How Improving Data Insights Saves Time

In facilities management, communication is critical. From assigning work to trades, to keeping requesters up to date and providing various reports to different stakeholders in the organisation.

All these communication requirements take up a lot of time, particularly if information must be collected from various sources. Available information needs to be collated and provided in a way that meets the needs of these various parties.

Information accessibility is critical to this process, and improving this can put hours back into your week. It’s about ensuring the right information is available to the right people, in the right format, at the right time.

The right information

Ensuring you have the right information available is much easier said than done. Traditionally, facilities teams operate off spreadsheets, internalised knowledge, and calendar reminders.

However, this approach isn’t scalable, and creates inefficiencies and unecessary risk.

Centralise data

Centralising information is the first step to improving information accessibility. Bringing information about work being performed across facilities into one platform reduces risk and speeds up the delivery of that information to relevant stakeholders.

When information is stored in disparate places, it is extremely difficult to keep track of which information is being updated. One team member might update a record, and save it locally, so when another team member edits it, they are editing an outdated version.

By bringing all data into one place, you can be sure the information you’re accessing is the most up-to-date version.

The right format

When communicating information to stakeholders, make it as quick and easy as possible for them to access the information they need. Effective communication delivers the right information to the right people, with as little room for misinterpretation as possible.  

In some cases, an automated email is the right communication tool.  For example, acknowledging work requests, and keeping requesters up todate on the progress of their request.

In other cases, data visualisation can be a powerful and useful tool.

Visual dashboards deliver information at a glance, and help to ensure that information can be easily understood by relevant stakeholders.

FM team dashboard

Keep your facilities team in the loop by using a dashboard showing current work orders. By ensuring the whole team is aware of what work is happening, and when, the risk of work being missed or double handled is significantly reduced.

This visibility also empowers team members to respond to facility user requests with confidence. Any team member can look up the status of a job, to provide a prompt response to questions.

Assigned work orders

Allow internal and external trades to see work assigned to them at a glance. Providing a visual overview of all assigned jobs helps to stop trades relying on email or memory to plan their day. This in turn, can lead to less work falling behind or being lost and forgotten.

Empower trades to effectively manage their workload and open jobs. Ensure all trades are following the same simple, consistent processes to support better overall workflow management.   

The right time

Timely, relevant information helps to inform better decisions, and generates better results for the business. Centralising data helps to improve the accuracy of data, but to unlock real value, that data must also be timely.

Cloud-hosted data

By keeping data in a cloud-hosted solution, you can ensure when records are updated, they are updated for everyone. This means when information is accessed, it is the most up to date version.

On-the-go information

Hosting in the cloud is the first part of the equation when it comes to data timeliness. Second, is ensuring data is available on any device.

Stakeholders and team members won’t always be sitting at a desk when a decision needs to be made. A solution that is available in the field on a smart phone or tablet offers on-demand information to support faster, better decision-making.