Facility management

Facility management (or facilities management or FM) is a form of asset management concerned with the successful and profitable maintenance, operation, and monitoring of buildings or properties. It encompasses multiple disciplines to ensure functionality of the built environment by integrating people, systems, place, process, and technology.

Professional FM as an interdisciplinary business function has the objective to coordinate demand and supply of facilities and services within public and private organizations. The term “Facility” (pl. facilities) means something that is built, installed or established to serve a purpose, which, in general, is every “Tangible asset that supports an organization.” Examples are real estate property, buildings, technical infrastructure (HVAC), lighting, transportation, IT-services, furniture, and other user-specific equipment and appliances.

The European standard for facilities management defines it as "the integration of processes within an organization to maintain and develop the agreed services which support and improve the effectiveness of its primary activities." The International Organization for Standardization has also published international standards relating to facilities management.

FM covers two main areas: 'Space & Infrastructure' (such as planning, design, workplace, construction, lease, occupancy, maintenance, furniture and cleaning) and 'People & Organization' (such as catering, ICT, HR, accounting, marketing, hospitality). The first refers to the physical built environment with focus on (work-) space and (building-) infrastructure. The second covers the people and the organization and is related to work psychology and occupational physiology. According to the International Facility Management Association (IFMA): “FM is the practice of coordinating the physical workplace with the people and work of the organization. It integrates the principles of business administration, architecture and the behavioral and engineering sciences.” In a 2009 Global Job Task Analysis, IFMA identified the core competencies of facility management as:

FM may also cover activities other than business services; these are referred to as non-core functions, and vary from one business sector to another. FM is also subject to continuous innovation and development, under pressure to reduce costs and to add value to the core business of public or private sector client organisations.

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