennox Martin, FM consultant ⁄ Peter McLennan, joint course director, MSc Facility Environment and Management, University College London ⁄ Lionel Prodgers, principal, Agents4FM ⁄ Chris Stoddart, general manager, Heron Tower ⁄ Jeremy Waud, managing director, Incentive FM ⁄ Jane Wiggins, freelance lecturer and FM author ⁄ Chris Wood, senior associate at Advanced Workplace Associates

Average net circulation 11, 654 (Jul 09 – Jun 10) FM World magazine is produced using paper derived from sustainable sources; the ink used is vegetable based; 85 per cent of other solvents used in the production process are recycled © FM World is published on behalf of the British Institute of Facilities Management (BIFM)

by Redactive Publishing Ltd (RPL), 17 Britton St, London EC1M 5TP. This magazine aims to include a broad range of opinion about FM business and professional issues and articles do not necessarily reflect the views of the BIFM nor should such opinions be relied upon as statements of fact. All rights reserved. This publication may not be reproduced, transmitted or stored in any print or electronic format, including but not limited to any online service, any database or any part of the internet, or in any other format in whole or in part in any media whatsoever, without the prior written permission of the publisher. While all due care is taken in writing and producing this magazine, neither BIFM nor RPL accept any liability for the accuracy of the contents or any opinions expressed herein. Printed by Pensord ISSN 1743 8845

BIFM ENQUIRIES

British Institute of Facilities Management Number One Building, The Causeway, Bishop’s Stortford, Hertfordshire CM23 2ER

y email inbox is full. Not of the usual press releases, ideas for articles and spam but of invitations to connect on LinkedIn, comments on my Facebook status and the news that more people are following me on Twitter.

After erring on the side of technophobia, last year I started to embrace social media. I rejuvenated my dormant LinkedIn account and set myself up on Twitter tweeting mini reports from FM and workplace events and links to interesting blogs and articles.

Without over-dramatising it, social media has revolutionised the way I work. LinkedIn is one massive database of contacts. If I’m looking to find a specific person, they’re easy to track down on LinkedIn. And it’s a great way to get some background info on someone you’re about to meet or have met in the flesh. LinkedIn, like all similar sites, allows you to get in touch with people you might not otherwise have the opportunity (or the nerve) to meet or say hello to in the flesh.

In the Twittersphere, I’ve had the opportunity to be in touch with people I already know and get snippets of news and links to articles and blogs that they find interesting – and often I do too. But more interestingly, I’ve also developed relationships with people I didn’t know before. At several FM events recently which I’ve been tweeting using the event hash tag (see #wtrends or #worktech on Twitter) I’ve met other people also tweeting the same event and we’ve developed a conversation through Twitter about the event. Another member of the Twitterati described this as the same as passing notes around the classroom, but with the health warning that these ‘notes’ are in the public domain. Some of these people I’ve been lucky enough to meet afterwards and it’s a great springboard to a relationship if you’ve already been discussing ideas online first.

Recently I’ve also had a go at virtual worlds such as Second Life, and from initially being very suspicious, have realised that there are numerous opportunities for the facilities management sector (more on that in a future FM World). It’s like an advanced Twitter or LinkedIn, where you get to meet and discuss ideas, but in an almost real environment.

Although the technology still has some way to go, I think Second Life will be as big, if not bigger, than Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Which brings me on to a problem with social media. With all this time spent online, will we lose the ability to talk face-to-face? Will the idea of actually having a random chat with someone in the flesh become anathema to some people and will we hide behind our screens?

Already people email across offices rather than pick up the phone or walk a few paces.

As Neil Usher from Rio Tinto said at the Workplace Trends conference (page 14 or #wtrends) we need to “respect the encounters which may be inconclusive” and introduce a bit of chaos into our lives. Nothing is quite as good as a natter over the coffee machine. We need to remember how to chat.

This issue of FM World includes the Buyers’ Guide to FM Services, sponsored

by Spie Matthew Hall, your free annual guide to who’s who in the FM sector. And look out in the next issue for the results of the FM World Salary Survey, in association with Catch 22. FM

M

“WITHOUT OVERDRAMATISING IT, SOCIAL MEDIA HAS REVOLUTIONISED THE WAY I WORK”

Tel: 0845 0581356 email: admin@bifm.org.uk web: www.bifm.org.uk

www.fm-world.co.uk

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Government attacks PFI project spending A new government report on the financing of PFI projects during the credit crisis has found that the cost of borrowing for projects rose by a third, or £1bn, during 2009.

The Committee of Public Accounts has criticised the previous government for not exploring alternative and cheaper sources of finance, to “reduce reliance on expensive bank financing,” at a time of high-cost borrowing.

Committee chair Margaret Hodge MP said: “The high interest charges to which PFI projects have been subject as a result of the credit crisis will be locked in for up to 30 years, even when the project is up and running and posing less of a risk to lenders”.

“The Treasury must find ways to reduce these high bank financing costs and monitor market conditions to help departments claw back as much in savings as possible if and when projects signed in 2009 are refinanced,” Hodge added.

But business leaders came out in support of the previous system, stating that the majority of PFI projects have benefited millions of people.

Commenting on the report, Financing PFI projects in the credit crisis and the Treasury’s response, Susan Anderson, CBI director for public services, said: “Thanks to PFI, communities across the country have benefited from hundreds of much-needed schools, hospitals and housing, which otherwise wouldn’t have 06 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

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been built.

More than 50 MPs have backed the PFI Rebate Campaign, which asks that contractors such as

PA

LOUISA ROBERTS newsdesk@fm-world.co.uk

Hodge: Charges are locked for 30 years

Balfour Beatty and Serco reduce their repayments by 0.05 per cent, a figure which could raise £500m for the public sector.

According to a report in The Independent, £267bn in repayments are due to be made to private companies over the next 50 years. A House of Lords report this year found that 800 PFI contracts are in operation, with a combined total of £64bn.

“The majority of PFI projects are delivered on time and within budget, according to the National Audit Office. Moreover, PFI is not about delivering a building and walking away. Good maintenance and management over the life of the project is an integral part of the contract.

“As the Committee recognises, the government needs a variety of finance options available to

GETTY

PFI

Blame game in wake of NI water woes

Good practice will cost companies more LOUISA ROBERTS newsdesk@fm-world.co.uk

Revised rules to the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) will cost companies that take a good practice approach to energy management more than those who take a more basic approach.

In October, the coalition government made changes to the CRC as part of its comprehensive spending review, so that any revenue generated by the scheme that would have previously been fed back into the best performing companies, will now go straight back into the government’s purse.

This means that good practice organisations will be approximately £560,000 worse off each year, as before they would have received up to £130,000 in

credit. Organisations that perform less well and undergo only the most basic compliance will be around £360,000 worse off under the revised CRC, as the cost of basic compliance has shifted from £280,000 to £640,000.

Despite this, energy experts say that good energy compliance is still worthwhile for businesses.

“Many now see the CRC as a green tax by another name.

However, our analysis shows it will still pay businesses to invest in good carbon reduction

practice,” says Stuart Bowman, energy and sustainability director at consultancy firm hurleypalmerflatt.

Organisations covered by the CRC will be listed in a league table showing the best and worst performers. Companies which invest in carbon management and reduce their emissions will need to buy fewer credits, Bowman said. “We are in an era where sound environmental practice makes commercial, as well as ethical, sense.”

“Many now see the CRC as a green tax by another name. Our analysis shows it will still pay businesses to invest in good carbon reduction practice” www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 16:42:28

NEWS

BRIEFS

Northern Ireland’s businesses looked for heads to roll over the ongoing water cut-offs and shortages because of the province’s crumbling mains system.

“Heads will have to roll for this,” Glyn Roberts from the Northern Ireland Independent Retail Trade

Association said. “Why on earth was Northern Ireland the only part of the UK where there was such massive disruption since the thaw?

Heads will have to roll.”

Roberts’ call was answered last week when Laurence MacKenzie, the chief executive of Northern Ireland Water, resigned with a greatly reduced severance package.

Around 40,000 homes and businesses were without water over Christmas and New Year after low temperatures gave way to a rapid thaw, causing water pipes to crack and burst.

Seventeen emergency water stations were set up across the north of Ireland, while supermarkets and shops were swamped with customers seeking to buy bottled water as many shops had run out.

Half a million litres of water were sent from Scotland to Belfast at one point to aide the crisis.

Snow plan for BAA BAA has been criticised for failing to invest in adequate snow clearing equipment or sufficient manpower to keep runways clear over Christmas.

Internal BAA documents obtained

by The Telegraph, show that the airport had fewer snow ploughs than Gatwick, despite being twice its size.

According to the company’s snow plan for 2010/11, Heathrow had 10 snow ploughs and seven de-icing vehicles. In contrast, Gatwick had 14 snow ploughs.

BAA spent just £500,000 on equipment this year, The Daily Mail reported, compared to £8m invested

by Global Infrastructure Partners, the owners of Gatwick.

According to The Telegraph, the company also told airlines that their staff were not qualified to de-ice aircraft stands, although later admitted that it “lacked sufficient manpower and equipment to do the job itself”.

Following heavy snow fall in December, hundreds of flights were cancelled at both airports, leaving thousands of passengers sleeping at the airport, or being turned away.

CATERING

Age of austerity forces canteen cuts

ALAMY

DAVID ARMINAS newsdesk@fm-world.co.uk

The works canteen is in decline with only around half of British workplaces having one, a survey of union representatives shows.

The survey, from the Labour Research Department, found 56 per cent of reps said their workplace had a canteen, a drop of 65 per cent from a decade ago.

In 1995, 82 per cent of reps said they had one.

Even where canteens exist, they are less likely to be subsidised by the employer, according to the survey.

Just over half – 52 per cent – of the canteens were subsidised compared with 64 per cent a decade ago.

And the price of canteen fare is significantly affected by whether www.fm-world.co.uk

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or not there is a subsidy. The average price of a cup of tea in an unsubsidised canteen is 65p – half as much again as in a subsidised one at 43p.

“The average price of a cuppa is 60p where there is no union involvement in the running of the canteen compared with just 37p in

canteens with union involvement,” the Labour Research Department said.

“A snack meal averages £1.97 where there is no union involvement compared with £1.53 where there is, and a main meal costs £3.30 compared with £2.69.”

However, fewer than one in four survey respondents said unions now have any involvement in the running of their workplace canteens.

This compares with almost twice as many a decade ago.

The current era of cuts and austerity is likely to impact badly on the provision of the workplace lunch, LRD noted.

“A number of survey respondents in the public sector referred to a recent deterioration of their facilities as a result of spending cuts.”

OBE for catering CEO Robyn Jones, co-founder and chief executive of catering group, CH&Co, has appeared on the New Year’s Honours List for her services to the hospitality sector. Jones, who has worked in the industry for almost 30 years, established Charlton House in 1991 on a Government Enterprise Allowance.

Over the past 19 years the company has grown and in 2010 underwent a major rebranding, now operating under the group name, CH&Co.

Darkness falls on Lear A production of King Lear, starring Derek Jacobi at London’s Donmar Warehouse, was plunged into darkness earlier this month, following a power cut. When staff were unable to restore power, the 250 audience members were made to leave, just one hour after the play had started. All audience members were offered a full refund.

Savoy Hotel goes green London’s Savoy has reopened after a three-year, £220m green revamp that allows guests to gaze across the city’s skyline while lounging in the new rooftop pool.

On top of that, the iconic 1889 building will run on half the energy it used before it closed its doors in 2007, according to the Savoy’s management.

The restoration has introduced a number of environmental technologies and efficiencies, including using excess heat from fridges to reheat hot water.

Cooking oil from the hotel restaurants will also be recycled and turned into biodiesel, while waste management systems will recycle up to 90 per cent of waste from the hotel.

Fast food chain faces fine McDonald’s has been fined £5,000 plus costs after a worker lost part of his vision. A maintenance worker used an acid-based drain cleaner to unblock a waste pipe. There was a blow-back which left him with partial blindness in his left eye. Following treatment he recovered about 97 per cent vision in his right eye but only between 55 and 60 per cent in his left eye. Councillor Sarah McDermott from Wandsworth Council, which took the retailer to court, said the member of staff was given money by his managers to buy a very hazardous product.

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PROJECT OF THE

FORTNIGHT MORE NEWS IN BRIEF

Spain attempts to go non fumar...

Spain’s tough smoking ban law kicked in on 2 January, after a day’s grace to ease smokers into not automatically lighting up.

Smoking is now banned in all bars and restaurants, as well as being prohibited on television broadcasts, near hospitals and in school playgrounds.

“It is over already,” one Madrid waitress said. “We have taken away all the ashtrays. When you look at the health question I agree but I also think there should be a minimum zone where you are allowed to smoke.”

Spain has had a partial ban on smoking since January 2006, but the impact was negligible, a Barcelona newspaper said.

The previous ban disallowed smoking in the workplace, on public transport and in shops. But bar, restaurant and café owners could decide whether to ban smoking or not. The majority kept smoking, fearful of a loss of business, the newspaper said.

...as Dutch cafés light up once more

Security challenge of Bristol justice centre Bristol’s new Civil Justice Centre, designed by Associated Architects replaces the city’s former county courts, which was no longer suitable for a modern day civil and family court. Now, the new centre, which incorporates as much natural ventilation and light as possible, includes 15 courts and hearing rooms, including six large courts, a fraud court, family proceedings court, civil jury court and six civil hearing rooms.

Engineers Hilson Moran oversaw the project, providing sustainability consultancy and business services. The company say that its greatest challenge was to fulfil the complex circulation and security needs of the building, to ensure that the public were separated from the judiciary. To this end, three lifts were installed. One is used by judges. The other two are used by the public and staff, but can, when needed, be used solely for witnesses.

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The Dutch government has rolled back the European Union-wide ban on smoking, and small cafés and bars can allow puffers to partake on the premises.

But smoking is allowed only if the premises are 750 sq ft or less, and only if they don’t employ any staff. These are the small establishments that have been hit hard by the ban since it was introduced on 1 July, 2008, according to a pro-smoking group.

Dutch health minister Edith Schippers said the new law “will allow consumer choice. A sign will inform customers whether or not they are allowed to smoke on the premises”.

The coalition government has reportedly also cancelled 280 outstanding fines handed down for allowing smoking on the premises. The fine can be as low as 300 euros for a first offence.

But Clean Air Netherlands, a public health lobbying group, has launched a campaign to reinstate the ban.

Government art collection to go on display A painting of Queen Elizabeth I will be shown for the first time in 113 years at London’s Whitechapel Gallery next year.

The painting is part of the government art collection that is made up of more than 13,500 works to begin showing from June. Some of the works date from the 16th century such as the portrait of Queen Elizabeth I by an unknown artist, selected for showing by Peter Mandelson.

QEI, painted by an unknown artist, will hang beside the painting Lancashire Fair: Good Friday, Daisy Nook by L.S. Lowry which was picked for inclusion by Samantha Cameron.

Much of the artwork usually hangs in embassies and other government buildings around the world and includes works by John Constable, William Hogarth and Lucian Freud.

Fraudulent feng shui faces crackdown Hong Kong city officials have cracked down on feng shui consultancy deals after discovering murky payments of millions of dollars to re-orient buildings during construction.

Strict guidelines will be drawn up after the South China Morning Post newspaper forced them to admit that at least £6m had been spent compensating people living around construction projects.

Building have been re-oriented so the new structure would not disturb the “qi”, or vital energy, flowing into existing buildings, as feng shui dictates.

Claimants ask the government to pay for a “tun fu” cleansing ritual, which involves a feng shui master performing rites around the site.

This has resulted in rail tracks, roads, bridges, tunnels and telephone lines being “cleansed”. www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 17:42:17

FM 100 POLL

Very 33%

WE ASKED 100 FMS… Sometimes 41%

How widespread do you think is the issue of payment being demanded to do business with a company, even being on a tender list?

Nearly three-quarters of FMs believe FM firms are demanding money from suppliers in exchange for contracts or being considered for work.

Mitie recently came in for heavy criticism for some parts of the business requesting payment from suppliers in order to do business with the firm. But Mitie reacted quickly to put a stop to it.

However, it raises the sensitive question: how much of this payment for a business relationship goes on? (see feature, page 12) “I can’t believe this has only

just come out into the open, as its been going on for years,” said one respondent who ticked the “very widespread” choice.

“Among the major FM companies, with a preferred supplier list it is widespread although one major client recently switched from demanding retrospectives to a straight discount off the rates probably as a result of this publicity. In some cases it is a significant part of their margin when they are bidding and therefore a contribution to their overhead and profit.”

Respondents working as FMs for public sector organisations, such as the NHS and police, said there is too much scrutiny and adherence to best practice for such payments to be made. “I have had no experience of this,” said an NHS FM. “Things within the NHS are pretty tight with lots of checks and balances.”

Occasionally 26%

Another facilities manager noted that they had seen occasional requests for payments for large and complex tender documents, but this was to put off “chancers”, as he called them – suppliers who wanted the documents but had no real chance of managing such a large contract.

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ANALYSIS

Councils must cut spending ahead of bill GRAEME DAVIES newsdesk@fm-world.co.uk

The coming year is likely to prove just as challenging for the FM sector as 2010, when uncertainty over spending cuts hampered confidence. But the phoney war will be over shortly with the government’s most significant cuts kicking in from April onwards.

So what can those providers to the public sector expect? Well some of the detail is already known from October’s savage comprehensive spending review intended to save £83bn on the national deficit by 2015.

The review included plans to sell off property because it believes it might be run more efficiently if owned by the private sector with the government as the tenant.

