Facilities managers need to start playing an instrumental part at the design stage of building projects when costs over the whole life of the building are considered, delegates to a London seminar heard last month.
Simon Osbaldiston of the University of Salford told the seminar on life cycle costing, organised by the British Institute of Facilities Management, that facilities managers must have full and early involvement with the entire life cycle planning process if those projects are to succeed.
He said: ‘It is the fact that facilities managers stand isolated that we want to address.’
During his presentation he likened the life cycle costing process to a group of islands he called ‘the islands of automation and construction’. Facilities management was the smallest island with no links to the other islands, which included engineering and architectural design. This scenario may be one that many facilities managers could relate to, he said.
Peter Vamplew of Amec offshore services group stressed the amount of money that companies could save by using life cycle costing techniques effectively. He told the delegates to the Amec sponsored seminar that this meant involving facilities managers at the design stage.
He said: ‘Wrong decisions are phenomenal at the design stage and can cost businesses millions upon millions of pounds.’
This could be avoided, he said, through the availability of good data. He said facilities managers should capitalise on the fact that they manage the assets of the business and collect maintenance data on a daily basis.
He said that when a life cycle cost plan is developed it has to be flexible enough to incorporate changes to the business plan.
Source
The Facilities Business
