DIRECCIÓN DEL FLUJO

A sizeable advantage for BBW is that they secured additional outsourced facilities management contracts in close proximity to the new university site. This is significant for their ability to deliver FM contracts successfully through the use of their National Operations Centre (NOC). All helpdesk calls for the offsite university facility, in addition to their other local FM services contracts, are answered through the NOC. Housed within walking distance of the university’s offsite facility, the NOC provides central work reception support services and a single point of contact for BBW’s local customers (BBW, 2011).

The NOC is managed similar to a call centre, designed with an open office concept where planning and dispatch coordinator’s for BBW’s local customers sit in rows of desks with computers and headphones. One full-time planning and dispatch coordinator is assigned to the university’s offsite facility. They are responsible for coordinating all building issues closely with the building engineer, subcontractors and stay in daily communications with the facility manager and district manager. The NOC is accountable for “planning and organising the full life cycle of all facilities management work orders from the time they are logged to completion, this would involve understanding the work orders and allocating the correct skill set(s) of the engineers or subcontractors and updating the system” (BBW, 2011). The lead times for answering the phone, assigning work order tickets, follow-up and closing tickets are measured against the FM contract service level agreement performance criteria.

The NOC provides BBW with flexibility of using planning and dispatch coordinators and building engineers (and suppliers) from other local client facilities when needed. This is considered multi-skilled staffing; a lean technique that supports BBW’s management of complex FM service contracts with limited budgets. For instance, their handypersons/ porterage staff assigned to the university are multi-skilled employees performing janitorial duties when needed. They do everything from carrying boxes, moving furniture,

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conference/event set up, to cleaning and whatever else is asked of them in any given day. Besides delivering FM services, BBW staff is helping the landlord and university finish the construction snag list. The newly constructed buildings snag list contains construction defects and warranty issues that need to be completed prior to defect/warranty expiration period. This was not in BBW’s original contract, they are providing additional services in order to keep the university customers comfortable, happy and secure in their new space.

One of the main case objective was to determine BBW’s perception of value based outsourced FM services. At first a questionnaire was developed and administered to BBW employees, however it was not being filled out and returned. This became a typical theme throughout the case studies. As a result, the researcher decided to change data collection methods turning the original questionnaire into an unstructured interview conversation, a less formal approach appeared to function better. The administered questionnaire can be found in Appendix A. Scheduling availability to meet with everyone took time, being that facilities management is such a reactive service function, everyone was always busy putting out fires.

The first two questions asked in the unstructured interview were: what does “value” mean to you?, and how do you perceive “value”? BBW’s facility manager who is in charge of the university’s offsite building alleged that:

“For me added value gives the university the time to take care of what they need to do and not having to deal with the pain of FM and fixing a broken light or AC issue – we fix it with a smile on our face. It’s the way we look at everything. We allow the customer, the university to do their job, which is teaching degree courses and we take care of everything else to make that happen”.

Balfour Beatty’s organisations values of integrity, teamwork, excellence and respect trickle down to the way BBW provides FM services, how their employees perceive value, and how customers are treated. It was established that there appears to be a sense of ownership. Or could it be that employees are still enamoured with managing a new high profile media education facility, which is located in close proximity to the BBC. Still, the facility manager assigned to the university has worked for BBW for some time and transferred from another BBW managed facility. Their management and leadership skills

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are based on Balfour Beatty’s lean organisational training, as well as their own experience managing outsourced third party FM services contracts. They seem to be open and transparent in daily operations and interaction well with staff. There is a very positive customer service attitude which could be contributed to this scenario.

The planning and dispatch coordinator considers value in respect to how the different stakeholders and customers view their environment. They feel it is about building relationships between all stakeholders and being respectful that lets BBW engage in their work. This leads to a smoothness and ease of workflow activities that allows all stakeholders and BBW to perform their job meaningfully on a daily basis. On the other hand, the university’s operations director who manages BBW’s contract and is assigned to work at the new facility, considers value more in line with the third party outsourced FM services contract. Value for the university’s operations director is in “terms of financial levels based on the budget, extra value in terms of what you pay for” and the services rendered. They are merely concerned with BBW providing a healthy, clean environment and making sure that university students, teachers, administrators, and visitors to the building are satisfied. For BBW’s one assigned building maintenance engineer, “value is worth what you pay for, services expected, and feeling of accomplishment when services are completed”. There is one common scheme, to make sure no matter what needs to be done, it gets accomplished within the contractual SLA performance metrics. Combined with what customers and occupants of the university facility value such as: “a clean, comfortable, healthy, secure and safe environment” (EE, 2015, p.83).

4.2.1 Offsite Facility Management Service Provider Value Stream

As soon as BBW was awarded the offsite FM services contract they set up employment criteria, hired necessary personal, and value streamed mapped all processes and procedures prior to the facility opening. Value stream mapping of processes and procedures is the second lean principle. Figure 21 illustrates the value stream map of the NOC service desk procedures. Determining service level agreement criteria and performance measurements are linked to visual management through category: visual displays, performance metrics and standards category.

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Figure 21: Belfour Beatty Workplace’s NOC Service Desk Value Stream Map

One full-time planning and dispatch coordinator logs the work orders through completion, and assigns them to the one multi-skilled building engineer. The NOC is in walking distance to the new facility which adds value in the ability to communicate closely with university staff. Having multi-skilled handyperson/porterage staff adds value to BBW’s FM services contract, as well. Furthermore, BBW can pull additional resources from other local facility contracts if needed; such as maintenance, operation personnel, suppliers and contractors. There are fewer BBW employees on site due to the size of the offsite facility, as well as the stringent contract budget.