Capital expenditure on the schools estate was slashed by 60 per cent to £15.8bn for the review period to 2015.

But it is not all doom and gloom as outsourcing of public services is increasingly seen as a vital source of money saving. Indeed, we were given a stronger glimpse of the future just before Christmas when the communities secretary Eric Pickles launched his ‘Localism’ bill aimed at setting out how local councils will be funded in the years to come.

For the local councils themselves, the Localism bill did not make pretty reading. Although there was much talk of devolving more power to a local level, the sting came in the fact that local council budgets will be cut by an average of 27 per cent over the 10 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

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next four years. This throws up the awkward quandary of how to get more done at a local level, and by local community groups and charities, when their main source of funding – local government grants – is going to come under intense pressure.

The Localism bill is not likely to come into force before November this year, but councils will have to begin changing the way they work well before then, as the first cuts kick in during the spring.

Indeed some have already begun

announcing radical changes to the way they operate.

For example, Suffolk County Council is planning to outsource virtually all of its service delivery, slashing central costs and effectively becoming an administrator of contracts. This is likely to benefit larger FM players that can offer a wide range of outsourced services in a ‘one-stop shop’. And we are only at the beginning of the journey with Capita estimating last year that just 30 of the UK’s 468 councils had already signed major outsourcing deals for back office services.

With the current government seemingly intent on pushing through what would amount to a radical agenda for local governance in the UK, the opportunities for the private sector to benefit will be many. But there is no guarantee that we will not see more upsets such as those that claimed Rok and

Connaught in 2010. Opportunities will present themselves but the competition will be fiercer than ever as the pressure to win contracts and deliver value for money will intensify.

The biggest challenge for FMs, and particularly those publicly quoted companies that are under constant pressure to perform for shareholders and to maintain their pipelines of work, is the risk of chasing the big contracts too hard and leaving their margins squeezed. This should be the key that metric shareholders use to analyse how a company is doing as we move through 2011; remember, Connaught and Rok gave off the impression of solidity for a long time but their respective demises were rapid when they came.

Graeme Davies writes for Investors Chronicle

Contract wins

NEW BUSINESS CARILLION has won a five-year contract to deliver hard and soft FM at the Land Registry estate that includes 37 sites in England and Wales, over 2m sq ft, including office space, data centres and file stores. Additional services include space and move management and business continuity management. The contract will begin in April and run for five years, initially.

INCENTIVE QAS has won a threeyear contract for cleaning services at airline BMI. The estate includes the airline’s head office in Donnington and its hangar and workshops at East Midlands airport, as well as its training centre, hangar, offices and check-in areas at Heathrow airport.

Covent Garden venue, also home to the Royal Ballet.

CHARLTON HOUSE has signed a catering contract worth £100k annually with PZ Cussons, makers of toiletries such as Imperial Leather and Charles Worthington, for its Innovation Centre in Salford, Manchester. CH already provides catering at Cussons’ new corporate HQ in Manchester Business Park.

INTEGRAL UK has won a three-year M&E maintenance contract with the University of Manchester Incubator Company. The contract includes maintenance of two large research facilities on Grafton Street, the Bio-incubator and Core Technology buildings whose combined size is around 200,000 sq ft. Integral will provide a resident site engineer, with additional support from specialist service teams and Integral’s Manchester mobile engineering team.

Chemical group BASF has appointed FACEO FM at its 60 western Europe sites. Faceo will provide building maintenance, cleaning, security, catering, reception, print and copy, archive, landscaping and fleet management services. The contract covers Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Portugal, The Netherlands, Spain and the UK. Faceo is part of the Vinci Facilities group.

MITIE has picked up a five-year £19m integrated FM contract at the Royal Opera House. Services include security, cleaning, reception, post, reprographics and general technical skills at the

Medical dressing manufacturer Systagenix has awarded a three-year contract to INITIAL FACILITIES SERVICES for total FM at their site in Gargrave, North Yorkshire. www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 16:09:53

Energy boost: Paul Cottam, managing director of GSH Group

GSH set to expand energy offering In an exclusive interview with FM World, GSH Group aims to grow its energy management and advisory side of the business to around 50 per cent of turnover by 2012.

“Within two years, we want to have over half of revenues to be from energy-related activities,” Paul Cottam, managing director of GSH Group said. “It’s now about 30 to 35 per cent.”

Energy data is increasingly available thanks to additional smart meters coming on stream, improving building management systems and energy consumption

information from energy suppliers.

“We can present the client with consumption data, league tables of how their sites are running. But we can’t achieve results without client buy-in for this.”

GSH will remain focused on its core businesses: mechanical and electrical maintenance and project services, and its EnergyPlus offering that strives to manage and reduce clients’ carbon footprint.

“What we will not be is a Mitie, where we do everything, from catering and cleaning to security,”

BUSINESS BRIEFS

said Cottam who joined GSH at the beginning of 2010 after several years at G4S as their managing director of integrated FM, excluding the education and NHS sectors.

He said GSH is not overexposed to the public sector, with about 20 per cent of revenue coming from government contracts.

Cottam foresees the possibility of risk management moving up the priority list of clients and suppliers during the current age of austerity within the UK economy.

Serco strong on back of MoD wins Serco is on track to deliver continued strong organic revenue growth, a pre-close statement said, ahead of the firm’s financial yearend 31 December 2010.

“Our confidence is underpinned by the strong global demand for the efficient delivery of essential services which drives significant opportunities for Serco in both existing and new markets, and by our operational and financial performance during the year to date,” the statement said.

Serco will release its 2010 full year results on 2 March 2011.

In July, Serco Group signed a six-year £36m contract with the Ministry of Defence for support services at RAF Brize Norton.

Serco supports all the station’s functions, such as strategic air transport and the movement of www.fm-world.co.uk

10-11_FM Business.indd 11

military and civilian personnel.

Earlier in the year, Serco signed a ten-year £100m contract to deliver support services at RAF High Wycombe and RAF Halton.

Serco has been the incumbent service provider at RAF Halton since 1997, and the new contract extends the group’s responsibilities to include technical, catering, retail and leisure services, as well as non-aircraft engineering and accommodation support at RAF High Wycombe.

However, in November, Serco suffered an acknowledged set-back when it failed to win a contract at Hinchingbrooke Hospital in Huntingdon.

Circle was the preferred bidder, beating Serco which had formed a partnership with Peterborough and Stamford Hospitals NHS Trust. A Serco spokesman said the company would “remain focused on our approach and work to further develop our model”.

Share Price Changes as of January 5, 2011:

Period 1 week 1 month 3 months 6 months 1 year

Price 576.00p 571.50p 611.50p 561.50p 525.00p

Source: (Serco Group Web Site)

Change -9.50p -5.00p -45.00p +5.00p +41.50p

Per Cent Change -1.65 % -0.87 % -7.36 % +0.89 % +7.90 %

Mouchel rejects Costain bid Costain made a £118m offer for Mouchel, which the company rejected as undervaluing it.

Mouchel has around £100m of debt and issued a profit warning in October that saw shares fall by 25 per cent. Last year, VT Group offered almost 300p per share for Mouchel, but VT itself was then bought by Babcock.

Carillion sells MoD equity Carillion sold five per cent of its equity in the military accommodation Allenby Connaught project at Aldershot to Innisfree for a £14.5m. The PFI disposal leaves Carillion with a 12.5 per cent equity.

In December 2009, Carillion sold 65 per cent of its 50 per cent interest in the project to Innisfree. The project, a 35-year deal, is for living and working accommodation for 18,000 military and civilian staff. It includes 7,000 new bedrooms in single-soldier living accommodation blocks.

PHS acquires Fyr Fyter PHS Group has acquired Fyr Fyter, a Durham-based compliance provider in electricity, gas, fire and power management founded in 1989. It also provides fire safety services, equipment and specialist training programmes.

G4S buys Guernsey Air Con The Guernsey operation of G4S has bought Guernsey Air Conditioning, one of the largest building services contractors in the Channel Islands, from David J. Le Gallez. The price has not been disclosed, but assets of the business are said to be worth £1.8m. The deal extends G4S’s services to its government and commercial customers across the Channel Islands for the first time.

FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 11

6/1/11 16:10:04

FM BUSINESS SIGN UP FOR FM WORLD DAILY AT FM-WORLD.CO.UK

Pay-to-play contracts are legal ‘grey area’ DAVID ARMINAS newsdesk@fm-world.co.uk

Mitie embarrassed itself in November. The major FM contractor had been “requesting” money from would-be suppliers in order for those suppliers to work with it.

When the news was splashed across the business press, Mitie, after what appeared to be some initial confusion over what it had been demanding of suppliers, quickly put a stop to it.

According to a report in the Daily Telegraph, Mitie said it was “not justifiable to ask for it” and the instances of demanding £10,000 from suppliers were “isolated” and had been stopped.

The dust may have settled over the FTSE 250 company’s requests for money, but that begs the question of just how widespread the practice is of asking suppliers to ‘pay-to-play’.

Is requesting money in exchange for having a business relationship, be it getting a contract, being put on a preferred supplier list or included in a bid team, actually unethical, or worse, illegal?

And if so, what can the FM sector do to stamp it out?

FM World contacted Mitie who agreed to consider these questions and also how the payment request came about within their organisation. However, they later declined to comment. “We have nothing to add to the comments that have already appeared

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elsewhere,” Mitie said in a written response.

Widespread The so-called “prebate request”, or demand or request for money, is “very widespread” within facilities management, said one FM consultant who spoke to FM World only on condition of anonymity.

“Companies repeatedly tell me that they have been asked to pay these prebates in order to get a contract,” the consultant said. “And very often the end client will not know that their supplier is asking this of its supply chain partners.”

For example, a big FM player who has just got a major contract will then subcontract out some of the work to several suppliers cleaning, catering, security, transport services and others.

It won’t be a tender, and the big firm “may even go to a mediumsize firm that lost the original bid,” the consultant said.

The so-called request for money could be “several thousand pounds, as in a golden hello payment for the work”.

There could even be some negotiating as to the size of a payment, depending on what the contract is worth to the second tier

supplier who will pay the prebate.

“However you look at it, it’s a barrier to entry to those firms who can’t afford the payment, or are unwilling to pay it,” she said.

“It’s a grey area, murky. Big companies are basically asking their suppliers to subsidize their own cash-flow. My advice to a medium firm being asked for a prebate is to

“Big companies are basically asking their suppliers to subsidize their own cash flow. A firm asked for a prebate should contact the end client”

contact the end client about it.”

The practice, says Amanda Meader, head of facilities at the Audit Commission, is “very unethical”.

Asked if it is a bribe, “that’s exactly how I perceive it”, but it is also a likely legal grey area, says Meader who has 15 years FM experience. The supplier should be invited to be a preferred supplier on their merits alone.

One managing director of a national major repairs and maintenance business assured FM World that his business does not request payment from suppliers in return for handing www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 17:22:18

GETTY

Caption to go in here

out contacts or putting a business on a preferred supplier list.

However, when asked if such payment demands are unethical, he was warned off answering the question by his public relations adviser who was present at the meeting with FM World. The managing director would not say whether he considered such requests ethical or unethical.

The BIFM, when asked by FM World if such payments are unethical, responded with the written reply that the organisation “does not condone this practice.

All transactions should be open and transparent and seen to be www.fm-world.co.uk

12-13_FM Business new.indd 13

fair to all.”

It is “certainly not best practice, but probably not illegal”, the BIFM says. “All bidders in any process should be treated in a similar way and any practice that disadvantages a bidder unknowingly must be considered unethical.”

But are payment requests more than just immoral or unethical?

Could they be considered a bribe?

“No, not literally, but if not open and transparent it might be misinterpreted as one,” according to the BIFM’s written response to the question.

David Hawkins, operations director for Partnership Sourcing

Limited, agrees that it probably falls short of being a bribe in some fashion. “I don’t know if it is illegal, but playing on the supplier’s fear of being excluded would be more akin to blackmail,” he says.

At the least, such requests and payments “must be detrimental to a good business relationship, especially in this age of greater transparency”, says Hawkins whose organisation – a joint Department for Business Innovation and Skills and Confederation of British Industry initiative – promotes best practice business relationships “It suggests to me that the purchaser has no respect for their suppliers or fails to recognise the value of their suppliers. If they are the right preferred supplier that should be on the basis that they bring some value in terms of quality, performance and price. In which case, why would they need a cash incentive?

Legal matters In the strict legal sense, such payment requests are unlikely to be illegal, says Susannah Cogman, partner in the corporate crime and investigation division of Londonbased international legal practise Herbert Smith.

“As a general matter, it is not a bribe,” she says.

“But if the money were to go to an individual within a company, it potentially would be a backhander and possibly a bribe.”

Nonetheless, where a payment request is made of suppliers and

that transaction is not made transparent to the requesting firm’s client, there would be an issue if any “positive false representation” is made to that client about the supplier relationship.

For example, if the requesting company tells the client its own suppliers are chosen on merit only and fails to disclose that an exchange of money is also included for the privilege.

“Basically, that could in some cases amount to lying about your supplier relationship,” says Cogman. This could leave the first tier FM provider open to legal action by the client, even if senior management in that first tier FM provider were not aware of the practice and condemned it.

Cogman says many firms are now revisiting their ethical policies in light of the UK’s Bribery Act 2010 that comes into force in April.

Companies will be liable for failing to prevent bribery.

To defend against bribery allegations, they will have to show they have adequate procedures in place. In other words, have done everything required to stop it.

What will be required is to be published later this month by the Department of Justice, after a lengthy consultation with industry and commerce since last October.

From this year, companies will need to know who is asking for what within their procurement departments and their immediate supply chain if they wish to steer clear of the law.

FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 13

6/1/11 17:15:40

FM EVENT WORKPLACE TRENDS

REPORT

WORKPLACE WONDERS

The Georgia World Congress Centre (left) played host to FM delegates from around the world

In a world of Wi-Fi internet, rising transport costs and burgeoning social media, what’s in store for the future workplace, and who’s got the blueprints?

Cathy Hayward reports from the Workplace Trends conference

PHOTOLIBRARY

CATHY HAYWARD cathy@fm-world.co.uk

“Work has left the building”. That was DEGW’s Philip Tidd, arguing against the motion that tomorrow’s workplace will be similar to today’s in the debate at the 8th annual Workplace Trends conference.

“Synchronicity and co-location are being turned on their head by new generations and new technology,” he said. People no longer need to be in the same place at the same time every day. “We will still need the office, but the office will be different as technology and the way we work changes. We will connect virtually.”

But things don’t change as much or as quickly as you think, said Paul Morrell, chief construction adviser at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, who argued that despite the hype around Generation Y, social media and the Cloud, the workplace of tomorrow is likely to be very similar to what it is today. “We’re dealing with a very simple thing: a desk, a chair and a light. The furniture and lighting may change style, but the office hasn’t changed for a hundred years.”

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The humble paper clip, for example, has stayed almost exactly the same since its invention in 1892. Offices one hundred years ago had big atriums and rows of desks and nothing much has changed since then, he said.

Both speakers repeated the familiar complaint that the architecture, real estate and FM professions are not keeping pace with business demands. “Architects have no new ideas,” said Morrell.

“All the funky space in offices is spectacularly under-used. Rows and rows of desks are not conducive to work but neither are huge floor cushions,” added Tidd.

Generation gap?

The use of social media, how individuals and companies use it and how the digital natives of Generations Y and Z will use it to transform work, was a recurring theme throughout the day – although only four of the 150 people in the room were tweeting their views on the conference, leading one of the twitterati @theatreacle to claim that the train had already left the station.

Marie Cecile Puybaraud, director

of workplace innovation at Johnson Controls, argued that social media can make or break a company and ruin reputations. But she went on to claim that we have been talking too much about Generation Y. “We seem scared about the way they are transforming the workplace, using technology and space.”

Talking through some of her recent research projects, she depicted Gen Y as a selfish and needy generation, wanting to come to work for the social structure and collaboration, but also wanting flexibility to move around and work where they want, how they want and when they want – and own their own desk in the office.

The challenge for FMs and real estate professionals is to make better use of the space they have.

John Anderson, CEO of PeopleCube, which produces space utilisation software, argued that workplaces have much to learn from the airline industry. Aeroplanes used to carry extra capacity but were forced to become more efficient after 9/11.

“When did you last travel on a half-empty plane?”, he asked.

In the same way that the airlines had used data to analyse

everything from traffic volumes by route, passenger no-show rates, seasonal traffic patterns and delays/ cancellations to determine the most profitable routes, the right equipment to use and the right mix of seats to offer, workplace managers must make more efficient use of existing space, reduce space through alternative workplace strategies and track actual usage to make better decisions. Data is the key, he said.

Ways of working Despite Tidd and Morrell’s insightful comments, many corporates aren’t listening. A case study presentation from the FM director and agile working director at Unilever focused heavily on the (admittedly stunning) office interiors at the new HQ for UK and Ireland in Leatherhead and less on the way people were working and the change management that had accompanied the introduction of agile/flexible working.

What was interesting was that although three workstyles have been created depicting people’s use of the office (resident, mobile and off-site) Unilever allows employees www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 12:12:29

Space race: The design of future offices will help to shape how we work

to work how and where they feel they are most productive – which seems like a sensible option that more firms should follow – if they have the right performance management structure and the right training in place to help people adjust to the new way of working.

The introduction of agility has paid off for the firm – the site was shut for eight days over the past two years due to snow. But no orders were lost and staff were able to work flexibly from other locations. “But they were all keen to get back into the office to reconnect with each other and collaborate again reflecting the enduring importance of the workplace,” said Ian Dunning, FM director, south-east at Unilever.

