Technology is going to change facilities management roles, automation will bring in the robots. Machines will be smarter and faster than people. Facilities managers will need to adapt to this new reality and adopt the technology to remain relevant and in a job. The job will look and feel different and it will (still) be important, but you either fall in line or be side-lined.
McKinsey conducted a study of US jobs that are most adaptable to automation. The research states that although automation will eliminate very few occupations entirely in the next decade, it will affect portions of almost all jobs to a greater or lesser degree, depending on the type of work they entail. In discussing automation, McKinsey refer to whether or not the automation of that activity is technically feasible.
In practice, automation will depend on more than just technical feasibility. Five factors are involved: technical feasibility; costs to automate; the relative scarcity, skills, and cost of workers who might otherwise do the activity; benefits (e.g. superior performance) of automation beyond labour-cost substitution; and regulatory and social-acceptance considerations.
The hardest activities to automate with currently available technologies are those that involve managing and developing people (9% automation potential) or that apply expertise to decision making, planning or creative work (18%).
Technology is not the enemy though. As Lawrence Wintermeyer states: “Technology should not be viewed as something that is going to enslave us, nor will it save us, it is here to enable us .”
Upskilling facilities management
The fourth industrial revolution has ignited a broad conversation about upskilling that naturally extends to facilities management. Technology advances are a change from the status quo and have always created fear in the hearts of human beings who naturally resist change, yet the ability to adapt also makes us successful as a species.
Will robots replace humans in facilities management jobs in the future? It is almost certain that some roles will be delivered through an automated solution in the future; others might change beyond recognition, however that does not mean facilities management will cease to exist. In fact, the more reliant we are on the built environment the more prominent facilities management, as its custodian, will become. The truth however is that machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) will create computers that will be many times smarter and faster at doing many activities than facilities managers will ever be able to upskill to.
Upskilling is required and a clear distinction can be made between two older, well understood, somewhat out of fashion, terms; blue and white collar workers. Both will be using technology more in their future roles. For blue collar workers the main premise as technicians will not change except where the technical aspects are highly tactical and repeatable as per the McKinsey report. White collar workers on the other hand will see a much larger change looming. Today’s manual data and record entry, management, administration and reporting will all be automated and superseded by technology advances. Strategy setting and creative adjustments to a set course of action will most likely become core functions for white collar workers. In principle the anticipated near future skill gaps are in no particular order:
Blue collar:
Will need to be able to interpret data received on a hand-held device from the wireless enabled asset in order to diagnose the problem and subsequently fix it remotely or on site.
Will increasingly be required to use technology and connected systems and tools to receive work orders, report on progress, log service requests or conduct business with head office.
Communication with all relevant stakeholders will more and more rely on the use of technology.
White collar:
Big data, data mining and data lakes require skills to manage, interpret, analyse and administer the tsunami of data is already in motion.
Analytical and data interpretation skills will become more important to make informed decisions, adjust strategies and connect seemingly disconnected data sets for insights.
Data insights allows unprecedented visibility and comprehension of facilities management operations, all of which need to be able to be understood to be of value.
Digital Journey
Data and records will enable facilities managers to make better more informed decisions. New skills will be required to enable the use of data and records to develop and adjust service delivery plans and maintenance schedules. Digital journeys in the facilities management industry will mean moving along the maturity continuum currently articulated as:
- Descriptive – What happened and what actions do we need to take?
- Diagnostic – why did it happen and what can we learn from it?
- Predictive – What might happen and how do we plan for it?
- Prescriptive – What should be done depending on what happens?
- Adaptive – What needs to be changed, automated and re-architected?
Facilities management upskilling is not so much about technology, but more about the ability to articulate value and justify activities. What needs to be done why and when? This will require facilities managers to do some naval gazing and answer a couple of fundamental questions:
- How mature is the facilities management organisation, descriptive, adaptive or somewhere in between?
- What are my facilities management critical success factors, what really needs to be achieved in order to be considered valuable?
- What technology and tools are available to efficiently and effectively deliver on the facilities management critical success factors?
- What data and analysis is required to prove the critical success factors are being met?
- What data is already available and what is missing?
- What technology and tools are best suited for data collection, monitoring and reporting that prove delivery against the critical success factors of the FM organisation?
The maturity model shows that we are moving in to an era of ‘Predictive’, ‘Prescriptive’ and ultimately ‘Adaptive’ maintenance and facilities service delivery. These new ways of working undoubtedly require upskilling, especially since technology continues to advance and buildings become smarter and more capable to ‘run themselves’.
Suffice to say that what is considered new and advanced today will be the ‘business as usual’ of the future. Although this sounds dismissive, it illustrates the perpetual need to upskill. FMs will always need to upskill to be able to be efficient, remain relevant and provide facilities services in the technology enhanced future. A future in which change is the only old faithful constant.