Update your Contract Management
Have you updated your contract management yet? Contract management is moving from legal terms and specifications to an important tool between you and your service provider to ensure success.
DetailsPenalize Your Suppliers!
The search term “penalize your supplier” in a Google search recently led someone to my web site, www.StrategicAdvisor.ca They landed on our performance measurement article, which certainly has those words in the content, but then they quickly went somewhere else – probably because we don’t talk about penalizing suppliers – we focus on managing supplier…
DetailsDay Time Cleaning – Benefits, Problems and Making it Work
Day Time Cleaning is gaining ground for several very good reasons, not the least of which is energy savings, which is helping organizations meet their energy objectives for envrironmental stewardship and sustainability. There are other good reasons to implement day time janitorial service, but there are some important considerations and it takes support at the hightest…
DetailsProcuring FM Services – Are You Asking The Right Questions?
There is a simple mistake many Facility Managers (or their procurement departments) make when writing the Request For Proposal (RFP) questions for FM services. I’ve seen it time and time again, having written my share of proposal responses both for past employers and for some consulting clients, assessed procurement practices, procured FM services and helped FM clients…
DetailsWrite Persuasive Proposals
Whether you are a facility manager, property manager or a supplier, writing RFP’s, writing responses to RFP’s and evaluating them is an important part of the supplier / client relationship. Suppliers can do their clients a favor by writing better proposals that are easier to evaluate, provide the info they need and let them differentiate…
DetailsManage Performance, Don’t Just Measure It at the IMEC Conference
Performance isn’t just about measuring results. You must implement management techniques that use performance measures proactively to drive behaviour and improve results. Start with measurement data and KPI’s, understand their impact on employee and subcontractor behaviour and implement a management approach that influences behaviour and drives results.
DetailsProcuring Facility Management Services isn’t the same as Procuring Paperclips
Procuring Facility Management services is not the same as buying widgets or tendering project work. You will live with the results, and the people who come along with the supplier, for the term of the contract. This means it is just as important to get the right service and the right company as it is…
DetailsKPI’s aren’t the answer to getting Performance in Facilities Services
Having been on the supplier and the client side in the past, I know that Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) themselves don’t result in performance. While some people like the carrot and stick approach, you need a management approach that uses measurements (and other techniques, not just KPI’s) to get performance. Don’t just rely on a…
DetailsSparring Partners : Outsourcing May Not Equal Partnership for Facility Managers or Suppliers
Sparring Partners : Outsourcing May Not Equal Partnership Building Operating Management My latest article was the feature article and appeared on the May 2010 cover. I took a very hard look at what partnership is and isn’t as well as what needs to change in the industry.
DetailsDo you use the Carrot & Stick approach to managing Outsourced or Subcontracted suppliers? Think Again.
There’s a lot of evidence that the typical Key Performance Indicator (KPI) methods of trying to ensure you get performance from an outsourced or subcontracted service provider don’t work the way you think. In this Video (see below), Daniel Pink, author of “Drive : The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us” presents research that tells…
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Sparring Partners – At The Facilities Show, Birmingham, UK
I had the privilege of speaking at The Facilities Show in May. My seminar is based on a cover article I wrote for Building Operations Management Magazine called ‘Sparring Partners’ (email me for a copy of the article) and focused on the 3 ways we fail to develop a strong partnership with our service providers…
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In-House or Outsourced? – The Right Answer
I keep seeing debates about the issue of whether to outsource or manage in-house, whether full-FM or subcontracted service. I’m always amused when someone, usually someone with experience only on one side of the equation, or someone selling services, says that one way is better than the other. This is particularly interesting when the debate…
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5 Techniques to Get Better Responses to your RFP for FM Services
Evaluating RFP proposal responses is a critical yet often painful process. You want enough information to evaluate the bidders, yet you get widely varying responses that don’t always answer your questions and sometimes don’t reflect their true capabilities. This makes it hard to evaluate.
Adopt Best Practices from Facilities Outsourcing Companies.
Facility Management Outsourcing companies have expanded into huge organizations, managing large portfolios of facilities for small and large corporations with local and even international portfolios. There is a reason they are successful in getting the attention and the business from large sophisticated corporations who entrust them to manage their Facility assets. While their success is…
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