A similar case study presentation from Deutsche Bank was more focused on the people aspects of workplace change. The bank capitalised on a pre-existing highly mobile workforce (real estate behind the curve again) through the db New Workplace programme. The aim was to standardise operating platforms, functionalities and the look and feel of offices around the world while increasing flexibility and future proofing the business with a www.fm-world.co.uk

014-015_Workplace Trends.indd 015

distributed workforce. Improving the end user experience was a key requirement, not just saving money.

The tangible benefits were obvious: 70 per cent reduction in future churn costs; 10-15 per cent reduction in direct occupancy allocation; reduction in power use from new IT. But the less quantifiable benefits were far more interesting.

People felt they had access to decision makers and could make decisions far quicker as a result; without a fixed desk and often working remotely there was a feeling they owned the whole office and not just one desk; there was a reduction in email traffic which seems counter-intuitive but distributed working empowers people to use the phone, chat, or find out things for themselves; and finally improved collaboration.

The challenge for Jeanie Chuo, head of workplace strategies at Deutsche Bank was to sell the idea to those holding the purse-strings.

Workplace change is costly, and its implementation does not always result in immediate cost-savings from real estate disposal, improved employee productivity and associated business performance.

“There is a conflict between long-term business benefits and the immediate impact on the bottom line.”

Location is less of an issue than we think, argued Robin Dunbar, professor of social and cultural anthropology at the University of Oxford. In a fascinating presentation about the social brain in the workplace, he argued that happiness, like obesity, is contagious and it doesn’t matter how far you are away from someone as long as you maintain good contact – ideally face-to-face through something like Skype.

Size matters Dunbar went on to talk about management structures within organisations, arguing that the size of a military company, roughly 150 people, is the perfect size for good co-operation and communication.

A strong management structure (and probably strong discipline like the army) to maintain co-operation and order would be needed for organisations of a larger size.

Poetry is fast becoming de rigueur at workplace conferences.

Following on from the excellent Matt Harvey at Worktech last month, Neil Usher, head of property at Rio Tinto, electrified the Workplace Trends audience

“GENERATION Y WERE DEPICTED AS SELFISH AND NEEDY, WANTING TO COME TO WORK FOR THE SOCIAL STRUCTURE AND COLLABORATION, BUT ALSO WANTING FLEXIBILITY”

WORKPLACE TRENDS

with his entertaining and provocative verse.

Like Deutsche Bank’s Chuo, he saw the property and FM team as there to look after the core business, and respond with elasticity to their needs, rather than being an end in itself (we provide the best possible workplaces but go with the ebb and flow of the business).

Most interestingly, he called for a return to chaos, out of which comes creativity. The workplace is not a rigid environment and we must respect the encounters which may be inconclusive and the ideas whose time has not yet come, Usher said.

The art of work Despite the allusion towards the imminent death of the workplace, its future is secure – if only in the arts. The final presentation of the day from architect Brian Szpakowski explored the depiction of the workplace in art, film, TV and books since its inception in the late 1800s.

Szpakowski quoted Charles Lamb’s 1825 essay The Superannuated Man which described: “the irksome confinement of an office” and Herman Melville’s Bartleby, the Scrivener which describes how the conformity of work and the office results in physical and mental deterioration of Bartleby and the only way to resist is to do nothing – which eventually results in Bartleby’s death.

The films and art presented

by Szpakowski continued this trend towards conformity – tall, identical buildings full of identical people doing identical jobs. But the workplace is not all negative, Szpakowski said. “Eroticism in the office is unavoidable. Men and women are put together in an erotically-charged atmosphere, when they look their best, in a completely separate sphere from their home environment. The office is an easy target.” FM Read the Twitter feed about the conference at #wtrends

FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 15

6/1/11 12:12:56

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4/1/11 12:25:13

FM EVENT AWA

A whole new world: managing talent

REPORT

PREDICTIONS

TOMORROW’S OFFICE WORLD

Predictions for 2020 Will Hutton ● The war for talent will intensify and be fought on a global scale. Organisations will need to focus more on developing skills. Innovation and skills are the backbone of the knowledge economy ● We will see new business models and a significant shift to more flexible, remote and virtual working – this will pose challenges for line managers, in terms of such issues as engagement and performance management ● Further polarisation of jobs will make it harder than ever for employees to move up the ladder ● Employees will become increasingly sophisticated – as employees and consumers – demanding more from their employer. CSR for example will move centre stage. Notions of fairness will be increasingly challenged as inequality rises.

Speakers at the fourth seminar on Life and Work in 2020 shared predictions on how the workplace will alter over the next decade

GETTY

CATHY HAYWARD cathy@fm-world.co.uk

The employer-employee relationship will be turned on its head over the next 10 years as a result of a change in demographics and technology, economic development, social, workplace and economic inequality, environmental challenges and the changing role of the state. That was the message from Will Hutton, executive vice chair of the Work Foundation, speaking at the fourth seminar on Life and Work in 2020, organised by Advanced Workplace Associates, late last year.

Managing the talent of people in their sixties and seventies together with dealing with the question of fairness in organisations will be two key issues facing the world of work in 2020, he said. “In developed economies, the workforce is ageing and required to work longer which raises issues about workplace health and longevity, engaging, motivating and retaining older workers and career management for the younger generations.” The maximum sagacity – when the rate of brain cells dying is outweighed by the rate of brain cells being created – is aged 72, he said emphasising that older workers had an essential role to play in the workplace.

Talking the day before the release of his own Fair Pay Report, which argued that bosses’ salaries should be no more than 20 times those of the lowest-paid staff in an organisation, Hutton said www.fm-world.co.uk

17_AWA.indd 017

that the polarisation of income meant that many businesses would have to think about fairproofing themselves. “Income and wealth disparities are widening in developed economies while the opportunities for social mobility are limited,” he said adding that the traditional paradigm of wealththrough-work will be challenged by very low economic growth in the developed countries. The real growth will come from Brazil, Russia, India and China, he said.

The development of increasingly sophisticated technology will present challenges and opportunities for how we work, where we work and when we work, Hutton argued. This would provide significant challenges to managers around virtual team dynamics and increasing the productivity and innovation of employees.

By 2020, Hutton predicted that the workforce will be largely knowledge based (and therefore be able to work flexibly by time or location). New industries will require new skills – green, low carbon, STEM – which will mean a skills gap requiring the UK to

embrace a global talent market.

The changing environmental picture will also play a part in the world of work, Hutton predicted.

“There will be a shift in the zeitgeist towards greater personal and societal responsibility for the protection of the environment, possibly to the point of resisting the primacy of the discourse of economic growth.”

David Smith, chief executive of Global Futures and Foresight echoed many of Hutton’s points, arguing that by 2020, little work will actually take place in a workplace.

“Mobile and remote working technologies will be considered routine, reliable and widespread enough to allow most jobs to be completed away from the office” which could result in a shift in the built form and social organisation of cities.

Quoting a 2009 Orange survey, he argued that most people don’t want to work in cities but would prefer to move to the south-west, Wales or Scotland – rural areas – if work was not location dependent.

By 2020 we will interact with artificial intelligence just like humans. Smith predicted that almost all routine work roles such as secretaries, tutors and salespeople will be done by virtual assistants.

Virtual worlds could also become mainstream. FM

“THERE WILL BE A SHIFT IN THE ZEITGEIST TOWARDS GREATER PERSONAL AND SOCIETAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE PROTECTION OF THE ENVIRONMENT”

David Smith ● There will be seamless computerhuman interaction: advances in speech recognition, artificial intelligence (AI), and computer power suggest the old computer interface (keyboard, mouse, etc) may yield to an intelligent interface in which we simply converse with smart computers ● Mobile and remote working technologies will be considered routine, reliable and widespread enough to allow most jobs to be completed away from the office. ● Recruitment will become increasingly fragmented owing to changing demographics, technology and flexible employment. Power will shift towards candidates.

FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 17

6/1/11 17:47:52

FM OPINION THE DIARY COLUMN DAVID WALKER

David Walker is facilities project manager at Northumbrian Water

“4,500 TONNES OF TIN FOIL, 500 TONNES OF CHRISTMAS TREE LIGHTS ARE ALL SIMPLY DISCARDED” GOODB YE CHR I ST M A S , H EL LO 2 0 1 1

hristmas is well and truly over and it’s C back to the office where a large toilet refurbishment scheme lies ahead and the prospect of recycling Christmas waste, a sad reminder of festive times, is just another task to tick off the list Hello and welcome to my first column of the new year. I, like many of you, have had a busy time with regards to the weather – keeping the offices serviced the best we could proved to be something of a task especially with the volume of snow that fell.

As a business we have spent large amounts of time urging our customers to protect against frozen pipes; we have also been taking extra steps in preparation to make sure it was business as normal, this was largely done through sheer

determination of my colleagues making sure the job got done.

Early starts were very much the order of the day although I did have to admit defeat on two of the days and work from another office much closer to home on one particular day. I really could not see a thing or indeed see the road I was attempting to drive on. Tractors, JCBs all played a part in trying to keep the car parks and footpaths open in what at times seemed to be a losing battle.

One of the more unusual tasks

was to ensure the wellbeing of animals grazing on our operational sites – many sheep had to be rescued and moved to more sheltered parts of the sites until the weather improved.

We also issued general advice to the staff with regards to travelling to and from work, well as I write things are improving and we are now in the middle of the thaw so I can relax a bit more now.

As part of our commitment to reduce waste and recycle more we have also advised on the various things that can be recycled over the Christmas period. Christmas trees, cards and wrapping paper all can be recycled, in fact the amount of wrapping paper estimated to be thrown away in the UK could stretch around the equator nine times, or to the moon if laid end to end.

More than 250 tonnes of Christmas trees could be recycled –

a product which is rich in biomass that can be used for mulch or soil improver.

4,500 tonnes of tin foil, 500 tonnes of Christmas tree lights and 13,500 tonnes of glass are all simply discarded or thrown away but recycling all of them could save 4200 tonnes of CO2, the equivalent of taking 1300 cars off the road.

Christmas really is a massive opportunity to recycle.

After a slow start to work I am faced with office moves and the start of a large toilet refurbishment scheme which will provide improved facilities for male, female and disabled users while at the same time provide first aid rooms and changing and storing facilities for our restaurant staff.

The work is expected to take around eight weeks although I am yet to work my way through the bill of quantities to agree start dates and programmes for the job. FM

BEST OF THE WEB The latest views, comments and reaction across the web

1⁄

Twitter: flashboy: Inbox full of out of office auto-replies to my out of office autoreply. The machines have been talking amongst themselves.

2⁄

fmt_conference: Blog from Naomi Millan: Facilities Management and Parenthood http://bit.ly/ eh7NOJ

18 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

Opinion2.indd 16

3⁄

37 Productivity Tips for Working From Anywhere: http://t. co/sj3m7T8

4⁄ Networkwithbifm: Lee Haury: Less emphasis on outputs, measurement and targets and more emphasis on innovation is what is needed during this age of austerity. Risk taking and

blue sky thinking have both taken a back seat of late, but this is exactly what is required to help drive organisations forward and help them address the changes of the past 18 months. Does innovation occupy a high enough status in your organisation, is innovation supported and rewarded?

Does anyone have examples of frameworks or systems which support

this type of approach?

Liz Kentish: Lee, for many years I’ve been involved with the Best Practice Club, an organisation which supports its member companies in sharing what works, as well as what doesn’t!

I believe those of us working in FM should be doing more of this – sharing – and there are plenty of opportunities to do so. There’s a real

difference between Gen X and Gen Y in terms of sharing knowledge and information, some of us seem a bit reticent to share, whilst the younger generation are far more comfortable with ‘uploading’ information into the public domain to share with others. I’d be interested to know what others think - and how we can encourage even more sharing of ‘best practice’. www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 14:42:40

You can follow us at twitter.com/FM_World and cathy_fm_world facebook/fmworldmagazine

BEST OF THE

FMWORLD BLOGS

FIVE MINUTES WITH

1⁄

NAME: Karyn Lord JOB TITLE: Facilities manager COMPANY: Crown Bevcan

FM can make a difference

Charles Sinton/Rollright Facilities Stephen Green, ex-chairman of HSBC and newly-appointed Minister for Trade has made the following observation: “Any business which values its brand has to be able to ask and give a satisfactory answer to the question: how does the business contribute to the common good?”

In my experience, FM is one of the few remaining industries that is meritocratic, offering opportunities for hard-working individuals to succeed that simply would not be available in other employment sectors. It is an industry that can truly not only provide life chances to individuals but also help build sustainable communities through employment and development opportunities.

2⁄

The next big thing

John Bowen/chair of BIFM’s Procurement Sig Revenue is one of the key components of profit, and therefore its perceived position as the lifeblood on business is reflected in the amount of money spent on trying to generate it; sales and marketing, and all of their associated costs make a reasonable dent in a company’s expenditure and so does the amount spent on training the people involved. Customer relationship management (CRM) is a big thing.

It was the foot and mouth crisis which got me into FM. I was a catering manager for Russell & Brand at an abattoir serving 1,000 people a day. The site was closed during the outbreak and I was offered the opportunity to move into general FM. I love the diversity of FM. At 7.30am this morning I was outside gritting, I’ve covered for our receptionist who couldn’t get it today, I’ve done a permit to work, talked to a contractor about a new quote and helped to put the Christmas tree up. And it’s only lunchtime.

The calls at 2am to say the stores man hasn’t turned up and can you come in, are the downsides of FM. Fortunately it’s rare.

I’ve worked with my fair share of executives and vice-presidents. But I love the factory environment, it’s more real. You don’t get the “I’m too hot/too cold” complaints much in factories. It’s more about “the fork lift truck has crashed into and broken the roller shutters again”.

My proudest moment is not being made head of this or that, it’s seeing what happens to the people I train up from catering or cleaning staff.

3⁄

The PFI issue

Annie Gales/director of Service Works Group While the future of PFIs in the UK continues to lack clarity, there are many countries in the world that are embracing them and using the model to mitigate years of under-investment in infrastructure, re-enforcing a standard of living that people have come to expect and securing a competitive edge. Canada is one such country and it has been refreshing to attend the Canadian CCPPP National Conference on Public-Private Partnerships this week, where the Canadians have demonstrated that they are one of the leading lights in PPPs, with over 150 projects completed or in procurement.

www.fm-world.co.uk

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FM gets pushed from pillar to post by most businesses; you report into HR, then engineering, then finance. They don’t understand it. The business tries to cut back on cleaning and pay just the minimum wage, then wonders why the service standards fall.

I’ve been made redundant four times and am about to be Tupe’d for the ninth time. It’s frustrating that FMs are often brought in too late in the process.

In FM you have to be nice to people.

Communicating properly with customers and telling them when they’re problem will be fixed is the difference between good and bad FM. FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 19

6/1/11 14:43:04

FM CASE STUDY YELL CATHY HAYWARD

DEVELOPER: KIER PROPERTY AND INVISTA REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT MAIN CONTRACTOR: OVERBURY SIZE OF YELL’S PREMISES ON SITE: 153,000 SQ FT DESKS: 1,200 WORKSTATIONS FOR 1,500 STAFF QUANTITY SURVEYOR/PROJECT MANAGER: ARCADIS FIT-OUT DESIGN: BROADWAY MALYAN FURNITURE: FURNITURE SOLUTIONS TOTAL FM CONTRACT IN UK AND NORTHERN IRELAND (CLEANING, SECURITY, MAINTENANCE, RECEPTION): SHEPHERD FM HEALTH AND SAFETY: IN-HOUSE MANAGER SUPPORTED

BY SHEPHERD FM CATERING: HARBOUR AND JONES FITNESS SUITE: PERSONAL TOUCH FITNESS

Cathy Hayward finds out how at Yell’s new building at One Reading Central, you can have any colour, as long as it’s not yellow

WORTH

SHOUTING ABOUT 20 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

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www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 12:13:34

YELL

On-site facilities include a gym and several break-out areas

here’s something very familiar about the new Yell building in Reading. But it’s not until facilities manager Jon Buckley reveals that in preparation for the fit-out he spent a year nosing around 50 new builds, talking to their facilities managers about what worked (and what didn’t) that it becomes clear why there’s a sense of déjà vu.

The seven floors of the 218,800 sq ft, ten-storey building that Yell occupies at One Reading Central uses ideas borrowed from some of the UK’s best projects.

From EC Harris’s Kings Cross HQ, Buckley borrowed the idea of landside and airside areas, whereby clients can have meetings while avoiding secure areas; the circular meeting pods are reminiscent of the BBC; and Buckley received huge amounts of advice from IPC Media’s facilities director Jenny Noon, who suggested the use of TV screens to disseminate messages to avoid the mess of posters on the wall. Buckley also learnt what he didn’t like – Amex had giant posters of their adverts in its premises but Buckley felt that images of JR Hartley (a classic character in Yell’s TV adverts) wouldn’t create the right ambience, “and we certainly didn’t want it all to be yellow”.

In fact you have to look very hard to find anything yellow in Yell’s HQ. “We were very keen not to have a yellow building. We’ve tried to capture what the business is about without it being yellow.

That would have been too easy,” says Buckley. Instead Yell, and its design team, looked outside (at the green side of the building, not the views over nearby Reading

Station) and brought that natural feel into the building through green manifestations on the glass and in the art. The space feels bright and airy, helped by the huge 22,500 sq ft floorplates, the 2.75m floor-toceiling height windows and the few divisions across the floorplates – end panels have been kept low and storage units are used to divide up the teams. There are work settings for every different user – more than 1,200 traditional desks for the 1,500 employees, and 532 meeting, break-out and informal seats including project rooms containing white boards, table, chairs and sofas which can be booked for several weeks for teams working on specific projects.

