Best practice makes perfect

Best practice is that which fully integrates the business requirement, value, cost and the flexibility that is needed to respond to changes, almost on a daily basis," states Kit Ord, regional manager of consult services, Faithful+Gould.

If assets - human, information, financial and intangible, as well as physical - are operated, sustained, developed and maintained to meet the business objectives day-by-day, that is best practice.

But in a region where developers are under pressure to catch up with so many international standards, best practice is currently on the back burner.

And for the time being, Ord thinks this is the best place for it to stay. "I don't think there is any point trying to build best practice guidelines at the moment because the baseline is so low. The key issue, as I see it here, is one of education and training. I'm not saying that in a college sense."

He explains that if people are to deliver best practice, they need to understand issues about risk and transferring risk. "Once senior management in organisations understand that, then there will be a move towards best practice."

But the critical point in this part of the world is the contractor. It doesn't matter who a company brings into a management team and how much experience they have, if the contractors, the people delivering, haven't got a clue, companies could well be fighting a losing battle. Ord says this is where education and training is needed.

"It is a challenge to influence best practice. What often gets lost in the race is this transfer of knowledge from the people who have come out (expatriates) to the people who are actually delivering it (locally employed staff), so everything backslides to the traditional approach," he adds.

But does a facilities manager manage a facility? "No, they don't. They manage risk. They look at what's facing them today in terms of keeping the business going," claims Ord.

He says that in the Middle East, the traditional way of procuring a service contractor is to buy their time for a number of hours or days and tell them what to do. "But this means all the risk stays with you and all the reward goes to the sub-contractor. It doesn't lift up the best practice threshold," he explains.

With property portfolios in the region far outweighing many on an international level, Ord claims the big players are doing themselves no favours by procuring a very well renowned and experienced facilities manager to come in and look after their FM requirements and portfolio. Why? "Because these people who have been used to running a little basket now come out and find they have a dumper truck full of properties to look after. They get sucked in to the coalface and you loose the strategic overview."

He gives this statement off the back of his thoughts about what developers are concerned about. "So many of the lead players here are primarily interested in development rather than in operation. It's critical for property developers and the big players to ensure that they employ and enable a strategic facilities manager or director to take that long view and look at the needs."

While developers still execute this train of thought, buildings being constructed will inevitably have a shorter life cycle. But when owners find their property looking a bit tawdry sitting besides the new glitzy ones, they will want to give their 10-year-old building a face lift.

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