Start as You Mean to Go On

This is an excerpt from an article in the Facilities Management Journal.

No one has a better understanding how a building operates in its day-to-day life than the facilities manager (FM). The responsibility for even the smallest of operational elements results in a much greater understanding of economy, aesthetic and efficiency and how all of these impact on the end user. Now, with the advent of Building Information Modeling (BIM), the role of the FM in the design process is expected to increase.

BIM is a completely different approach to designing buildings. It analyses a building’s efficiency at all stages of the life cycle, treating it as a holistic entity. As such, different aspects can be added, changed or removed to alter performance levels before work even begins. This step change in every aspect of building design has meant a review of processes of how decisions are made and the people involved in making them.

Alongside this development, a recent report from Building Research Establishment (BRE) and the British Institute of Facilities Management (BIFM) looked at the results of a three-year study to increase the role and profile of FMs both in their organizations and relationships with other sector or industry professionals. One of the most interesting aspects, from the point of view of a partitioning company like Komfort is the setting out of the multiple benefits of involving FMs within initial design consultations and the common reasons they’re excluded from design processes.

The full article is available on the Facilities Management Journal website.