Buckley would have liked to have adopted a complete hotdesking approach, but while the

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building is ready, the technology, (and one suspects Yell itself), is not quite ready for such a move. But the vast array of different ways and places to work mean that a gradual cultural change is taking place at the organisation. There is management recognition that work is no longer something that has to take place at a desk.

The company has gone from masses of cellular space in its previous buildings to just three enclosed offices, for the CEO, CFO and company secretary. The C-suite is far more transparent than before – although you need a certain security card to access the executive offices, they are visible through clear glass and feel very much part of the business.

The office floors have a north and south facilities services point.

FM QUICK FACTS

1,200 532 153,800

workstations for 1,500 staff but with flexible setup for growth

meeting, breaks out and informal seats

square footage of Yell’s floors at One Reading Central

PHOTOGRAPHY: PETE SEARLE

“The company has gone from masses of cellular space to three enclosed offices, for the CEO, CFO and company secretary, and the C-suite is literally more transparent”

Jon Buckley sought advice from fellow FMs before the fit-out FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 21

6/1/11 12:15:42

FM CASE STUDY YELL CATHY HAYWARD

Meeting pods and TV screens are nods to the BBC and EC Harris buildings

The north is primarily a kitchen area, with toasters, microwaves and a fridge with large bench-style seating, a TV and recycling points.

The south facilities point has a smaller kitchen area but a printing and copying area, recycling and centralised stationery. All of which encourages people from different departments and teams to interact and share ideas – something Buckley says is incredibly useful getting feedback on how people work, who they work with and what they think of the building.

Along with the C-suite, HR and finance, the ninth floor is home to a variety of meeting spaces, from enclosed meeting rooms to break out areas. The tenth houses the restaurant and again provides a variety of spaces for staff to eat, from a nod to Wagamama’s benches and café chairs to American diner booths and comfy sofas separated by spaghetti walls – something to appeal to everyone.

The result is, for Buckley, the culmination of a fascinating year’s research. “I had the best job in the world touring some great buildings for a year, and if I could change anything it would be that I had given up the day job and concentrated on the new build,” says Buckley.

“It’s easy to see why Yell bonded with Shepherd FM as it is the provider’s biggest client and the Yell team have a quick route to the top” 22 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

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Because in addition to working with Yell’s UK head of property Simon Taylor to look for, and then fit-out, new premises over the past five years, Buckley has had some challenging day-to-day FM issues to manage. Yell’s business model has undergone some major changes as it switched from a fully paper-based operation through the famous Yellow Pages, to a combined digital and paper operation. For the FM team, this has meant some major transformations over the past few years.

Over a period of time under different ownerships the organisation took accommodation in three offices in Reading and one in Slough. Meanwhile, the sales force would take over hotels for four to six months in particular areas they were targeting for advertising, take on six to eight rooms, create offices and work out of there until they were ready to move on to the new patch. “We recognised that this was a fairly haphazard way of operating, and decided to look for permanent office space on the border of two targeted regions,” says Buckley.

A group of 2,000-3,000 sq ft offices were designed as sales drop-in centres. But no sooner was this model in operation than the technology changed and it was felt that the sales staff didn’t always have to visit potential clients. As a result, these offices were closed down and larger sales hubs created, which were two-to-three times the size of the previous touchdown spaces and much better specified.

“But then we realised we could go one step further and not have any office for sales staff at all,” says Buckley. Now Yell has a contract with Regus for its sales teams to use serviced offices throughout the country.

When Buckley joined Yell almost 20 years ago, the firm was talking about bringing all its disparate offices into one major

building. That didn’t start to take shape until Taylor joined five years ago when the firm was occupying 30-40 properties across the UK. He has worked to reduce that to eight – the Reading head office, regional offices in Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Glasgow, London, Manchester and Newport, and international offices in the US, Spain and Latin America, the latest move being to amalgamate three Reading and one Slough office to One Reading Central, which was completed in November last year.

Its own internal changes mean that Yell is no easy client. Five years ago its FM was managed

in-house with only specialist services contracted out and the FM team stood at 30 people. The decision was taken to outsource facilities management but Yell went through two FM service providers – Alfred McAlpine in 2005 and Carillion in 2008 before it cemented a relationship with Shepherd FM in August 2009. The first two contractors were poorly matched, says Buckley. “They were big and we were getting smaller and we didn’t feel loved,” citing examples of an engineer fixing a problem on their site only to be called away to a more important client.

It’s easy then to see why the firm www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 12:18:47

YELL

GREEN CREDENTIALS

One Reading Central ne Reading Central is the first of three similar buildings which will create a campus environment near Reading station. It is Reading’s largest and greenest office premises and the town’s only speculative build with a Gold Breeam rating. The Yell fit-out achieved a RICS Ska Silver rating because it tries to ensure resources are used as effectively as possible including a lighting control system with motion sensors; follow-me printing; full floor-to-ceiling glazing allowing maximum benefit from daylight. Yell is moving to thin client technology to reduce the amount of computer equipment on desks, reducing heat emissions, lowering costs and improving energy efficiency. The building’s EPC rating is C55.

CSR sits outside Yell’s facilities management department because with Yell producing a large circulation paper production through the Yellow Pages, sustainability is a big issue for the business. Sustainability was at the heart of the building specification and was ensured through the use of technology, rather than encouraging employee engagement. “We know that people don’t do what they’re supposed to do, so we’ll do it for them,” says FM Jon Buckley. All waste, including that which is put in recycling bins, for example, goes to the same contractor and is then sorted.

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bonded with Shepherd FM – Yell is the FM provider’s biggest client and the Yell team have a quick route to the top. Shepherd FM’s CEO Noel Clancy accompanies us for the FM World tour and it’s hard to imagine the CEO of one of the big FM providers doing the same. Yell’s Taylor has also visited Shepherd’s offices so staff can know who their biggest client is.

Yell has also followed the same principle with its other contracts, outsourcing its catering to niche caterer Harbour and Jones and its gym to Personal Touch Fitness, a small corporate fitness provider.

Gary Pyle, Shepherd FM’s account www.fm-world.co.uk

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director at Yell, who used to work for a major FM service provider, argues that he would not have been able to provide the same level of service to Yell at his previous employer as he can now. “The challenge in Yell is that everything moves very quickly and that change is ongoing; if you’re a large organisation that’s quite a challenge to deal with.”

Internally, Yell has a thin FM team made up of seven people: Taylor, Buckley, an administrative assistant, an office manager and four post/switchboard staff.

Shepherd and Yell have cut out all wastage from the FM

operation and have become a lean operation by ensuring staff multi-task wherever possible.

“We’re not quite at the stage of an engineer with a spanner in hand walking past a catering trolley and wheeling it back to the kitchen, but we’re almost there,” says Pyle.

Cleaners, for example, are called housekeepers because they do so much more than just clean the building.

One Reading Central is testament to the success (so far) of the relationship between Yell and Shepherd FM. FM World visited on the ninth day of full occupation and while there were small issues to

be ironed out, the building is living up to its ‘ultimate workplace’ sell.

Yell’s HQ at One Reading Central embodies some of the best workplace design and usage ideas around and much of that is clearly down to the Buckley’s research, together with the partnership with Shepherd FM. If there is one criticism of borrowing ideas and styles from other projects, it is that the building fails to develop its own style and personality. But it will be down to the FM team and the employees themselves to adapt the workplace to suit their way of working and engender that sense of identity.

FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 23

6/1/11 12:29:01

FM FEATURE SECURITY PAUL HARVEY

SECURITY CHECK What does ‘security’ mean for today’s business? More than keeping employees safe, the security function now combines technology and manpower to provide customer service beyond asset protection, offering a key competitive edge. Illustration by Raymond Biesinger

n a world of diverse and complex security risks, delivering effective security and visitor management is a real challenge.

Risk management has the potential to impact multiple business functions. If integrated into the wider business risk strategy, security and visitor management can be seen as business enablers that ensure other parts of the business can operate with minimum disruption and risk. Modern security does not have to be viewed just as a cost, but more so a mechanism for contributing to the goals of an organisation including customer service and retention of employees.

The implications of getting security and visitor management wrong are immense. If people do not feel safe, then productivity and staff turnover can suffer. If visitors have a bad experience there is a possibility that customers and investors will take their business elsewhere. If visitors experience negative treatment the message they receive is that the organisation does not want them there. The visitor experience will influence the perception of the business, which is especially important in competitive times.

Excellence in security comes from understanding the wider challenge of securing the working environment, critical assets and infrastructure.

By delivering a better user experience and a warm and friendly welcome the business reputation is being protected, and achieving robust and secure visitor management is critical – the challenge is to deliver the best from both.

The security sector has traditionally operated in individual silos with facilities and purchasing departments having to select different providers in each discipline to achieve their security specifications.

In particular, the current price competitiveness of the guarding market has placed financial constraints on the development of the industry’s infrastructure.

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As a result, it is not uncommon for a single location to use completely different service partners for manned guarding, CCTV, front of house, access control, remote monitoring, keyholding and patrol services.

The tangible benefits for the FM function and enduser of rationalising the supply chain are significant.

Decreased time in dealing with operational reviews and a streamlined back-office ensure effective time management, cost reduction and removal of conflict of interest between service lines.

The future of security While key change drivers such as regulation, increasing employment costs, market consolidation and changing security requirements are stimulating industry change, the strength, initiative and ability of the competitive forces within the guarding industry are determining its shape. Companies that are embracing change and competing on product and service differentiation are moving ahead of their competitors. As a result, the security guarding industry has the opportunity to change from a low profit, mediocre-performing sector to become a profitable, stakeholder focused, professional partner.

Unless security guarding companies develop a knowledge base and the capability to provide solutions as opposed to manpower, they will not be able to move away from the cycle of cost reduction.

There are constant calls for end-users to buy on quality not price; the stark reality is that there is no added value consistently coming from the sector to justify margin increases. Providing a well-trained guard at a post is not adding value, it is fulfilling a requirement. Developing an effective overall security strategy and providing a cost-effective solution adds a dimension that justifies a margin increase.

Companies that are adopting holistic integrated service solutions, combining manpower, physical and electronic security, are beginning to develop www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 10:24:32

SECURITY

www.fm-world.co.uk

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FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 25

6/1/11 10:24:44

FM FEATURE SECURITY PAUL HARVEY

a competitive edge, creating two distinct market strategies: price competitive and value added.

Companies that demonstrate value-added differentiators have the opportunity to benefit in increased returns, which results in improved levels of investment, in turn benefiting the end-user.

The challenge that faces the FM sector is to consider the way specifications are viewed. Is service being specified, for example, on the basis of ‘three people, 24 hours a day’ or ‘we have a building and people to protect and front of house impacts the first impression of our business – what is the most effective solution’? This question is at the core of the future of security and visitor management. As a result there are a number of companies that are moving towards combining the various elements of security.

Winning combination In many corporates there is a clear move to softer customer interfaces during core working hours.

Security providers able to offer intelligent spend are delivering a blended solution of concierge and security guards during the working week and then supplementing this with a combination of manpower and technology out of hours. The needs of the customer are not remaining the same and providers are facing the challenge of finding new ways to meet them. The move to concierge services has tangible benefits, such as, the friendly impression that an employee or visitor gains as part of a customerfocused welcome. The extended menu of services that a concierge service can offer including taxi ordering or local contact with florists and dry cleaners can also demonstrate added value.

Electronic security and associated technology continues to develop at a phenomenal rate.

When combined with the increasing capability of communications networks, effective CCTV and access control can provide a cost-effective alternative to security guards. This change becomes particularly effective when combined with remote monitoring and emergency response.

Is the future a combination of security guards, concierge, technology and intelligent spend? The answer should be no. If businesses are managing their risks properly they should already be considering holistic, integrated, service solutions.

The fundamental questions for any business are: ● Have we considered our security risks recently? ● Are we protecting our assets, staff and visitors? ● Should we move to an integrated solution to meet our security, concierge and technology requirements by delivering intelligent spend? FM Paul Harvey is operations director of security, at Emprise Services

26 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

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NUMBER CRUNCH

WORKING IT ALL OUT The numbers 1 guard x 24 hours a day (168 hrs/wk) x officer pay rate of £8.00 per hour = £100,000 approximate annual cost Roughly £65,000 of this is incurred during nights and weekends (108 hrs/wk) ● In many cases the premises are unoccupied ● These costs are recurring every year Mitigating the Cost of 24/7 Guarding In the right circumstances, it is possible to implement technology solutions during out of hours periods, replacing manpower altogether.

1. CCTV – Good CCTV coverage can ensure that visually, all key areas are covered. Cameras can also be set ‘on alarm’ resulting in an event driven approach, which is now preferred to the conventional, continually recorded CCTV as it triggers action at the time of the event.

2. Remote monitoring – Camera ‘patrols’ can also be conducted by a remote CCTV operator to a predetermined schedule.

3. Access control – Allows people with authorised access to enter the building at any time and visitors can use an intercom system which contacts a central control room to validate their entry.

4. 2-way audio – Can be used to alert intruders that the police are on their way in the event of an incident.

The benefits: ● The single biggest benefit of a blended solution is that once the system has been installed, other than maintenance, there are no large recurring costs ● Payback can be achieved in less than 12 months, with significant annual savings ● These savings can be re-invested in improving the terms of the manpower element of the contract, driving up standards by: 1) attracting higher calibre personnel 2) decreasing staff turnover 3) increasing management support 4) motivating the service partner by delivering profitable contracts

FM QUICK FACTS

£3.2bn

The estimated turnover of the security industry in the UK

75%

The top 20 security providers’ control of the market www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 10:25:08

have confidence in your security and fire solutions NSI believes every customer, whether a householder or large commercial organisation, is entitled to receive a first class service from security and fire detection companies.

As a specialist certification and approvals body, we ensure our approved companies comply with industry Standards and our own Codes of Practice.

Our inspection services are said to be the toughest in the industry and by specifying NSI approved companies you are protecting your interests, your property, your assets and your personnel.

find out more at

www.nsi.org.uk or call 01628 637512 safeguarding high standards

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4/1/11 12:15:47

FM FEATURE STRATEGIC FM ADRYAN BELL

Adryan Bell, director of workplace strategy and change consulting with Johnson Controls and author of Re-imagining the Office, explains how six elements will define the office of the future: efficiency, effectiveness, e-work, expression, engagement and experience

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Future workplaces here have been decades of speculation about the future office. Are open-plan work environments here to stay?

Will having your own desk be a thing of the past? Do we even need offices in the future?

These are valid questions in challenging economic times, together with the advances in technology and working practices, and changes in workforce demographics and attitudes.

Given these factors, it’s clear that now is the time to re-think, re-invent, even re-imagine, the workplace. But what will this mean

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for those creating, managing or simply working in an office?

Looking back We’ve been here before.

Computerisation in the 1970s, personal computing and mobile telephony in the 1980s and mainstream internet access in the 1990s, all introduced radical change at work. In reality, though, very little physically changed in the office, even if our lives beyond its walls were transformed forever.

Certainly the nature of work altered, as the age of the knowledge worker emerged and

‘new ways of working’ (a term already 20 years old) first came into vogue.

It is virtually impossible to compare a working day now with one 20 years ago. Four generations of worker are currently shaping the future office and each has differing needs, expectations and roles to play. It won’t be easy to get it right, but what is clear is that the timebound office workplaces prevalent today have to change.

Despite all the advances in the way we work and live, organisations and their cultures cling to deep-rooted conventions www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 14:03:11

▲

STRATEGIC FM

THE HIVE

A combined, work/home space could be the future of the office, spurred on by technological advancement

and traditions. They are obsessed with (and strangled by) an inappropriate need for paper, desks, personal offices, meetings, formality, complex processes and a culture of physical presence.

The real revolution has yet to materialise.

Destination of choice But these are unprecedented times.

The office workplace can no longer afford to be out of step with the real world and neither can those who have built careers, services and products around it.

In recent times seemingly imperishable organisations have faltered because of an inability to innovate, adapt and be relevant.

There is no room for complacency.

Survival of the fittest has never been more apt.

But there is opportunity here as well as threat. The value of a physical place, such as the office, will become increasingly important. Niche environments will emerge where people with common purpose and values can come together to balance and give meaning to their virtual and mobile existences.

It needs to be the right place, though – a distinctive, functional and rewarding destination of choice. It will need to compete with, as well as complement, alternative virtual and physical choices. And we need to look beyond the usual focus on cost cutting for the answer if real change is to be achieved.

Efficiency Efficiency is, of course, still important. Decades of failure to address waste management led to a raft of efficiency drives in the 1990s, in particular, by technology and consultancy organisations.

Walls were removed, space standards/allocations reduced and offices closed, as remote working was imposed to achieve huge savings. www.fm-world.co.uk

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1 Many of these early developments were crude and failed to tackle efficiency beyond the obvious easy wins. In fact, they gave the terms open-plan and hot-desking a bad name. Even today, efficiency-driven change has given rise to numerous examples of generic workspaces filled with unpopular linear rows of desks; in other words, the one-sizefits-all office.

But there are new, more sophisticated ways of achieving efficiency, as an outcome rather than a driver of change.

Effectiveness Over time, there has been a growing recognition of the need to balance efficiency with effectiveness. Better attention to office design and layout, linked to emerging workstyles, workspace utilisation and reviews of furniture styles and storage levels have led to more interesting and acceptable office environments.

