When it comes to facility management (FM), driving efficiencies up and costs down is a major objective. Outsourcing FM can offer a considerable advantage, but doing it without first performing a technical due diligence can be both risky and expensive, says Daniel Kruger, Lean Six Sigma manager southern Africa, Global Strategic Programs and Lean Six Sigma, Johnson Controls Global Workplace Solutions.
Knowing the condition of the facility and its component parts is a smart first step. Adding Lean Six Sigma to drive process optimisation helps to close the circle, ensuring more efficient and consistent performance, lowering risk and embedding quality assurance.
An organisation cannot make capex or any other decisions, nor can it appropriately quantify and mitigate risk, set goals, optimise performance, or lower costs without access to the necessary data. This includes what assets it has, who own them, the condition of those assets, their maintenance requirements, and their importance to operations or the achievement of strategic business goals.
The reality in the public and private sector is that responsibility for FM and operations has traditionally been shared. As people leave or the organisation changes and grows, key information regarding assets and systems has been lost.
Tech due diligence and Six Sigma
Technical due diligence comprises a thorough inspection of a facility with a consulting team.
Discovery and analysis of FM-related components and systems (such as the structure of a facility, security, HVAC, fire prevention and suppression, and energy consumption, as well as plant equipment if it is manufacturing or industrial concern) are done in conjunction with the organisation to establish their status or condition, their hierarchical importance within an integrated system, the opportunity they offer to add value and the risk they pose to the functioning of the facility.
Inefficient processes contribute to risk and poor facility performance. Identifying and eliminating process risk and waste, as Six Sigma does, is thus a parallel step that will help to embed excellence within FM.
If technical due diligence provides the data, Six Sigma provides the insight and control mechanisms. It helps the organisation understand points of failure, how these various assets, systems or processes fit into the overall operation of the business, and how they impact business resilience. Six Sigma then makes use of well-defined tools and methodologies to reduce variance in processes, reducing risk and introducing greater quality assurance and control. The Six Sigma DMAIC methodology refers to the Define – Measure – Analyze – Improve – Control cycle. This is a structured process by which you move through the stages of solving performance problems, or making a performance improvement. Another way of thinking about DMAIC is in terms of the scientific method, which requires data and measurement – and repeated confirmation – as the basis of knowledge.
Perhaps the most important part of the FM solution is, however, finding a service provider with the experience and proven methodologies to integrate and leverage technical due diligence data and process optimisation to best effect.
Specialised, global, proven
Beyond the formalisation of asset, operational and process knowledge lies the discipline of implementing a smart decision matrix around key assets and FM that takes risk, cost, spend, and business objectives and priorities into consideration.
Today, leading FM providers can be distinguished by the depth of their offering as well as the skilled resources they have on board. With global experience and specialised knowledge of specific industries – finance, oil and gas, technology, life sciences, manufacturing, etc. – they are able to benchmark facility performance within and across sectors, introduce leading practices, proven methodologies and global standards. Trained Six Sigma practitioners add immense value while service level agreements are backed up by rigid governance processes.
Discipline and vision
Successful FM requires discipline, but also vision. A recent success for one of Johnson Controls local manufacturing clients illustrates this. When we entered the engagement, our client had acceptable machine availability figures measured against industry standards. With technical due diligence, and the introduction of condition based monitoring and a world-class computerised planned maintenance system, uptime has improved by more than 20%.
In financial terms, a 20% improvement in manufacturing uptime directly leads to profitability growth. The addition of Six Sigma to this management process brings stability to it and ensures continuous improvement in an ever changing technology driven market.
For any organisation considering outsourcing its FM, the key goal is to ensure the facility functions optimally, driving productivity and, if it’s an industrial or manufacturing plant, meeting performance and output demands reliably and safely.
But as any FM professional will tell you, greater productivity, improved efficiencies and incrementally driving more value from the facility will not come without a little effort. Technical due diligence and Six Sigma lay the foundations and provide the tools necessary to achieve these benefits.