The pandemic has led to a host of changes across industries and Facilities Management has come a long way in making places safer to live and work. The safety and hygiene standards adopted by facility managers for all residential, commercial and public spaces, has demonstrated expertise in dealing with challenges. For instance, a tech park on average is used by close to a thousand people in a day. To ensure a safe premise for all, the facility managers included AI-driven thermal screening, Contactless visitor management, automatic elevators, UV lightings for washrooms and AHU units, etc. The confidence in recreating a better tomorrow is the core purpose of managing the facility amidst the pandemic.

On this journey, the facility management underwent several transitions and evolved with the growing needs of the corporates. The industry which was majorly managed with manually driven practices adopted digital technology to go paperless and monitor all operations from their computers thereby mitigating the risk of safety and business continuity. This involved reskilling employees and providing them specialised training to deal with the transition. At a time when businesses were still thinking of their strategy to manage employees remotely, the facility managers had already created solutions to blend with the hybrid work culture. Not only did they share their learnings with businesses to help with seamless adoption, but also went a step ahead in creating advisories and support them in creating an efficient working system for their people.

Today, companies are giving utmost importance to the safety and wellbeing of their employees. Standing by their core philosophy, facility managers are helping companies make the working environment safer and smarter for people. These experts are innovating each day to help corporates strengthen their operation and deliver value to their patrons. As part of this innovation, facility managers are also helping the corporates redesign their office to manage crowds with better distance measures, integrate cloud technology to existing systems, enhance current people management software and help them reduce carbon footprints by going sustainable. Amidst the pandemic, many organizations have thoroughly realised that outsourcing FM operations enable them to focus on their core business and also leads to higher reliability in day-to-day operations.

The future of the workplace will be based on fostering Employee productivity and increased retention, which boosts profitability. Facility management will be the key driver for the companies to adopt best global practices and align themselves to the changing times. To address these, in the last year facility management has become core to businesses, and with continued developments, it is creating a cohesive ecosystem for overall health and sustenance, even beyond the physical office space.

by Mr. Pradeep Lala, MD and CEO, Embassy Services Pvt Ltd