These are often referred to as ‘landscaped offices’, characterised by a mix of new activity-based work settings and a balance of open and enclosed areas, as well as formal and informal spaces.

Interestingly, the term actually originates from the Bürolandschaft office planning evolved in

▲ SMART OFFICE Recreation spaces, such as bars and clubs could comprise some elements of today’s workplace in a social setting

“Despite all the advances in the way we work and live, organisations and their cultures cling to deeprooted conventions and traditions” Germany in the 1950s and 60s.

But getting this balance right is not always easy, especially if, despite the mobility of workstyles both within and outside the office, the traditional notion of a deskper-person remains.

Typically while new ‘informal’ work and meeting spaces are added to the working environment, there is a reluctance to reduce the provision of formal desks and meeting spaces, which can result in both an overprovision of places to work and

meet and also a need to tighten workplace standards to ensure efficiencies are still achieved.

This lack of innovation can result in an unpopular, wasteful and unbalanced modern work space.

E-work Aligning the office with the true nature of work is still the biggest challenge, as workstyles, work patterns and career models become independent of the traditional office environment. The boundaries between work and personal lives, FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 29

6/1/11 14:03:30

FM FEATURE STRATEGIC FM ADRYAN BELL

▲ GATTACA Security, surveillance and efficiency are the major theme of this ‘dystopic’ interpretation of the future workplace

30 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

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as well as between organisations, are blurring and there is a need to reassess our relationship with the office. And this inevitably means, for many, breaking the time-bound link with the desk, or at least the concept of a desk of our own.

Many workers with processdriven, ‘anchor’ or specialist roles will still need a dedicated workstation, of course. But for many others, the ability to work anywhere within or beyond the office enables a workplace less dominated by desks to be created.

This, in turn, can improve utilisation and efficiency and increase scope for the desirable alternative work settings to support both private and collaborative working, adding value and appeal to the office. In this scenario, even enclosed offices are possible (on a shared, bookable basis, of course).

Beyond the office walls, armed

with mobile technologies and everexpanding broadband speed and access (as well as organisational ‘permission’), there are a range of private (home, other offices, customer sites), semi-public (business centres and clubs) and public places (cafe, hotels and shopping malls) where people can choose to work alone or virtually with our colleagues, keeping in touch through online ‘presence’.

Similarly, organisations may choose to reduce their office portfolio to optimise this wider workscape – by encouraging dispersed home and remote working, as well as sharing workspace with partners and compatible organisations. However, within these dynamics, it will be extremely important that the ‘office’ (whatever its nature, size or location) is a regular choice for the workforce, if they are to remain

connected to an organisation’s values and purpose.

So organisations need to get this right. And if they can, the office has a new important future role to play for them.

Expression Increased thinking around office layout and its links to differing work style activities has provided a stronger role for interior design, which has brought further enhancement, stimulation and meaning to the office workplace in terms of colour, mood and imagery.

It’s a welcome change from decades of grey and beige blandness.

Such developments have also helped to reinforce organisational identity and branding internally, borrowing ideas from the retail world and providing new symbolism and messages for occupants. www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 14:03:53

STRATEGIC FM

“The workplace can no longer afford to be out of step with the real world and neither can those who have built careers, services and products around it”

It’s not a new concept of course, although historically, office expression has only been used externally or in reception/client spaces to impress and portray a sense of power and stability to customers and clients. Security issues and trends towards multioccupancy buildings have changed this emphasis more recently.

In its place, attention to branding and design of internal workspace is an important development that is key to making the changing workplace an attractive proposition to those who need and want to work within it.

Making physical changes is the easy part. Supporting the workforce to understand, accept and embrace this new thinking is more challenging, no matter how logical the solution is.

Engagement An attractive workspace also has to be highly functional, effective and relevant. Changing mindsets in this context will not be easy; it never has been. People have a special relationship with their work surroundings, especially their own desks.

Yet we have all embraced huge changes in our lives. We often make difficult choices and balance pros and cons to make change work for us. The same principles apply in the office to support that same self-realisation, through skilful communication.

To support this process the end solutions also have to be attractive, comfortable, relevant and effective, adding new value so end users feel a sense of gain, not loss; even if it is very different to what they have been used to.

This means involving but also challenging. It means inspiring confidence through clear rationale, direction, leadership and support.

The future office needs to change to survive, but above all it needs people in it to thrive, so the two need to be aligned in purpose. www.fm-world.co.uk

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Experience The final piece of the jigsaw is the sum of all these parts – experience.

Often overlooked, it is the subtle, subconscious element that steers our preferences and decisions. It is what guides our choices around holidays, hotels, restaurants and cars. It is what attracts us to a destination and makes us want to come back.

In a time when most products are capable of meeting our basic needs or specifications, experience is the one thing that can differentiate one situation or product from another.

A visit to the future office needs to be a positive experience, functionally and emotionally, if it is to be the desired future destination of choice for many aspects of our work.

Key to that experience are people, systems and (almost hotelstyle) service that allow effective access to information, knowledge and facilities that may not be available in other ‘places’.

Attracting a critical mass of people is therefore important.

The crowded football stadium on a cold, wet day (when the match could have been watched at home) is testament to the power of experience. The future office needs

to become just as compelling.

And this is the challenge for those designing and managing future offices.

▲ THE ECO OFFICE A strong relationship with the world around us could shape our offices, with sustainability at the forefront

The e-office All of the elements explored here conveniently begin with ‘e’.

Collectively they add up to the imagined ‘e-office’. The ‘e’ prefix has come to stand for ‘electronic’ as new words like email, e-commerce and eBay enter our language.

However, in the context of the future office ‘e’ may well stand for ‘extraordinary’ might be the most relevant interpretation.

Like so many other products and services today, the office will fail if it only manages to be ordinary. That will no longer be good enough.

The six elements help define the future office as a distinctive, niche destination that will be a great place to be. A fantastic opportunity, but also a necessity and wake-up call for many of us.

Take a look around you. How does your workplace or strategy measure up to this vision?

Exploring the future disturbs the present but the divergence that has developed over time between the office workplace and the real world in which it operates no longer makes sense.

FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 31

6/1/11 14:04:11

FM MONITOR TONY SOPER

LEGAL UPDATE

Tony Soper is Kingspan Environmental’s GB sales director

SCOT TISH OIL STO R AGE CH A N GES

hanges to oil storage regulations in C Scotland make it vital that you contain any oil or fuel spills. The fallout is increasingly, financial, as well as environmental Oil or fuel spills, as BP will testify, can be devastating.

While disasters on the scale of the Gulf of Mexico are mercifully rare, oil and fuel pollution is unfortunately a major issue across the world – and this country is no exception.

Incidents of oil and fuel pollution are so frequent in fact that, taken collectively, they are two of the most common pollutants contaminating UK rivers, lakes and seas.

What’s more, they can cause immense damage to aquatic environments. When oil is spilt into a watercourse, either directly or via a surface water drainage system, the harm done to plants and animals is often widespread and devastating.

Even if they pass apparently harmlessly into the sewerage network, oil or fuel can still cause havoc in sewage treatment works.

Given these scenarios, it’s no surprise to hear that oil storage regulations in Scotland have recently been updated and, in the process, made far more stringent.

Regulatory changes Changes to The Water Environment (Oil Storage) (Scotland) Regulations were introduced in three stages, starting in 2006. The final instalment came into force on 1 April 2010.

Under this instalment, all new and existing commercial and agricultural oil storage tank installations larger than 200 litres 32 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

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must have secondary containment (eg, a bund or drip tray). Any valves, pipes or other ancillary equipment must also be placed within the secondary containment to contain drips and spillages.

Business owners in Scotland who fail to store their fuel and oil in bunded, above-ground tanks could be liable for fines of up to £40,000.

The regulations apply to any kind of oil, including petrol, diesel, kerosene, mineral oil, heating oil, lubricating oil, waste oil, vegetable and plant oil.

Typical examples of the types of locations that will be affected by the regulation update include factories, public sector buildings, retail, offices, farms, motor and transport garages.

In terms of domestic buildings, all tanks larger than 2,500 litres serving Scottish homes have to be bunded. Any tank less than 2,500 litres in this sector is covered by The Building Regulations (Scotland) 2004, which require a risk assessment to determine the need for secondary containment.

We understand that the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) has stated its intent to investigate and take action wherever pollution has occurred, with priority ascribed to sites that have caused water pollution and/or where there is a serious potential for pollution, for example, if the site is less than 10m from surface waters or less than 50m from a well or borehole.

Scottish v English law There are similar regulations in England, namely the Control of Pollution (Oil Storage) (England) Regulations 2001 (details of which can be found on the Environment Agency website).

However, the requirements of the regulations in Scotland differ slightly from those in England.

For example: ● Regulations in Scotland apply to storage of waste oil, whereas the storage of waste mineral oils is exempt under English regulations because it is covered

by The Waste Management Licensing Regulations 1994. ● Regulations in Scotland apply to storage of oil in buildings while the English regulations exempt the storage of oil within a building ● Regulations in Scotland require

CASE STUDY In 2008, around 300 gallons of diesel fuel which leaked from the delivery hose serving an unbunded diesel fuel tank in Aberdeenshire ended up in a nearby river.

It caused pollution of a local river and the death of a number of invertebrates. The tank owner was fined £2,000 and also had to pay the bill for the clean-up costs. Failure to provide adequate bunding for the tank and to carry out appropriate maintenance on it resulted in serious pollution of the river – and considerable financial cost to the owner. Source: SEPA

that if oil is stored in a portable container of less than 200 litres, the container must be of sufficient strength and structural integrity that it doesn’t leak in ordinary use. There is no similar requirement in the English regulations ● Regulations in Scotland exempt oil stored in accordance with a Part A permit under the Pollution Prevention and Control (PPC) Regulations 2000, or the Environmental Protection (Prescribed Processes and Substances) Regulations 1991. Premises used as an oil distribution depot for the onward distribution of oil to other places are also exempt under Scottish regulations. The English regulations exempt storage of oil at premises used for refining oil or for the onward distribution of oil to other places. (source: SEPA) Information about the changes to the regulations and other differences between Scotland and England can be found on the SEPA website: www.sepa.org. uk/water/water_regulation/ regimes/pollution_control/ oil_storage.aspx It’s perhaps no surprise that, well before the new regulations came into force, many facilities in Scotland were already taking a bunded-only approach to new and replacement installations. It future-proofed their installations and avoided any possibility that the owner of the building could be held liable for single-skin tanks that might be installed in error.

There are already local authorities that specify all tanks must be bunded – if in doubt, check with your own authority. FM www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 11:24:52

LEGAL NEWS

Court report BT fined after worker dies HARVEY (JONATHAN) V PLYMOUTH CITY COUNCIL [2010] EWCA CIV 860

In this case the Court of Appeal considered whether or not a land owner was liable under occupier’s liability when someone was injured while acting recklessly (running around in the dark while drunk).

The case concerned land owned by the council used by local youngsters as an informal recreation ground. At the edge of the land there was a 5.5m drop onto a car park. A chain link fence along this boundary was set back 1-2m from the edge. The fence was not properly maintained and had been pushed down to about 65cm.

Harvey, a 21-year-old male, had been out drinking. He jumped out of his taxi at the end of the evening, ran across the land, tripped over the fence and fell over the edge into the car park below, suffering serious injuries.

Under the Occupiers’ Liability Act 1957 (OLA 1957), an occupier of land owes a duty of care to ‘visitors’. The duty is to take such care as in all the circumstances is reasonable to see that the visitor will be reasonably safe in using the premises for the purposes for which the visitor is invited or permitted by the occupier to be there (section 2(2), OLA 1957).

A landowner may, by their

conduct, confer an implied licence for someone to be on the their land. A trespasser is subject to the lesser duty of care under the Occupiers’ Liability Act 1984.

In deciding whether Harvey was a visitor, the court said that the question was not whether his activity might have been foreseen, but whether it had been implicitly assented to by the council.

The decision The court decided that Harvey did have an implied licence, created by the council’s conduct in allowing the land to be used.

However, the licence was for general recreational activity and extended to normal activities carrying normal risks.

The licence did not extend to reckless activities such as running around in the dark while drunk, so Harvey was not

a visitor at the time of the accident.

Overturning the first instance decision (which found the council liable, but Harvey 75 per cent contributorily negligent), the court decided that the council was not liable.

Over the past few years the Court of Appeal has been taking a much more robust view of occupiers’ liability: if someone behaves irresponsibly he or she must face the consequences, serious though they may be.

Conclusion However, land owners need to make sure that appropriate safeguards are in place to protect those using their property in the permitted fashion. There is also the practical point that landowners need to be aware of their land ownership and where they may have occupiers’ liability.

This can be difficult for bodies such as councils, where a regular audit of land owned may be required to keep on top of maintenance and potential risks of liability under OLA 1957. FM Victoria Blanchard is an associate at Allen & Overy LLP

Communications company BT has been fined £300,000 after the death of a worker who fell from a ladder while carrying out installation works. Power construction engineer David Askew, from Braintree, in Essex, suffered fatal head injuries after falling from a wooden ladder at London’s Canonbury Telephone Exchange on 27 October 2006.

BT were found guilty of breaching section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 at a previous hearing.

Clarification: 25 November We apologise for an error in the article published in the issue of FM World dated 25 November 2010, entitled How to: Understand emergency lighting by Paul Caddick at PHS. The error concerns the inclusion of superseded legislation; the Fire Precautions (Workplace) Regulations 1997 referred to in the article were revoked and replaced by the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. The inclusion of an excerpt from these regulations was intended to provide guidance on the provision of emergency lighting. This information can be found by reference to the Building Regulations 2000, which details the requirements for new buildings and major refurbishments. Reference should be made to specifically approved document B, table 9, which shows the locations that must be provided with emergency lighting.

NEED SOME GOOD ADVICE? The Good Practice Guide to SELECTING FM SOFTWARE The BIFM publishes a series of good practice guides which are free of charge to all members. For a full list of titles or to download the guides visit www.bifm.org.uk Non-members: call 020 7880 8543 to order your copy

www.fm-world.co.uk

32-33_Legal AC.indd 33

FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 33

6/1/11 10:29:59

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the future of our business – from the business end. Whether you’d like to simply attend a regional meeting and the national conference, organise an event, join a committee, become a mentor or sharpen your vocal or literary skills by being a key speaker or writing

in FM World, we’d love to hear from you. Because to help everyone in the industry make the most of it, we need all the useful tools we can get our hands on. So why not get involved and get more out of FM – for yourself and everyone else.

T: 0845 058 1358 E: membership@bifm.org.uk www.bifm.org.uk

2/8/10 12:19:58

4/1/11 12:28:12

FM MONITOR JOHN LANE

TECHNICAL

John Lane is director, IT consultancy, at Cundall Communications

W I-F I R AD IATIO N I N S CH O O L S

ith so many children using the internet in the classroom, exposure to Wi-Fi radiation has become a cause for concern. How can FMs keep radiation at a safe level during the school day?

W

More than 70 per cent of secondary and 50 per cent of primary schools have installed Wi-Fi networks. Typically, these are used to supplement wired networks and are used mostly with laptop computers.

A Wi-Fi network operates at 2.5GHz and allows the student to use a laptop to connect to the school’s network and the internet without a wired data socket.

It allows schools to use laptops in any teaching space at any time and is much more flexible than having permanent, hard-wired ICT classrooms with fixed computers.

Some teaching unions and parents, however, have expressed concern about staff and students being subjected to Wi-Fi radiation during the school day.

Figure 1 illustrates the typical radiation experienced from a Wi-Fi wireless access point,

a laptop with Wi-Fi and a mobile phone. The actual level of radiation depends on many factors, including the equipment make, antenna configuration and ceiling construction.

To compare levels of radiation experienced by the human body we need to consider the power of the transmitter, distance from the antenna and length of exposure.

The intensity of radiation from an antenna falls off quite rapidly: double the distance and the power is down to a quarter; four times the distance and the power is onesixteenth per unit of area.

Typically, Wi-Fi wireless access points are fixed to a ceiling at 2.5m above the floor and radiate 300mW (0.3 Watts). A seated student will be about 1.5m away from the antenna, even if they are sitting more or less underneath it.

RADIATION FROM WI-FI AND MOBILE PHONES Wi Fi Access Point 2.5 GHz 300 mW 0.011 W/m2 @ 1.5m

0.039 W/m 0.095 W/m 2 0.16 W/m 2

0.024 W/m 2 3.9 W/m 2 0.011 W/m 2

0.009 W/m 2

Laptop 25 GHz 30 mW 2 @ 0.5m 0.009 W/m

www.fm-world.co.uk

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Mobile Phone 1.8 GHz 500 mW 3.9 W/m 2 @ 10cm

2

A Wi-Fi laptop will radiate 30mW (0.03 Watts) and the antenna would typically be 0.5m from the user. The result is that a student will experience radiation of about 0.01W/m² from the Wi-Fi access point on the ceiling and a similar amount from his own laptop.

These levels of radiation are far lower than those from a mobile phone though of course they are present for some six hours each school day.

Wi-Fi radiation levels from both access points and laptops are well below those recommended by the Health Protection Agency (HPA), whose guidance is based on EC regulation (1999/519/EC) which sets the following maximum safe levels: Frequency range: 10MHz-10GHz Whole body average SAR (W/kg): 0.08 ● Localised (head and trunk) SAR (W/kg): 2.0 ● Localised (limbs) SAR (W/kg): 4.0 ● ●

The whole body average specific energy absorption rate (SAR) for a student weighing 40kg would be 0.08 x 40 = 3.2W. A student 1.5m from a 300mW Wi-Fi access point would receive in the region of 0.01 Watts, which is less than 1/300th of the HPA’s recommended maximum.

The radiation from mobile phone masts is also present all day but the level inside a school building is quite low and the real exposure is from the student using their own mobile phone.

With a typical mobile phone held close to the ear (less than 10cm) the radiation can be as high as 4W/m² – 400 times higher than from a Wi-Fi antenna 1.5m away or a Wi-Fi-enabled laptop 0.5m away.

One way to compare Wi-Fi radiation with a mobile phone is that sitting for six hours underneath a Wi-Fi access point using a Wi-Fi enabled laptop will subject a student to the same cumulative radiation as just one two-minute mobile phone call.

What can schools do?

Schools can make sure that laptops are used on a desk and not on the student’s lap.

This significantly reduces the radiation reaching the student’s body.

Schools can buy intelligent Wi-Fi systems that manage the power radiated by each Wi-Fi access point. The best systems manage all wireless transmissions centrally, and automatically reduce the transmit power levels of each Wi-Fi access point to provide uniform coverage.

Schools can provide permanent hard-wired, fixed PCs in libraries, learning resource centres, internet cafes and anywhere where students will spend many hours using a computer. This also helps the school conserve the valuable wireless spectrum and only use wireless technology where the mobility and flexibility are worthwhile.

What can parents do?

Parents can encourage their children to send texts rather than make phone calls – the phone is held much further from the head when texting.

Parents can buy their children a headset/microphone which means that the phone can be held much further from the head when in use – particularly the hollow air tube type of headset that overcomes possible re-radiation from the headphone wires. FM FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 35

6/1/11 10:30:47

FM MONITOR JANE DEAN

HOW TO…

Jane Dean is director of Jane Dean & Associates

MANAG E THE VAT I N CR EA S E I N YO UR CAT ER I N G F U N C T I O N

he rate of VAT increased from 17.5 per cent to 20 per cent on 4 January. How will this and the increase in food prices affect the catering function of your organisation? What actions do you need to take to maintain its profitability?

and development plan that includes a refresher on up selling techniques and a full customer service training programme.

Execute with staff regularly.

Audit the premises and assess customer satisfaction.

Ensure that managers and their teams are skilled, effective and productive and can deliver the service required.

Top tips for 2011

4⁄

T

Client organisations will be keen to reduce risks and cut the cost of catering during this period of economic recovery.

The increase in VAT can be tackled by price increases, re-engineering menus, adding value where appropriate and managing overhead costs more efficiently. Organisations that can offer great customer service will add value to their offer, driving revenue and profitability. So how do you go about it?

1⁄

Contractors

Examine your current contractual agreements and agree with your contactors how you will either increase your tariffs or reorganise your service to shoulder some or all of the VAT rise.

Conduct an intensive cost and sales analysis to determine the gross profit achievable for each dish or product line. This will highlight if all or only some items need to be increased in order to maintain budgetary targets.

Assess upcoming contract negotiations in light of the VAT increase and agree how this will be managed and accounted for now and in the future.

2⁄

Fixed prices Good management of fixed price and

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KEY POINTS ● Do not overlook VAT increases

– they can have a negative impact on catering budgets and subsidies ● Plan ahead. Consider the impact of adjusting your tariffs and communicate any changes ● Add value to your offer to drive revenue and profitability in order to negate the increases BIFM Catering Special Interest Group

commercial contracts are critical to the profitability of the caterer and delivery of either the return or fixed subsidy to the client.

Conduct an early meeting with all parties to establish how, what and when the tariffs or services will change.

Conduct a thorough customer use review and assess whether all elements of the service are still important to customers. Small changes may remove the need to increase tariffs.

Create an action plan for change and review it regularly.

3⁄

Customers

Delivering great customer service is more important than ever, especially if the rise in VAT leads to less custom in restaurants, pubs and hotels, intensifying competition in the sector.

Ensure there is a training

Marketing

Execute a marketing plan with discounted offers. Like it or not, discounting is a critical part of the retail landscape. The plan, be it for a restaurant, café or retail outlet must be appropriate to the facility. Differentiate your business from the competition and agree what discounting methods will be undertaken.

Allow for the cost of reprinting menus and associated marketing.

5⁄

Revenue

Grow your revenue and gross margin.

Re-engineer the menus so that price rises go unnoticed. Add something to the perceived value so people see they are getting something extra. Take care not to devalue the product.

Manage the tariffs and encourage staff to up sell on high volume profitable items. Reward staff for their efforts. Execute your agreed marketing plan.

6⁄

Hospitality

Examine alternative ways of delivering your hospitality services by creating deli, café and retail style services. Explore nil subsidies, commercial or franchise opportunities.

Benchmark operating ratios against competitors and establish

where key costs such as labour, food cost and other operating expenses vary. Then take action.

7⁄

Costs

Look at supplier and procurement deals, and negotiate on a regular basis to achieve the best price, quality and value for your customers.

Agree an annual budget.

Ensure the correct management controls and audits are in place to report on costs and revenue on a weekly/monthly basis, and take actions as a result.

8⁄

Zero rating

Could you be eligible for zero rating on cold takeaway food?

If you are not a VAT-exempt business find out whether cold takeaway food and drink (excluding crisps, sweets, beverages and bottled water) are being traded as zero-rated.

Adherence to seating area requirements and recording volumes of cold takeaway food sales are critical to satisfying the needs of HMRC. You can also use HMRC’s bespoke retail scheme (see notice 709/1 on the HMRC website: www.hmrc.gov.uk). FM

FURTHER INFO ● BIFM Forums The catering

special interest group supports and promotes the BIFM, acts as a centre of excellence, shares knowledge, promotes best practice and responds to proposed legislative changes. ● HM Revenue & Customs The National Advice Service (0845 010 9000) has information on VAT changes. HMRC has also published a useful guide: www. hmrc.gov.uk/budget2010/vat.htm

www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 11:25:57

Advertorial

Westway Services have been successfully using thermal imaging systems for several years and the results of the new technology are startling

Taking the Heat Out of Energy Reduction When making an assessment of any building be it for its energy efficiency, electrical safety or fluid leakage it is easy to think of the ‘old ways’ of simply doing a visual survey and looking for telltale signs of poorly fitting windows, an overheating generator, uninsulated pipe work or damp patches on walls. However, with growing pressure on energy conservation, carbon reduction and cost savings, now is the time to take the whole thing more seriously.

Westway Services have been successfully using thermal imaging systems for several years and the results of the new technology are startling. No longer are we resigned to looking at the external fabric of the building – now we can look into the materials of the building itself. Every object gives off an amount of thermal radiation and it is possible to identify problems before they become impossible to repair or affect other equipment or elements within the building.

Thermal imaging is ideal for surveying buildings, heat emitting services, plant and equipment within a building. For example, during the construction of a new building a thermal imaging survey can measure the heat energy through building fabric and can identify problems such as cold bridges, air pro leakage or insulation gaps. It can be lea used to identify areas for potential us improvement, minimising heat loss and im energy wastage, which in turn reduces en running costs and carbon emissions. ru

side of a building to another. The remedial work can then be focussed on the exact area of concern and the costs of the project can be managed to ensure the problem is resolved effectively.

The need for thermal imaging to be used as part of a comprehensive energy survey, is growing with the increasing emphasis on energy and carbon reduction. Combining the thermal images with the use of specialist software will generate an accurate assessment of the heat loss from a building, which can then be used as the basis for prioritising energy saving actions and the associated payback calculations.

Westway have also used thermal imaging for predictive maintenance of building services to assess high voltage distribution boards, power supplies, transformers and machinery. This is achieved with minimal disruption, highlighting any overloaded components, out of phase power supplies or poor connections. It can also help re-prioritise a maintenance programme, minimise shutdown time and satisfy insurance policy requirements.

Thermal Imaging can boast the following benefits s a non-destructive test method s a fast, efficient and economic way of pinpointing the exact cause of water penetration or other similar problems provide a visual picture for temperatures over a large area needing to be compared s peed up production and increase the accuracy of energy surveys

In existing buildings, Westway use tthermal imaging to identify faulty power management systems, areas of p poor insulation and the extent of p damage caused by water leaks, as well as many other potential problems. example with water leaks this has resulted For exam in the path of a water leak through a roof being tracked from one

s remove the guess work when assessing the extent of concealed damage in inaccessible or hazardous areas s be used for preventative maintenance to identify overloaded circuits, pumps and motors. s be used to find defects in shafts, pipes, and other metal or plastic parts s provide compliance with Parts L and J of the Building Regulations

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FMW.13.01.10.037.indd 1

4/1/11 12:17:29

FM MONITOR DR ROB YEUNG

CAREERS ADVICE

Dr Rob Yeung is an author and business psychologist at consulting firm Talentspace

SU CCESSF U L IN T ERV I EWI N G A N D R ECRUI T M E N T SK I L L S

ccording to one business expert, competency-based interviewing is the only way to attract the best and most talented people in the business

A

What questions do you ask when you’re interviewing candidates?

When you’re looking to fill a vacancy, do you ever ask: ‘What are your strengths and weaknesses?’ or ‘Where do you see yourself in five years’ time?’ Unfortunately, research by universities and employers suggests that such questions may be unproductive. Most candidates are too savvy to reveal any true weaknesses and of course they’re only going to tell you how their strengths match your job specification perfectly. An increasing number of businesses use a method of interviewing called competencybased interviewing. For example, I recently put a training programme in place to instruct nearly 10,000 branch managers at HSBC to interview using this method.

Identify competencies ‘Competencies’ is merely management jargon for the skills and behaviours that lead to success within a particular organisation.

Many organisations already have a list of competencies, capabilities or values governing people’s behaviour. Either get hold of this set of competencies or encourage your human resources department to identify the skills that are right for your organisation.

There are two key principles behind competency-based interviewing: 1. Ask questions in the past tense about actual, specific incidents that the candidate can talk you through. Research shows that past behaviour is the best predictor of future performance.

2. Ask follow-up questions to probe the incident in detail to ensure that the candidate isn’t exaggerating his involvement and skill.

Competency-based interviewing Given the two basic rules, competency-based interviewing involves asking candidates not only different questions, but also more 38 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

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questions than they may be used to answering. As such, I usually introduce competency-based interviewing with a short spiel along the lines of: “I’m going to interview you using a method known as competencybased interviewing. This means that I’ll be asking you questions about specific incidents and situations that happened to you in the past.

Please try to stay focused on the specific situation rather than talking in generalities about how you generally go about doing things.

“Also, you may find that I shall be interrupting you quite a lot during the interview. This doesn’t mean that you’re giving me the wrong information. It means that I’ve got the information I need and am simply moving you on in the interests of saving time.”

Ask questions using the STAR acronym Most organisations find that certain skills or competencies are important for their leaders and employees irrespective of their roles. Such competencies may include: influencing skills, teamworking

ability, customer service, decision making, leadership, and so on. For each of the competencies you want to investigate, you can prepare questions to ask by covering four broad areas: ● Situation. Ask candidates to give you a little background about the skill you’re looking for.

For example, a question about teamworking might be: “Give me a specific example of a time you made a significant contribution to a team. What was the situation?” Or a question about influencing skills might be: “Could you please talk me through a situation in which you persuaded someone to change their mind?” ● Task. Next, ask candidates what their task or objectives were. For example, ask “What were you hoping to achieve?” or “Why did you need to change that person’s mind?” ● Actions. Most of your question should be around what candidates actually did within that situation.

Remember that past behaviour is the best predictor of future on-the-job performance, so all of your questions (as well as the candidates’ answers) should be in the past tense. Your aim is to get quite a lot of detail about what the candidates did, what responses they got, and so on. For example, if you’re asking candidates about their influencing skills, you might ask a series of questions including: “What exactly did you do or say to influence this person?”, “Why did you do that? What alternatives did you consider? What initial response

did you get? What did you do next? What was the major obstacle in persuading this person? It’s only when you get into the detail of what candidates claim to have done that you can separate the strong candidates from the weaker ones who either don’t have the skills you require or who may even have been exaggerating their experience. ● Results. The final letter in the STAR acronym is for the results that candidates achieved. After all, you want to understand whether candidates’ actions led to successful outcomes or not.

As a rule of thumb, try to allow around 15 minutes to probe each competency in enough detail.

Even expert interviewers find that they need at least 10 minutes to talk about a competency, so err on the side of allowing more rather than less time when you begin competency-based interviews.

Also, aim to spend around 80 per cent of your time asking about the actions that candidates took.

Asking about the situation and task should only take a minute or two at most – these initial questions are about scene-setting. Ultimately, we as interviewers are more concerned with the actions and behaviour of candidates. FM i Dr Rob Yeung is a business psychologist and author of books including Successful Interviewing and Recruitment (Kogan Page) and The Extra One Per Cent: How small changes make exceptional people (Macmillan). BIFM readers can purchase Successful Interviewing and Recruitment for the special price of £8.50 including P&P. Call 01903 828503 and mention code CS0910

FINAL THOUGHTS The competency-based interviewing method involves asking many more questions – and much more specific questions – than the traditional ‘let’s have a chat’ style of interviewing. But if your goal is to hire the best, most talented people, it’s the only type of interviewing to use.

www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 11:26:38

Radio Tech.indd 1

5/1/11 13:49:21

Have your finger on the pulse of FM Get to the heart of facilities management by joining the BIFM today.

Be at the very heart of your profession by joining the BIFM. It’s the one body that has something for everybody in the business. We offer the most prestigious training, development and recognition for facilities managers.

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We provide a fantastic range of benefits, services, and offers for all our members. We enable you to network with your peers and share ideas at a whole range of national, regional and local events.

We keep you totally in the know through FM World magazine, our continuously updated website and networking groups.

We even give you a chance to influence your profession personally by getting involved and giving FM a better future.

If you want to put your heart and soul into FM, talk to us.

T: 0845 058 1358 E: membership@bifm.org.uk www.bifm.org.uk

2/8/10 12:21:43 FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 39

6/1/11 09:33:34

BIFM NEWS BIFM.ORG.UK

Cultural: Vienna sets the scene for this year’s EuroFM

EUROFM AWARDS

BIFM AWARDS

EuroFM Time to Awards Th!nk FM entries open Entries are open for the EuroFM Awards (May 24, Vienna). The four categories include: 1) Partners Across Borders Award Recognising excellence in delivering facilities management services to an organisation located in more than one European country.

2) Excellence in Sustainability Recognising excellence in delivering sustainability to an organisation located in more than one European country.

3) European FM Student of the Year Award Recognises technical knowledge, international perspective and personality. Entries are open to Bachelors and Masters students at the end of their studies or in employment in the year of their graduation, or graduate students (all aged under 30).

PHOTOLIBRARY

4) European FM Researcher of the Year Recognising the value of research being undertaken across Europe. The research must address the EuroFM research agenda and contribute to its overall objectives to ‘advance knowledge in FM and promote its effective application in practice and education’. i To be considered for an award, email karen.weeks@bifm.org.uk by 26 January detailing the name of your project, brief synopsis, key findings and the European countries covered. The BIFM will contact you to discuss the application process. For the full details visit www.eurofm.org/ events/eurofm-awards/

40 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

40-42_BIFM news.indd 40

A new year is upon us and with it comes changes to the FM arena.

First and foremost is the BIFM’s re-brand of their major annual conference, taking place on April 5 and 6 at the East Midlands Conference Centre, Nottingham.

With its new format and unrivalled learning and networking opportunities, Th!nkFM, the new name for the BIFM annual conference, promises to be this year’s premier event for FM practitioners at all levels.

The BIFM has remodelled their conference programme from top to bottom, making it more inclusive and relevant to today’s marketplace than ever before. The interactive content schedule comprises four topical ‘hubs’, offering smaller sized presentations and workshops from which each delegate can pick and choose, shaping their own itinerary.

Headed up by a roster of keynote speakers and plenary sessions discussing such essential topics as the impact and implications of the first coalition Budget, the rest of the conference is yours to decide. Hub presentations will run concurrently in different areas of the venue, leaving you free to opt in and out, taking advantage of the flexible programme to network with other FM professionals. For those who are new to FM or are attending alone, the experienced and well connected Th!nkFM Networking Buddies will be on hand to guide you round, enabling you to makevaluable contacts.

i Th!nkFM – Delivering Value in Facilities Management: Innovation and adaptation for today’s economics 5– 6 April 2011, East Midlands Conference Centre, Nottingham. For details and to book call 08701 632804 or visit www.thinkfm.com

» Network with BIFM @ www.networkwithbifm.org.uk » Twitter @BIFM_UK » LinkedIn » facebook

MIDLANDS REGION PROFILE Chair name: Ashley Rogers (director – corporate facilities management, Eddisons).

Contact details: Email ashley.rogers@eddisons. com or call 07827 353379 Number of members: 1,230 Key dates and events for 2011: 19 January – Skittles evening, Lygon Arms, Feckenham, Redditch February – PFI partnership – a working example February – Joint event with the Rising FMs March – Fleet Management and more, AA , Birmingham April – Tour of Cowley Works April – FM in the retail world, The Brewery, Cheltenham June – Sustainability and the

environment – can measures put in place be sustained in this economic climate?

June – Visit to NEC, Birmingham – FM behind the scenes July – AGM and barbecue Why should you join this region?

Members of the Midlands region have a huge mix of talents and responsibilities; from education establishments to the military, from hospitals to factories, from pubs to retail companies, for occupier, landlord and public sector. They have the complete range of understanding from students studying FM to fellows.

The region believes in the need for all individuals in FM to become more knowledgeable and will assist in providing CPD combined with the access to meeting like-minded professionals.

www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 12:41:49

Please send your news items to communications@bifm.org.uk or call 0845 058 1356

BIFM AND GOVERNMENT

Help shape the BIFM gov agenda The BIFM is seeking members, both individual and corporate, to get involved with public affairs work.

Through direct engagement with the government, our membership of the Construction Industry Council and CBI, and our agreements with both the Business Services Association and the FMA we can help to raise the profile of FM and shape government policy.

In recent months we have engaged an energy policy advisor, responded to key consultations and arranged meetings at the Treasury and DECC to discuss energy management in FM contracting.

Through our membership of EuroFM we are also taking the first tentative steps in European public affairs.

Over the coming months we will be updating our energy and skills position papers and setting up more direct meetings. The institute is looking to create a roster of members who can contribute.

This group will act as a sounding board for policy proposals; help to draft the BIFM’s response to formal consultation exercises and provide expert technical, financial and other specialist input.

We are especially interested in hearing from those members responsible for a sizeable estate or portfolio; those with energy management responsibilities and those involved with PFI, particularly in the health and education sectors. i If you would like to join the group (there will be no formal meetings to attend) or have any queries contact the BIFM’s corporate and public affairs director Richard Byatt, email richard.byatt@bifm.org. uk or call 01279 712640 for further details.

www.fm-world.co.uk

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Ian Fielder is CEO at the BIFM

BIFM COMMENT N E W Y E A R , F R E SH P L A N S

am sure the BIFM is not alone in commencing the planning for the year ahead many months ago. As far back as August, the board started a thorough review of the medium term plan and asked the executive to firm up on the 2011 business plan. This involved every member of staff and after gaining the board’s approval in November we are poised at the beginning of a brand new year, champing at the bit to get on with the job. Having refreshed many of our back of house systems we are investing in an umbrella business intelligence package that will bring all of our information into one place, allowing us to inform the board and volunteer groups of latest data through a dashboard format.

Having launched some exciting new developments, including social networking, we are now planning the next major development of a web-based membership platform.

A major focus will be growth and our membership department has been working on smarter and more effective ways to manage membership applications, plus new promotional ideas. We are proud of the benefits and offers already available to members but we recognise that we must improve the extent and quality of knowledge transfer and the improvements to the web and our systems are designed to facilitate this important area of our service.

We have rebranded the BIFM conference to Th!nkFM, to expand it into more than just an institute conference so we capture the wider FM experience plus we are moving it to Nottingham to make it more accessible. After the very successful Members’ Day, held at the popular Imax, London venue, we are repeating this event which focuses on the very best of the BIFM Award entries from 2010. This day again will be linked with our AGM and the growing Member Recognition Awards. Our main BIFM Awards are also being refreshed to reflect the ever changing landscape of FM and will continue to be the very best showcase in the FM calendar.

To support our focus on increasing the customer and membership experience we are well ahead with developing a number of staff initiatives including gaining Investors in People accreditation and launching into achieving the European Foundation Quality Management (EFQM) framework, helping us to be more competitive.

Building on the excellent work last year in developing the complete suite of qualifications we are adding an award and certificate grade at Level 6 and an award grade at Level 5. We have also extended the relationship with the Institute of Leadership and Management (ILM) to continue the entry level qualification at all three grades at Level 3.

2011 is shaping up to be another challenging year and I look forward to meeting many of you throughout the year as well as updating you on progress against this exciting plan.

I

“A MAJOR FOCUS WILL BE GROWTH AND OUR MEMBERSHIP DEPARTMENT HAS BEEN WORKING ON SMARTER AND MORE EFFECTIVE WAYS TO MANAGE MEMBERSHIP”

ian.fielder@bifm.org.uk

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BIFM NEWS BIFM.ORG.UK

BIFM TRAINING

BIFM learning: Qualifications prove popular

QUALIFICATIONS

BIFM quals prove a success Over 200 learners are now registered for the new BIFM facilities management qualifications – and the first awards have already been made. Since they were launched in March last year the BIFM’s new FM qualifications, at levels 4, 5 and 6 in the UK’s Qualifications and Credit Framework, have been wellreceived.

The BIFM’s suite comprises three ‘sizes’ of qualification – Award, Certificate and Diploma – at three levels: 4, 5 and 6. This gives maximum choice to candidates who are frequently combining study with a demanding job.

Although learners have up to two years to complete a programme, it is possible to achieve success more quickly and the BIFM is delighted to have awarded the first three Level 4 Awards in October.

There are currently seven centres offering a range of delivery models, including face-to-face and distance learning. More centres will join the network in 2011, widening access and supporting learners across the regions.

The BIFM qualifications cover all levels of facilities management, from operational to strategic.

They have been developed in consultation with leading FM employers and offer a flexible, unitised approach to learning.

All assessment is work based and can be linked to live business projects. This means employers can see a real time, tangible benefit from their employees.

BU I L D I N G SU RV E Y I N G A ND MAINT E NANC E

by the Institute of Leadership & Management in collaboration with the BIFM. The ILM Level 3 Qualifications in Facilities Management have been especially designed to help learners develop specific skills in FM, alongside a wide range of leadership and management skills.

The ILM Level 3, also available as an Award, Certificate and Diploma, is suitable for anyone new to FM, those with less than two years’ experience in an FM role or first line managers seeking an FM qualification.

Over 500 learners are now registered for the Level 3 and the BIFM has recently extended its contract with ILM to the end of 2012. The agreement provides for promotion and marketing of the qualification, as well as exploring further areas of benefit to the FM profession.

The ILM Level 3 provides the “knowledge based component” of the Advanced FM Apprenticeship, developed by Asset Skills.

Commenting on the relationship with the BIFM and the progress of the qualification, ILM CEO Penny de Valk said: “We are delighted to work with the BIFM to develop cutting-edge qualifications for the FM sector. The ILM and BIFM partnership gives facilities managers a clear pathway to higher level qualifications and career progression – and the results have been impressive, with hundreds of individuals taking a Level 3 qualification in facilities management.”

ISTOCK

Entry-level Aspiring FMs can choose the entry-level qualifications developed

42 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

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he big freeze that set in early this winter demonstrates only too well the necessity of good maintenance management for your properties. In December FM World reported how insurer Aviva had issued a property maintenance warning following heavy and repeated snowfall across the country, highlighting the severe risk of structural damage if proper maintenance isn’t carried out. As climate change is set to result in further seasonal extremes, the effects of severe weather conditions are a growing concern, and just one more reason why we must not slack on our maintenance responsibilities.

Checking condition, anticipating problems and carrying out planned maintenance techniques will help you to avoid unnecessary cost, damage and downtime. In addition, well maintained buildings and commercial establishments also attract better clientele and more motivated employees.

Typical problems to avoid include flooding, dampness, subsidence, structural damage, decay and the presence of dangerous substances. Failure to detect faults before taking a building or neglecting to maintain it during occupation can therefore prove very costly and damaging, and may also be in breach of the lease.

It is important to remember that even minor problems can escalate quickly if left unchecked.

Let our highly experienced building surveyor take you step-by-step through the rules of good building surveying and maintenance. Ask yourself the following questions to see if this would be a worthwhile day for you:

T

For more information go to www. bifm.org.uk/bifm/careerdevelopment i

Do you fully understand the scope of building maintenance issues? ● Can you anticipate problems and manage planned and preventative maintenance programmes both inside and outside the building? ● What are the signs and potential cost of poor design and neglect? ● When should you commission structural and condition surveys? ● Are you able to instruct a surveyor and effectively interpret the report? ● What are the key lease commitments you should be aware of? ● Can you confidently evaluate a prospective building and predict running costs? ●

i The course next runs on 15 March 2011. For further information or to book a place please visit our website www.bifm-training.com, email info@bifm-training.co. uk or call 020 7404 4440.

www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 12:42:27

FM NEWS

Call Adam Potter on 020 7880 8543 or email adam.potter@fm-world.co.uk For full media information take a look at www.fm-world.co.uk/mediapack

FM innovations ▼ Major new contract for refreshment systems

▲Crown Paints reveals personal touch for specifiers with launch of latest colour influences

Refreshment Systems has agreed a five-year deal with Spire Healthcare, one of the country’s largest independent providers. The contract will roll out gradually as existing contracts at individual sites come to an end. Ultimately, Refreshment Systems – recently named by Auto Vending Magazine as one of the country’s Top 3 vending operators - will be fulfilling the refreshment requirements of patients, staff and visitors at 37 hospitals nationwide.

Spire Healthcare will acquire its new equipment on lease, with Refreshment Systems providing technical maintenance and ingredient supply.

‘We’ve worked hard to develop a single solution for patients, staff and visitors that is comparable with that of the High Street coffee shops” said Refreshment System’s Sales Director, Paul Shaw.

The 2011 edition of Crown Paints’ Colour Influences has been launched - featuring vibrant colours, inspirational finishes and different textures to offer a personalised effect for public spaces, commercial environments and retail areas.

Produced by The Crown Paints’ Colour Panel - a team of nine creative experts from backgrounds including design and architecture – the influences were unveiled at London’s Chiltern Studio and will go on to inspire Crown Paints’ portfolio across the professional sector.

The panel pinpointed a range of trends, including the Natural Primary palette – inspired by nature and focused on greens and reds - with wood stained in light natural tones, complemented by softer shades and light textures. www.crowntrade.co.uk

▲The scent of success Independent staff caterers, Charlton House, have gained a second catering contract with PZ Cussons, the global consumer products group behind such well-known brand names as Imperial Leather, Charles Worthington and The Sanctuary.

The contract, at the company’s Innovation Centre in Salford, Manchester, is worth £100k in annual turnover and comes as an extension to Charlton House’s existing contract with PZ Cussons at their stunning corporate headquarters in Manchester Business Park which opened earlier this year.

(April 2010) The new contract opened on 11th November. A team of three Charlton House staff now manages a breakfast, lunch and hospitality service for 120 PZ Cussons staff on site.

Charlton House is a specialist staff catering brand within the CH&Co group. www.charltonhouse.co.uk

▼PE goes to the races

▲The iPhone for the cleaning industry In today’s fast pace world of ever changing technology, great pioneering and revolutionary offerings are unfortunately hard to come by in today’s cleaning industry. There is certainly no shortage in the choice of chemicals available in the market place or green products, which flood the market almost by the day but sustainable innovation is hard to find.

Futures Supplies & Support Services Ltd is leading the field in revolutionising the cleaning industry through the delivery of sustainable chemical free cleaning. The ionatorEXPTM really is a most impressive piece of kit delivering a new generation of cleaning technology – the i-phone for the cleaning industry!

This practical, hand held and completely chemical free piece of cleaning kit lifts dirt effortlessly from a wide variety of surfaces simply by activating tap water and converting it into ionised water.

For more information: Mandie Kemp on: 020 8689 2072 or info@futures-supplies.co.uk

Power Electrics Generators has recently won a threeyear contract to supply the UK’s largest racecourse group, Jockey Club Racecourses (JCR), with a selection of rental generators, electrical distribution, cables and towerlights. The agreement covers JCR’s fourteen racecourses, including Aintree, Cheltenham, Newmarket and Epsom Downs, which host the likes of the John Smith’s Grand National Meeting, Cheltenham Festival, Guineas Festival and the Investec Derby Festival.

The agreement includes the provision of fuel, engineering support and full site management and generators ranging from 15kVA – 1000kVA and a number of multiple synchronising 500 kVA units.

Power Electrics was awarded the contract following a three month tender process which included liaison with the core technical management team at JCR’s main venues. www.powerelectrics.com

▲ Outlook integration with Causeway’s Resource/Room Booking module The latest version of Causeway’s Integrated fm facts Resource/Room Booking module features close integration with Microsoft Outlook/Exchange, so that rooms and associated services can be booked directly from the Outlook Calendar. The process is also twoway, so that bookings or amendments made directly in the Resource/Room Booking software, by requesters or FM staff, are updated in the Outlook Calendars of meeting attendees.

This seamless integration of FM back-office tools with everyday software used by customers delivers benefits to all concerned. Internal customers can manage their resource booking within a familiar software environment while enjoying the search and booking functionality of Resource/Room Booking, while FM departments save time through dealing with fewer calls.

Tel: 01926 517700 E-mail: ifm.info@causeway.com Web: www.integratedfm.com FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 43

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FM DIARY

Send details of your event to editorial@fm-world.co.uk or call 020 7880 6229

NATIONAL BIFM EVENTS

SCOTTISH REGION

19 January Women in FM event Liz Kentish, the FM Coach and Julie Kortens, head of facilities at Channel 4, will be facilitating an interactive session, where you can plan your personal and corporate journey for 2011. Claire Gilchrist, facilities manager at Lawrence Graham will be talking about her FM Journey.

Venue: London Contact:Liz Kentish, coach@ lizkentishcoaching.co.uk or call 07717 787077

26 May Scottish Region golf event The cost will be £60 Venue: Renfrew Golf Club Contact: bill.anderson@ telerealtrillium.com or call 01977 598914

3 February BIFM International Sig: ‘The office as we know it will be obsolete in 20 years’: A Pecha Kucha debate Two teams of property and facilities experts will be pitting their wits against each other using the Pecha Kucha format to debate this topical subject for the International Sig and its members.

Venue: Steelcase’s offices in London Contact: clairesellick@ btinternet.com 10 February The People Management and Women in FM Sigs Our guest speakers will be sharing their knowledge and expertise on motivation and how it can help you get the best out of your teams.

Venue: Gresham Street, London Contact: ali.moran@workplacelaw.net 23 February WiFM forum Venue: Central London Contact: Liz Kentish, coach@ lizkentishcoaching.co.uk or call 07717 787077 5-6 April Th!nkFM conference: Delivering value in FM Bringing its wealth of market leading knowledge and expertise to a wider FM audience, the BIFM has launched ThinkFM - a groundbreaking skills sharing and networking hub designed for FM practitioners at every level. A refreshingly different take on the standard conference model, the April conference, along with the entire ThinkFM brand, has been built with the opinions, wants and needs of all FM professionals at its core.

Venue: The East Midlands Conference Centre in Nottingham Contact: conference@thinkfm.com 10 October BIFM Awards Venue: Grosvenor House Hotel Contact: Sandra Light on 0141 639 6192 or email Sandra@fmevents.biz 00 | 30 SEPTEMBER 2010 | FM WORLD 44 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

Diary.indd 45

HOME COUNTIES REGION 25 January FM Clinic - Quiz the FM Experts This informative evening is intended to provide a forum where you can ask industry specialists those questions and pose scenarios that come up in your everyday FM life, as well as sharing your own experiences to develop solutions for enhancing your workplace.

Venue: Autodesk, 1 Meadow Gate Avenue, Farnborough, Hampshire Contact: jane.m.wiggins@ btopenworld.com or call 07799 033341 MIDLANDS REGION 19 January BIFM Midlands Region skittles evening An opportunity to show off your skills on the skittle alley. Join for an evening of fun and networking. Just £10 per person (includes game and supper) - pay on the night. Partners welcome Venue: The Lygon Arms, Feckenham, Redditch, Worcestershire Contact: Wreide Poole - w.poole@ sss-support.co.uk or call 07595 413086.

27 January Selling Business Continuity to the Board This briefing looks at how board directors and senior managers look at risk, particularly business interruption risk.

Venue: NFU Mutual, Tiddington Road, Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire Contact: ann@echo-marketing.co.uk or call 07970 255240 EAST REGION 9 February BIFM East Region presentation: The Light Works Venue: The Leeton Group, Peterborough, Lincolnshire Contact: Graham Price at g.price@ forumevents.co.uk 6 April BIFM East Region presentation: Secure Data and storage of Critical Information” Venue: RECALL Secure Data

and Storage Centre, Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire Contact: Graham Price at g.price@ forumevents.co.uk 28 April East Region networking golf day Venue: To be confirmed Contact: Graham Price at g.price@ forumevents.co.uk 23 June East Region Golf day Qualification” Venue: To be confirmed Contact: Graham Price at g.price@ forumevents.co.uk 3 July East Region Cricket Challenge Venue: Great Hyde Hall, Hertfordshire Contact: Graham Price at g.price@ forumevents.co.uk SOUTH WEST REGION 15 July South-west region 2011 Golf Day Venue: Orchardleigh Golf Club Frome Contact: Gareth Andrews on gmahome@tinyworld.co.uk or call 07540 079978 FELLOWS 20 January Fellows’ site visit event Venue: To be confirmed Contact: joannalloyddavies@ btinternet.com quoting your BIFM membership number, full name, company details and full contact details - the information will then be provided INDUSTRY EVENTS 19 January FMExchange event The theme of the evening is Sustainability in the FM Supply Chain, with guest speakers Paul Francis, MD Modus Services Ltd, MOD Whitehall and Michael Pitt, Professor of FM Innovation, UCL. Venue: Lower Refectory, Wilkins Building Contact: catherine.tchitembo@ ucl.ac.uk 24-25 January The 28th Facilities Management Forum Venue: Radisson Blu Hotel, London Stansted Contact: Hayley Wheaton at h.wheaton@forumevents.co.uk 24-26 January Hospitality NEC Birmingham Venue: NEC Birmingham Contact: Visit www.hospitalityshow. co.uk to register

27 January Office Relocation, A Step-By-Step Guide Venue: Morgan Lovell’s headquarters, Noel Street, Soho Contact:The seminar is free but spaces are limited and can be booked at www.morganlovell.co.uk/ events/ 10 February Workplace Futures 2011: Commoditisation vs Service Solution – which future?

Venue: Churchill War Rooms, London Contact: David Emanuel on 020 8922 7491 22 February Big Business, Low Carbon Conference Aquila Green and the University of Nottingham’s Innovation Centre are staging the first annual energy conference for businesses across Nottinghamshire.

Venue: University of Nottingham Innovation Park Contact: Register your place now for free at www.aquila-green.co.uk 8-11 March MIPIM 2011 Venue: Cannes, France Contact: www.mipim.com 22 March The Total Security Summit Venue: Radisson Blu Hotel, London Stansted Airport, Essex Contact: Graham Price at g.price@ forumevents.co.uk 20-21 April The National FM & Property Event Venue: The Celtic Manor, Wales Contact: leighhussain@ globalbusinessevents.co.uk or call 01633 290 951/ 07977 561 553 17-19 May The Facilities Show Venue: NEC Birmingham Contact: www.thefacilitiesshow.com for full details 23-25 May EuroFM Conference: Cracking the productivity nut Venue: The Vienna University of Technology, Vienna Contact: www.eurofm.org 23 June World FM Day World FM Day is a Global FM initiative to celebrate the importance of the FM profession.

Venue: UK-wide events, and primary BIFM event Contact: Karen Weeks at communications@bifm.org.uk

www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 10:42:15

FM PEOPLE MOVERS & SHAKERS

BEHIND

THE JOB How did you get into facilities management and what attracted you to the industry?

I started off in purchasing and got more and more involved in the facilities side of things. I was very lucky with my organisation which promoted me into the role of facilities and purchasing manager giving me more responsibility and opportunities as well as sponsoring me through my MSc in Facilities Management.

NAME: Elizabeth Carter JOB TITLE: Facilities and purchasing manager ORGANISATION: The British School of Osteopathy JOB DESCRIPTION: Managing the hard and soft services, maintenance and refurbishment projects at both teaching and clinical sites. This involves ensuring the buildings are run smoothly and efficiently on a day-to-day basis as well as planning for the future to provide a safe, pleasant and sustainable environment for our students, staff and patients.

ON THE

MOVE Changing jobs?

Tell us about your new role and responsibilities.

Contact Natalie Li Natalie.Li.@fm-world.co.uk

What has been your biggest career challenge to date?

We recently purchased and fitted out a new clinic. I was involved in the whole project and was responsible for equipping the new building, setting up all contracts and SLAs and co-ordinating the move. It was hard work and involved careful management and organisation but I enjoyed every minute of it.

If you could change one thing about the industry, what would it be?

Greater awareness of the benefits well-managed buildings can bring to an organisation, and an increased emphasis on facilities in strategic planning.

My top perk at work is…

Regularly meeting new people from a wide range of backgrounds and roles.

What’s been your career high-point to date?

Winning an award from the RICS for my MSc in FM.

People and jobs.indd 61

If I wasn’t in facilities management, I’d probably be… bored.

Which “FM myth” would you most like to put an end to?

We wear boiler suits and fiddle with the heating controls all day.

How do you think facilities management has changed in the last five years?

An increase in legislation and environmental awareness has meant the role of facilities within an organisation has become increasingly important. It is beginning to be seen as something which can enhance the organisation and add to their success rather than something where the bare minimum can be done to ensure compliance.

What single piece of advice would you give to a young facilities manager starting out?

FM is challenging but hugely rewarding. Due to the nature of what we do we will often only hear from people when things go wrong, but by communicating regularly with the building users we can often get them on side and work together to make improvements.

BG Controls has appointed Ian Ross (pictured) as the new operations manager for the south east.

Ross will oversee and ensure efficient delivery of all projects in the BG’s growing south east division.

Hoare Lea has appointed Matthew Jones (pictured) as partner. Jones has worked within the building services sector for almost 25 years. Jones will also continue in his role as sector champion for heritage work.

HVCA chief executive Robert Higgs has announced his intention to retire from the association after 38 years’ service.

Interserve has appointed David Paterson and Dougie Sutherland as executive directors to its board.

Sodexo has appointed Glenn Ridsdale as the new director of financial performance.

www.fm-world.co.uk

If you could give away one of your responsibilities to an unsuspecting colleague, what would it be?

Responsibility for the toilet blocks.

Rentokil Initial has announced that Stuart Godman, managing director of City Link, has resigned from the business by mutual agreement.

Spie Matthew Hall has appointed Tracy Gandar and Nina Bawden as sales engineers to further develop the region surrounding Manchester and Birmingham.

G4S Technology has appointed Michael Bell as business development manager, focused within the healthcare sector.

Barry Varcoe (pictured), former group property director at the Royal Bank of Scotland, has been appointed global head of corporate real estate and facilities management at Zurich Financial Services.

FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 45

6/1/11 10:38:45

Appointments

Call Stephen Fontana on 020 7324 2787 or email jobs@fm-world.co.uk For full media information take a look at www.fm-world.co.uk/mediapack

HARD SERVICES MANAGER

SITE FACILITIES MANAGER (HARD BIAS)

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FM BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER

SALES MANAGER - FIRE ENGINEERING

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46 |â&#x20AC;&#x201A;13 JANUARY 2011 |â&#x20AC;&#x201A;FM WORLD

FM New appoints 130111.indd Sec1:46

6/1/11 09:46:28

University College London Founded in 1826, UCL is one of the world’s best Universities, with approximately 22,000 students and 8,000 staff, and a complex estate valued in excess of £1.3 billion. UCL’s Estates & Facilities Division (EFD) is responsible for the management of UCL’s physical estate, including property acquisition and management, development of new buildings, building maintenance and alteration, safety, security and cleaning, record keeping, student residences and central room bookings.

The EFD is changing. A new structure is being implemented, driving innovation and best practice across the estate. As a result of this change two new posts are being created:

Head of Engineering and Maintenance c. £80,000 per annum + generous benefits package Leading a newly formed team focused on innovation and best practice, this post will transform the way services are delivered across the estate.

Responsible for the development of strategy and leading edge best practice, you will ensure the estate is fit for purpose to deliver excellence in research and teaching. Reporting to the Director of EFD, the primary objective of the post is to lead the delivery of a flexible, efficient and safe building services function, in order to meet business needs and ensure they are operationally resilient and robust.

You will possess an in-depth knowledge of best practice in engineering and maintenance operations across a large, diverse, multi-site operation, coupled with demonstrable commercial awareness and change management experience. Ideally, you will have a formal qualification in an engineering related discipline and hold Chartered status, however, more important is a demonstrable track record in strategic delivery. This is a post that will suit professionals with strong communication skills, who are natural leaders and collaborators with the ability to engage stakeholders at all levels.

Head of Satellite Estate Services c. £80,000 per annum + generous benefits package A challenging role, leading the co-ordination and integration of estates and facilities services across a diverse portfolio of world leading postgraduate institutes and medical schools.

You will lead the delivery of estates and facilities services across a diverse portfolio of buildings outside the UCL core Bloomsbury Campus.

This comprises UCL’s postgraduate institutes and satellite medical schools, encompassing a portfolio of 50 properties, spanning a 150,000m2 estate. Reporting to the Director of EFD, the primary objective of this role is to improve service delivery through the integration and consolidation of functions, together with appropriate controls and the assurance of statutory compliance.

You will have a demonstrable track record of service improvement across a broad range of estates services, covering a large complex multi-client operation. You will have relevant experience working in a senior capacity and a formal qualification in an engineering/facilities/property management discipline, plus membership of a relevant professional body. A positive, innovative and collaborative personality, strong strategic management and leadership skills, and excellent communication and influencing abilities, are essential requirements.

For a confidential discussion, please contact our advisors at The Management Recruitment Group on 020 8892 0115. For Head of Engineering and Maintenance, please contact Michael Hewlett – michael.hewlett@mrgpeople.co.uk and Head of Satellite Estate Services, contact Ben Duffill – ben.duffill@mrgpeople.co.uk Closing date: Friday, 4 February 2011.

For details of the benefits of working at UCL, please follow the link: http://ucl.ac.uk/hr/benefits/employee_benefits.php We particularly welcome applications from women, black or minority ethnic candidates, as they are under-represented within UCL at this level.

www.ucl.ac.uk The Management Recruitment Group, Regal House, 70 London Road,Twickenham, TW1 3QS Tel: 020 8892 0115.

Senior Appointments for the Built Environment

www.mrgpeople.co.uk FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 47

FM New appoints 130111.indd Sec1:47

6/1/11 12:02:57

Passionate about learning.

Committed to excellence.

South Thames College is South Londonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s largest provider of post-16 education and training. Recently judged â&#x20AC;&#x153;goodâ&#x20AC;? by Ofsted, the College has already made signiďŹ cant progress towards becoming outstanding. Major investment in the redevelopment of the collegeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s main sites at Wandsworth and Merton has resulted in ďŹ rst class facilities, unmatched in the region, which we believe our learners deserve.

We are looking for ambitious individuals who share our commitment to excellence and who look forward to being part of a dynamic team working together to achieve our vision of building an outstanding and inclusive college.

Head of Estates & Facilities Salary: Job Ref:

ÂŁ48,689 - ÂŁ52,937 p.a. inc. London weighting J1267

We are looking for an experienced person to be responsible for the smooth running and effective operation of our facilities and estates function and for the management of the College Facilities and Health and Safety Departments. You will provide professional advice and support to the Vice Principal Finance & Estates as well as other College Managers on facilities and estates matters. You will also act as a budget manager for estates and facilities revenue expenditure and ensure that the facilities services and contracts are secured, co-ordinated, monitored and maintained to an appropriate standard.

You will have a relevant professional qualiďŹ cation/membership and a proven record of relevant experience at senior level in a substantial organisation.

You will have up to date, expert working knowledge of facilities management as well as knowledge of relevant health and safety requirements.

The beneďŹ ts package includes generous annual leave, ďŹ nal salary pension, subsidised sports facilities and professional development and training.

Closing date for the return of completed applications is 27th January 2011.

To apply please download a recruitment pack from http://www.south-thames.ac.uk/chapters/jobs.aspx Alternatively e-mail recruitment@south-thames.ac.uk or telephone 020 8918 7177 quoting the job reference.

Please note CVs are not accepted.

4062

The College is an equal opportunities employer and is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and vulnerable adults.

XXX D DP VL

Sales Director, London, ÂŁ65,000 plus commission and beneďŹ ts (OTE ÂŁ100k) Our client, a leading, innovative provider of Facilities Management services, is recruiting a Sales Director. The company, which has been in business for 10 years, has doubled its turnover every year to date and intends to maintain this level of growth for the next 5 years (turnover currently cÂŁ25m). As the Sales Director, you will be responsible for creating and delivering sales strategy and play a fundamental role in developing future growth by providing vision, direction and leadership. You will need to be able to develop relationships with potential clients, identify opportunities, manage the bid process and bring home the sales. You will need to be able to inspire, motivate and lead a small sales team. The role is home based although regular visits to the London HO and clients nationwide will be required. A driving license and a good deal of ďŹ&#x201A;exibility are essential. We are looking for a â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;sales hunterâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; with a proven track record at director level. Experience within the Facilities Management industry is not essential although initiative, drive and enthusiasm are. The package includes a car and beneďŹ ts is offered.

CVs to russell@c22.co.uk

â&#x20AC;˘ â&#x20AC;˘ â&#x20AC;˘ â&#x20AC;˘

News updated at least ďŹ ve times a day Archive of every FM World article since 2004 Job email alerts Career advice

UK Regional Operations Coordinator, London, cÂŁ40,000 A successful global investment company requires an Operations Coordinator to provide operational support on various corporate real estate and facilities management services at their regional campus. Main responsibilities will be to Coordinate multiple processes involving moves, furniture reconďŹ guration, space utilization and facilities management crew services (food service, building maintenance, transportation service, exterior maintenance, training/ conference setup, A/V setup, move support, custodial, document destruction and special event support).

CV and cover letter to steve@c22.co.uk

CoďŹ&#x20AC;ee and CV providing quality people

Leeds 0113 242 8055 London 020 7630 5144

fm-world.co.uk/jobs

has over 100 job vacancies

48 |â&#x20AC;&#x201A;13 JANUARY 2011 |â&#x20AC;&#x201A;FM WORLD Catch22 QP.indd 1

FM New appoints 130111.indd Sec1:48

5/1/11 16:47:16

6/1/11 10:10:23

IF SANTA FAILED........LET US DELIVER! Divisional Director (Mobilisation experience) £55,000 - £60,000 London A leading Managing Agent currently seeks to appoint a proven Mobilisation Manager to mobilise key buildings in the City. The ideal candidate will be proven in Mobilising trophy buildings, have an appreciation of the key issues involved in this and the totality of undertaking large scale project works including handling fit outs, security, etc.

The role will focus on Central London but also cover other UK cities.

Ref: 24172 Contract Manager (Healthcare) £55,000 London A leading Service Provider, currently seeks to appoint a proven Contract Manager to work on two key healthcare sites in London. You will be responsible for the delivery and smooth operation of all FM Services for a high value and key contract. The ideal candidate will be highly commercial, take an operational role and be expert at managing sizeable budgets and developing strong client relationships.

Ref: 24109 Assistant Facilities Manager (x2) £23,500 - £25,000 London/West London We are currently looking for proven and commercially astute Assistant FMs for different clients (one in Central London) and one in South London. Both roles are looking for candidates to progress up into full FM positions managing multi-let office buildings over the next 12-18 months. Ideal candidates will have proven FM experience in managing sites, budgets and contractors and must be hard-working with a desire to succeed.

Ref: 24073

General Manager (PFI Schools) £50,000 - £55,000 NW England An established and excellent service delivery provider is looking to employ a General Manager. As the GM you will be responsible for delivering full TFM services to an account with a value of circa £3.2m, seven buildings, four direct reports and all client liaisons. You will have a proven track record in a similar role and environment as you will be expected to hit the ground running.

Ref: 24233 Regional Operations Manger £52,000 SE England A TFM service provider that has enjoyed strong growth over the last two years is looking for a Regional Ops Manager in the South. As ROM you will be responsible for the delivery of all the soft services to a new account in the retail sector. This is a full soft services contract that will include, cleaning, security and customer services.

You will have full P&L responsibility and strong people management skills.

Ref: 24290

Cobalt Recruitment

Senior Project Manager £50,000 Hampshire/Wiltshire A leading TFM service provider is looking to employ a Senior PM with an engineering background. You will have a proven track record in taking projects from inception through to completion and delivering them on time and within budget. Typical projects will involve upgrades, replacements and refurbishments of all related M&E plant. Excellent people management skills are also a prerequisite for this opportunity as the PM will also oversee a team of 2-4 people.

Ref: 24293

Tel: +44 (0)20 7478 2500

Abu Dhabi Auckland Berlin Düsseldorf

London Manchester

info@cobaltrecruitment.com www.cobaltrecuitment.com

To apply for any of these roles please email your CV in confidence to info@cobaltrecruitment.com or call +44 (0)20 7478 2500 to speak to a consultant.

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FM WORLD | 13 JANUARY 2011 | 49

FM New appoints 130111.indd Sec1:49

6/1/11 12:03:16

FINAL WORD FELICITY MESSING

FELICITY

MESSING

THE TRUTH BEHIND CVS 1⁄

Exceptionally well qualified: Has committed no major blunders to date.

2⁄ 3⁄

Active socially: Drinks heavily.

Quick thinking: Offers plausible excuses for errors.

4⁄

A keen analyst: Thoroughly confused.

5⁄ 6⁄

Takes pride in work: Conceited.

Demonstrates qualities of leadership: Has a loud voice.

7⁄

Gets along extremely well with superiors and subordinates alike: A coward.

IS THE FUTURE BRIGHT? This new year season has produced the usual spate of predictions for 2011 – even though no-one really knows what’s likely to happen. Some are optimistic about the economy; others are cautious. Some think it’s the end of global warming; others that we’re entering a new ice age – but no one can outguess the unexpected. Those that get it wrong are simply ignored or forgotten.

I read recently that if weather forecasters were simply to say that the weather tomorrow will be much the same as the weather today, then their accuracy rate would be better than their present predictions of changes in the short term weather patterns – despite the huge investments in and reliance on new technologies.

Basically, predictions are nothing more than a guessing game. Journalists have been predicting a

royal wedding for the past eight years, and they will no doubt now say that their predictions came true, conveniently forgetting that they were bound to be right sooner or later.

So, taking a steer from weather forecast predictions, I suggest that 2011 will be much the same as 2010.

Shares in FM companies will go down and up and down again. There will be some mergers and acquisitions. Some FM companies will go bust. Some companies will outsource their in-house services.

The debate about PFI value for money will continue unresolved. The recession will continue. A company somewhere will pay damages for breaching health and safety regulations.

On the bigger issues, the sun will continue to rise, aliens will not land, my wishes probably won’t come to pass and neither will my resolutions. Happy New Year!

NEW YEAR NEW GOALS If at first you don’t succeed, redefine success.

A clean desk is a sign of a cluttered desk drawer.

IN THE NEXT ISSUE OUT 27 JANUARY

THE RESULTS OF THE FM WORLD SALARY SURVEY SPONSORED BY CATCH 22/// THE REFURBISHMENT OF NEWCASTLE’S GREAT NORTH MUSEUM/// PLANNING OFFICE SPACES/// THE LOO OF THE YEAR AWARD/// AIR-CONDITIONING LEGISLATION/// LIFTS/// BUSINESS TRAVEL/// AWARD-WINNING FM BUSINESS COVERAGE, NEWS AND COMMENT

50 | 13 JANUARY 2011 | FM WORLD

Felicity.indd 50

www.fm-world.co.uk

6/1/11 10:39:38

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